Is It Gay to Flip Texas?

Podsave America is brought to you by SimplySafe between the midterms and the never-ending news cycle and daily personal to-do's. Your brain has too many tabs open. That's why you need the reliability of SimplySafe to help you close the home security tab in your crowded mind. They've got it covered. I've set up a SimplySafe incredibly easy to do. Definitely gives you that piece of mind. You don't have to worry about it. The app is great. The customer support is great. SimplySafe, you can customize your system to fit your needs, and then it ships right to your door. The app guide is set up a simple. There's no drilling required so you can install an armory system in under an hour. SimplySafe is more than just a security camera. It's a comprehensive system of sensors, indoor and outdoor cameras, and 24/7 professional monitoring. In the event of an emergency, SimplySafe 24/7 professional monitoring agents will dispatch help when you need it. Over 5 million people value and trust SimplySafe with their home security every day. Right now our listeners will get 50% off a new system when you sign up for professional monitoring and your first month is free. Just visit SimplySafe.com/cricket. That's half off at SimplySafe.com/cricket. There is no safe like SimplySafe. America's 250th birthday calls for a history as sprawling and contradictory as the country itself. A history of the United States in 100 objects, produced by BBC Studios, and 99% visible tells this story one object at a time. Told over 100 episodes, Joy and host Roman Mars as he reveals the fascinating story behind a collection of often overlooked objects, each of which sheds light on key moments in American history. From a gold coin found in a shipwreck, the triggered financial panic to a tiny screw that kickstarted an industrial empire, every week one object will open the door into an extraordinary, often shocking story about who we've been, what we've built, and what we've allowed ourselves to forget. New episodes of a history of the United States in 100 objects are released every Tuesday, find it 99% invisible, or ever you get your podcasts. U.S. voters abroad. Have you got your ballot yet? All states are now sending ballots to overseas voters. So if you want to vote this year, you should request your ballot right away. Go to votefromrabraud.org and click Request My ballot, as to receive it by email. Questions? Ask our support team directly. Don't miss this chance to shape the future. Don't delay. Votefromraud.org. Welcome to PlottsaveAmerica. I'm Jack Faber. I'm Dan Pfeiffer. On today's show, we're going to talk about the news that U.S. and Iranian negotiators are on the verge of an agreement to keep negotiating. Also talk about Trump using our money to cover statues in gold and the push to put his face on a new $250 bill. Exciting. Also talk about Republicans losing their minds over James Talleriko, Rubio Topping Vance for the first time in a 2028 poll. Jill Biden admitted that her husband's debate performance was so bad, she thought he was either having a stroke or on drugs. Then could Democrats have a chance at a Senate seat in Mississippi, Democratic nominee Scott Colombe stops by the studio to make his case? Before we start, if you are not a subscriber to Cricket Media right now, what are you doing? You just listen to all these ads on PotsaveAmerica and Potsave the world and offline for nothing. You could be listening to ad-free episodes. You could be supporting independent pro-democracy media, which is kind of important to do right now if you've been looking at the news and seeing what Trump's been doing to the media landscape. Also, we got cool subscriber only shows like Polar Coaster or Dan. Today we're going to be talking about James Talleriko versus Ken Paxton, but if you really want to nerd out on that race and hear all about the polls and Dan's take on this, you get to listen to Polar Coaster this week. All right, Dan. Another day, another siren emoji, heralding a deal to end the war in Iran that appears to be an agreement to keep talking about the nuclear program that ostensibly led to the war in the first place. That's where we are. Axios reports and other outlets have confirmed that pending final approval from Trump and the Ayatollah negotiators have agreed to quote a memorandum of understanding that says the straightforward moves will reopen for quote unrestricted movement by commercial ships in exchange for ending the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports. And then everything else, including sanctions relief and Iran's uranium stockpile, will be the subject of negotiations that will take place over the next 60 days during which time the ceasefire will be extended, despite the tit for tat air strikes between the U.S. and Iran over the last few days. So not off to a great start there. Questions remain will Iran go back to enriching uranium? Will they get pallets of cash? Will they still control the strait? No one knows. But Trump addressed this last question during one of his marathon cabinet meetings on Wednesday. Would you accept a short term deal that allows Iran and Oman to control the strait? Nobody's going to control its international waters and Oman will behave just like everybody else. So we'll have to blow him up. We don't need oil. We don't need the straits. We don't need anything. We don't need anything at all, which is why we're making the deal. And also, we're going to control the strait. No one's going to control the strait if Oman doesn't let ships through. We're going to blow them up. And it all makes sense. Here's what a senior U.S. official told Axios about the deal. And this isn't agreement to get everybody to the table. We will work out the details in negotiations. That's not these negotiations that are leading to the deal that official was referring to. That is the future negotiations that will happen. Trump mouthpiece Scott Jennings responded to the story by dutifully tweeting, "The U.S. appears to be getting everything we want. Is this everything we want? Getting people to the table?" Well, it's an existential question, John. If you want very little and you get very little, did you get everything you want? Just saying. Very good, very good. I mean, it's kind of hard to believe that the thing that there's been so much of breathless reporting on so many siren emojis over the last couple weeks was simply an agreement to keep talking. And I know it says they're going to open the strait of form moves for unrestricted commercial traffic. Now, the problem here is, is there are still mines in unknown places all across the strait of form moves. And which around was laying just this week? They were laying more mines. That's what started the air strikes again. I wouldn't say the strait is open to say the strait is slightly ajar because obviously some ships will get through. There are these ships that are stranded there that the U.S. was pledging to a squirt which we then abandoned that after like one six hour period. So and it is it better that the United States and around and up on each other? Yes. Is it better that maybe a couple ships will get through there? Yes. Is this the Treaty of fucking Versailles? No. It's a very minor, if I even agree with it, as you said, it's an MOU. So cool. Right. Like, of course, it's great to cease hostilities because no one wanted this fucking war in the first place, at least most people in America didn't want it in the rest of the world. But the questions here are simple. Like, is Iran any further from developing a nuclear weapon than when this war started in February? No. We did nothing to push back the Iranian nuclear program that Trump hadn't done with the first round of strikes last year. So nothing has been achieved on that front. Is the regime any less radical? No. In fact, the regime is now more radical. Are the Iranian people any closer to freedom? No. They are not. In fact, they are going to be more repressed by an even more radical regime. Is America any safer? No. Is the Middle East any more stable? No. And so what did all of that cost us, well, 14 American lives, tens of thousands of lives in the Middle East, at least $50 billion in counting of taxpayer dollars that have gone to fight this war, and an estimated $4 billion in higher fuel costs so far. So that's what we had to pay. Those are the costs that we had to bear for getting absent fucking looting, except maybe the straight back open, which it was at the beginning of the war. And it's also not like Iran was on the cusp of a nuclear weapon when we started this process. The whole thing is so stupid. The whole thing is so fucking stupid. It's like, it's mind-boggling, we've been talking about this for so long, but this has happened because it's so stupid. The enriched uranium they are going to negotiate to figure out what to do with is only there because Donald Trump pulled us out of the Iran deal, so Iran went back to enriching uranium. All the uranium that's there has been enriched since the end of the Iran deal, which Trump pulled us out. And now there wouldn't even be more enriched uranium to be talking about if Trump hadn't gotten us out of the Iran deal. The best case scenario here is that we spent billions of millions of dollars. We used all of our missiles, five years to rebuild the munitions. That's the estimate. I'm sure we'll be a boon for a bunch of defense companies in which Jared Kushner and Donald Trump Jr. have invested, the America troops have lost their lives. People all across the region have lost their lives. And for nothing, we're just, the best case scenario is we have a deal that is worse than the one Obama cut 12 years ago or whatever it was. And we are very far from best case. And now like do we think the Iranians really believe that if these negotiations over the next 60 days go poorly, the Trump's going to start bombing them again, like what right before the midterms? No, they know. He might. He might. Yeah. You may be, maybe. But I don't feel like, I don't think this is a great play in terms of keeping any kind of leverage over the Iranians at this point. They know they can close the straight whenever they want, so and lay minds whenever they want. So that's what's happening there. I'm sure the deal could be announced any minute now who knows, we'll just look for more siren emojis from Axios and look for Scott Jennings to just sort of regurgitate whatever the administration tells him to because that's what he does. All right, so the White House press corps was briefed on the potential deal as well as the latest bad economic news by struggling soybean farmer, Scott Besent, the administration's resident populist, Besent had to contend with news that inflation has now risen to a highest level in three years and the GDP grew even slower than previously estimated in the first quarter of this year. Oster Gulzby, the Chicago Federal Reserve President, told the Wall Street Journal that the U.S. economy is moving in a, quote, "stagflationary direction," which would be the worst-case scenario. Scott Besent's response to all of this? Okay, doomers. I believe we've already seen oil prices come down substantially. These are short-term challenges that we will get over, and I think we'll move forward. This inflation's sticky because the PCE was at three-year high. Well, first of all, PCE today month to month was 0.2, which was, we're looking at decimal points, but the estimate was 0.3. Are you seeing signs that American households are dipping into their savings to pay from a higher cost than things like gas and groceries, and does data like that concern you right now? Well, the academic literature would tell you, well, our savings rate can mean one of two things. The, kind of, the doomer view that you took, or that people have more confidence. I'm no economist, but does the literature say when people are dipping into their savings during a global energy crisis that they are confident? They are doing so because they are confident about their finances. They are confident they need to drive their car to work. It's what they're confident. So, you know, we've had a number of auditions since Caroline Leavitt has been on parental leave. We had JD Vance, we had Mark Rubio, and now Scott Besson took a turn at the podium and let me tell you, I don't know. I don't know if he was the kind of soothing voice that the American people were looking for. Yeah, there's just, I just don't know at this moment in time where, you know, somewhere between 2/3 and 3/4 of Americans are very mad about the economy, economic anxiety is at the highest level possible, that you want to dismissively arrogant Wall Street, sent to millionaire, I think he is, to be your spokesperson. You don't want someone who exudes like money coming out of their pores. As Tommy refers to him as a pissy cadaver, it's fair enough, it kind of looks like that. I think the question now is, like, if this deal is signed today, would it actually help get inflation and growth moving in the right direction again before the midterms? It would lower oil prices, which will eventually, at some point in time, lower gas prices because oil, because oil futures will come down, but, you know, we're not going to see anywhere near the sort of traffic going through the straight that we had before for six months of the earliest and probably longer. The true economic damage is done here, right, with the growth that's been stunted, inflation is up, as it will take a while for all of that to come down, the Fed is even thinking about possibly raising interest rates again because of the PCE numbers that Bessent mentioned. Let's just put aside the economics where I feel deeply uncomfortable talking about them to focus on the politics where I am mildly more comfortable is, look, people's opinions about this economy are pretty set in stone. People's opinions about Donald Trump's handling this economy are pretty set in stone. People are going to start voting in a couple of months, and even if things do get a little bit better, which seems highly unlikely, we know from years and years of data that people's impression of the economy lags the reality by months. And so even if things got a little bit better, it's unlikely to help Republicans this fall. The CNN Business Reporter, their business reporter, David Goldman, was asked about when we might see $3 gas again. Guess which year he said for $3 gas again. It's not going to be 2026, is it, John? 2032. Well, I would say I was going to guess 2030 just because by the way, you asked that question. It was going to be far away, but that's even further than I thought. That's what your reaction was similar to CNN's Pam Brown. Who also was like, what did you just say? He's like, yeah, well, by the time he's like, if you just look at the futures, this is what the futures markets say right now. Because it would have to be down to, I think around $70, oil would have to be $70 a gallon and up $70 a barrel, and it's like down to hovering around 100 now. So it's not where it was at, it's like 120, but to get from there to 70, yeah, it takes the straight being fully open for quite a while. And the other thing about the straight is it's not just boats moving through the straight. It's that Gulf country cease production because they could not get oil through the straight. And so they have to restart production and that takes time. And that is on top of the facilities that were damaged from the Iranian missiles as part of the war that Trump started. One area of the economy that's undeniably booming, construction firms that Trump has contracted to make the nation's capital look like one of his failed casinos. The New York Times reports that the NoBid contractor hired to paint the reflecting pool, a tackier blue, is quote, "being paid an inflated and excessive profit margin," you don't say. The Times also reports that the administration has funneled over $60 million worth of national park admissions fees toward repairing the pool and some of DC's fountains. There's also apparently a $5 million contract to coat a bunch of equestrian statues by the Lincoln Memorial in gold. What? This is all ahead of America's 250th birthday celebration, which Trump is merging with his own. The president will ring in the big eight zero with a UFC fight on the South Lawn and they've just started to build the arena, which looks like a Roman Coliseum that's being sponsored by Axe Body Spray. That's what it looks like. It's real, a real eye sore. The White House has also announced a list of musical artists who will allegedly perform for this summer's festivities, like Flo Rida, Vanilla, I see in the music factory, Millie Vanilli and Young MC. I say allegedly because already, Millie Vanilli and Young MC have said they're actually not performing. This just in the Commodores also said absolutely not. They were on the list as well, so that list is dwindling, Dan. Did you follow how the Young MC and Millie Vanilli things played out? Young MC, I think, did not realize what he was signing up for, so he pulled himself out. Millie Vanilli seems to claim, based on a very bizarrely worded statement from the quote unquote real Millie Vanilli, that the Millie Vanilli that was booked was a Millie Vanilli cover band. Now, if you know, if you know, if you know, if you know, if you know, if a cover band of a cover band. Yeah, Millie Vanilli is also a cover band of Millie Vanilli, so it's a rusting, it's Russian nesting dolls of cover bands here. Didn't one of them die? I think we only, I don't know if we have Millie, it's only Millie, Millie or Vanilli dead. Let's see. Okay. I don't know which is which, but one half of the R&B dance duo, Millie Vanilli, Rob Pilatus is dead. The other half of the duo, Fab Morvin is alive. That's what Wikipedia tells me. Okay. Well, either way, either way, Millie Vanilli will not be performing as we commonly know. For many reasons, for many reasons, yes, yes. If he actually could get the original Millie Vanilli perform, that would be impressive. Now, of course, while all this is going on, you know, Trump can't be paying attention to all this, he's, he's, he's focused on what's really important. Let's listen. We have one in particular, a very long lake, we call it, reflecting lake, between Lincoln and Washington. You have the longest, like, 2,400 feet long. That's longer than the tallest milling in the world if you set it on your site. And we're now covering it with the most beautiful blue, very thick, you think of it as a very sophisticated form of rubber, no leaks, no problems. And it's beautiful. It's called American flag blue, that was the color we chose. Fick rubber doesn't leak. That's the blue. That's the blue that we're going for here, just covering the reflecting lake, calling it the reflecting lake now. It's not so much what Trump is looking for in his personal brand of depends, but there you go, there you go. So there's also this story today that Trump is pressuring treasury officials, the people who print the money in treasury, to put his face on a special $250 bill in honor of America's 250th and in honor of Trump, of course. And this may be wonder, like, okay, the corruption, huge political problem, the biggest political problem, I'm sure. Obviously, all of this also looks extremely out of touch while the economy is in the shitter. Do you think people also might feel just a bit uneasy about Trump's messianic rebrand of America here? I mean, it's just like the face is on everything, the name is on everything, there's fucking gold everywhere. It's a little fucking creepy. Okay. So I want to get to that question. But can we dig in on the $250 bill for a second? Yes. Trump was asked about this at the briefing and he pointed out that there is a law that says that you cannot put a living person on money. And that there's a bill before on like the 1800s and it was after George Washington. And our first president refused to put his face on currency while he was alive. And so there's a bill before the House and the Senate right now that would lift that restriction for the purposes of allowing best and to put Trump's face on the money. And my message to, I must speak directly to Mike Johnson, John Thin, and frankly, every congressional Republican immediately, if you do not immediately go to the Capitol right now and vote on that bill to put Donald Trump's face on our money, then you are traitors to the macro costs. You are weak, woke liberals. You have to do this vote for right now. I can think of nothing, no better use of your time. I got a better idea, Dan. Remember, they all went home before the Memorial Day break because they couldn't come to an agreement on the budget bill that was supposed to fund ICE and all the other bullsh*t in there, like the $1.8 billion slush fund for January 6th rioters. Democrats have the ability to offer amendments in a voter-rama process. So if I was Chuck Schumer or a Senate Democrat, I might offer an amendment about this and let's put everyone on the record and see what they think, see what all the Republicans think about the Donald Trump's face on the $250 bill. I like that too. That's a great idea. You have really aged into a legislative strategist late in life, so let's get to the meat of your questions. Yeah. Basically, do I think voters are creeped out and maybe a little scared by Trump basically cosplaying Kim Jong-un, Vladimir Putin, pick your 10-pot dictator? Look, I think the biggest political problem here is that Trump is focused on dumb self-serving shit instead of lowering people's costs, like that is the fundamental thing. If you add a side of pretty blatant corruption to it, that's pretty bad. I think people see the Trump putting his name on everything, his face on everything, and I think maybe last year they would have seen that as scary. I think this year they think it's stupid, because the Trump of 2026 is another Trump 2025. 2025, he was single-handedly destroying federal agencies, setting mass agents everywhere. He was astride the world. He was bizarrely popular, and now he is a deeply unpopular, dottering old man who can't stay awake in meetings, he is losing wars to Iran. He just looks weak. He seems different. He just seems smaller now. And you see that in the polling where majority of people and large majority of independents no longer describe him as strong. They see him as weak and indecisive. And I think so. I think should people be creeped out by it? Absolutely. I think the approach is probably not fear. It's derision. I was going to say, I don't, I probably, I probably articulated it wrong. I don't think it's fear like, oh no, scary dictator kind of thing. When I say to uneasy, I feel like people look at it, and first of all, I think part of this is me when the ballroom thing first happened, not thinking that the ballroom was going to be a big deal. And then realizing that the imagery of the East Wing being demolished was more powerful to people than I had imagined, and not just from a corruption angle, because at that point it was just, we're going to knock down the East Wing and I'm going to build a ballroom. And it wasn't just like, oh he's not focused because we didn't have the war then, right? But it was still like, what are you doing? I think that people have not, there's going to be a lot of focus and a lot of attention on Washington DC over the next couple of months because it's America's 250th anniversary birthday, and there's going to be a lot of activities in DC. And so those images are going to be broadcast and everywhere, and just like people tuning in to what's happening in DC with like Trump's face on the Justice Department and his name on everything and the gold everywhere, I kind of just think it's a small thing, but I think it's just sort of adds to the like, what the fuck is happening right now? Like it doesn't make you feel, it doesn't make you feel good about America. At a time where people, most people will want to feel somewhat patriotic or happy about America's 250th birthday, making it all about Donald Trump, I do think like cuts to the core of what, like it bothers people in like a, fuck, this is not our country, what is this kind of way? Yeah, I think that's right. I think it's also just people are going to see it and be like, why is this such a high priority? Yeah, like, yeah, what, yeah. And it all combines, I think, it's like, what do you, what do you do it? Lots of America's brought to you by policy genius this summer, you might be looking forward to taking a break from the never ending news horrors and spending time with your family, which means you don't want to spend your summer wasting time on personal admin if you don't have to. Policy genius lets you check life insurance off your to-do list in minutes and get back to your summer knowing your family is protected. Policy genius is an online insurance marketplace that allows you to compare quotes from some of America's top insurers side by side for free. Their license team helps you get what you need fast so you can get on with your life easily fine, which you need coverage amounts, prices, terms, no guesswork, just clarity. Policy genius helps you find the most affordable policy that meets your needs. They'll also answer questions, handle paperwork, and advocate for you throughout the process. With policy genius, you can see if you can find 20 year life insurance policies starting at just $276 a year for $1 million in coverage, head to policygenius.com/cricot to compare life insurance quotes from top companies and see how much you could save. That's policygenius.com/cricot. Policy of America is brought to you by Zeebiotic's pre alcohol. Let's face it after a night with drinks. I don't bounce back the next day like I used to. I have to make a choice. I can either have a great night or a next day. That is until I found pre alcohol. Zeebiotic's pre alcohol probiotic drink is the world's first genetically engineered probiotic. It was invented by PhD scientists to tackle rough mornings after drinking. Here's how it works when you drink. Alcohol gets converted into a toxic byproduct in the gut. It's a buildup of this byproduct, not dehydration. That's to blame for rough next days after drinking. Pre alcohol produces an enzyme to break this byproduct down. Just remember to make pre alcohol your first drink of the night, drink responsibly, and you'll feel your best tomorrow. I love Zeebiotics. I went to Vegas recently, had one before I had a bunch of drinks and lost a lot of money. That's not Zeebiotic's fault. That's my fault. That's my fault because I love the action. I love the action. I'm going to have a bunch of Zeebiotics when I get married before because I'm going to turn one on, I think. From the crack of the bat at the stadium to the start of wedding season, hey, May is packed with back-to-back reasons to be out. Don't let a rough morning after I keep you on the sidelines, drink pre alcohol, but stay ahead of it. Make the most of every Saturday this month. Go to Zeebiotics.com/cricut to learn more and get 15% off your first order. When you use Cricut, ad check out Zeebiotics is backed with a 100% money-back guarantee. So if you're not satisfied for any reason, they'll refund your money. No questions asked. Remember to head to Zeebiotics.com/cricut and use the code Cricut, ad check out for 15% off. There's just a bit more corruption to discuss before we move on. This is sort of your standard issue corruption. According to ProPublica, a Trump advisor and family friend, Peter Navarro. Remember Peter Navarro? Did all the tariffs that everyone's enjoying so much? And Jail time. He did Jail time. Jail time, man, tariffs. Yeah. So it turns out he pulled some strings last year to funnel a $620 million Pentagon loan to a North Carolina startup owned in part by Donald Trump Jr. What do you think is an early wedding present? We talk all the time about the crypto schemes and the Katari Jets and all the other very extravagant and extraordinary corruption. But there really is just a staggering amount of, as you said, mundane corruption, just funneling contracts to your friends so that they can make money off tax, off the tax payers. And Trump is probably, although not definitely going to pardon his sons before he leaves. Maybe Peter Navarro will cross the threshold of people who will get pardoned because he did serve time for Trump for a while, and he already has a pardon, I believe, or at least a commutation. But the people who actually facilitated this, people who work in the Pentagon, people who work for Peter Navarro, they're not getting any pardons. And they're probably going to see the inside of the jail cell because of it. And that is happening across the board. And like there are a lot of people who think who are serving their Magal Lords, they're doing what they're told, and they are going, Trump's going to pardon his close friends and his closest AIDS. And the rest of those people are going to be under tremendous legal jeopardy because of what they're doing. It realize it's easy to become numb to all the stories about corruption and all the numbers. But what happened here is, this is a pretty clear cut one. They set up this office in the Pentagon called the Office of Strategic Capital. And this was set up in the Biden administration and the idea was the government wants to give out some loans to companies, startup companies that are involved in developing rare earth minerals because we don't want to depend on China for that. We want to depend on the U.S. and so this is good. It's good for the government to sort of help these startups that are doing this. It was a, they had $1 billion lending authority under Biden. Donald Trump comes in and they increase it from $1 billion to $200 billion. So now it's $200 billion, but the government is handing out to these companies. And in the Biden administration, there's a process. You bid for this. If you're one of these companies, you apply. There's a rigorous process. They decide to take you or not. They reject some companies. They just, obviously, we want to give loans to the best possible companies because it's taxpayer dollars that we are giving to these companies. So we want to make sure they're the best ones. Except one company, Vulcan, skirted that entire process and in fact didn't even apply. The White House, Peter Navarro, calls the Defense Department and it was like, you got to give the money to Vulcan. You just got to give the money to Vulcan. And that is the company, the small company in North Carolina that Don Jr. had just invested then just a second. a couple months before this and once it got the money, once it got the huge contract, the valuation of the company went from 200 million to $2 billion, a 900% increase. That is how much money Don fucking Jr. made because his really good friend, Peter Navarro, the two of them are very tight, called up the fucking Pentagon and said, make this happen for Don Jr.'s company. - There's so much like this, there is, you know, just for the other day that Trump had a big investment, it made investment in Dell right before a big announcement where Dell was gonna get a government contract, same thing with Robinhood, just, it's across the board, just everyone is robbing the treasury with two hands at all times. - I was gonna say, it's not just like, they're using their office or they're abusing their office and just the fact that they have the office to make money. No, no, no, they're like stealing from you. They are putting their hands in the taxpayer pockets and stealing 'cause this is just taxpayer money that's been handing out and with no accountability or oversight whatsoever, is this company gonna succeed? Is it a good company? We don't know Don Jr.'s own some of it. That's all we need to know, money out the door. - There's only a year ago that the government told us that we can out of four to keep rural hospitals open. - Right, yeah, we can give a favorable contract with a huge profit margin of the people who put the weird, rubbery paint on the pool. We can give contracts to Don Jr.'s company. We can incase Washington DC based horse statues in gold. - Where's Elon? Where are the doge bros? Where's the all-in pod bros with all the fucking, come on guys. - Probably investors in the Donald Trump and the Donald Trump Jr. company. - Lots of waste in fraud right here. You guys are saying it's all kinds of waste in the government. You've been pretty quiet about this. Fucking losers. All right. The moment from Trump's cabinet meeting that actually got the most airtime wasn't the Iran stuff or the thick rubbery coating. It was this. - I don't care about the midterms. Look what happened last night. That was the prelude to the midterms. - Yeah, man, we noticed. We noticed you don't care about the midterms. It's coming through, coming through loud and clear. He was referring, of course, to the Texas Senate runoff where Ken Paxton, the deeply corrupt beneficiary of a last minute Trump endorsement, absolutely crushed incumbent Senator John Cornon by almost 30 points. When Trump said look what happened last night, what do you think he thinks to say that demonstrated about the midterms? - He's a simple-minded fellow, John. And I think he very simple-mindedly looked and saw that a candidate he supported won a race. And then he then presumes that candidates that he support will win similar races in the fall. Now, what Trump is to simple-minded to understand is that among the people who voted in that primary in Texas, I imagine Trump had a 85 to 95% approval rating. These are Texas primary voters. When people go to the polls in the fall, Trump will have somewhere between eight, I don't know, 42 and 32% approval rating, depending on the district in the state, switching to like a slightly different environment for his candidates. Also, I think, I just want to stipulate this. Ken Paxton was winning this primary whether Donald Trump and Dorsen were not. He may have won by more, but there were reports in private that private polling had Paxton up 10 points before Trump's endorsement. And we knew from the runoff that even though Cornyn got the plurality of votes, there was a strong majority when you added up Wesley Hunt and Ken Paxton votes just there was a strong majority of Texas who did not want John Cornyn. And when incumbents go to runoffs, they almost always lose because the reason they're in a runoff is there was 50% of people who looked at that incumbent they knew and said, "Give me someone else." - Yeah, I was gonna say, also the turnout was so much lower. Did you see some of the estimates on turnout? Like, it looks like between the first race and the runoff, Paxton got about 7,000 more votes in the runoff and Cornyn lost about 400,000 votes between the first race and the runoff. So it seems like a ton of Cornyn's voters just stayed home and decided not to vote. And then the most engaged, craziest mega voters turned out for Ken Paxton. - Yeah, which was always sort of the fear. And it's not like this was the only race on the ballot. You also, you had congressional runoffs and you had a very important attorney general runoff as well. - So I guess we could talk, let's talk about how they're going after James Tallerico, who's now the Democratic nominee in that race. And then we can sort of talk about the race ahead from now until November. It does seem like MagaWorld is a bit more nervous about Tallerico than they're letting on as evidenced by their subtle new strategy of questioning James Tallerico's masculinity. It's very subtle, I don't know if you can figure it out. Paxton uses victory speech to call Tallerico, low T Tallerico, tofu Tallerico, and six gender Jimmy. Steven Miller tweeted that Tallerico will make history as the first transgender Senate candidate. And here's the gang from Foxes the five on Wednesday. - This baby lotion soft, a child, a does he looks pre-pubescent. - The major factor in this race, Greg, is whether Tallerico's vegan. - You say you have a girlfriend. - Why don't you name her? - Are they gonna have a coming out party? Or is she still gonna stay the secret girlfriend? And is this totally not fake girlfriend? Also a vegan. - He looks like such a beta male. He was beta O'Rourke was his big brother in the afterschool program. - They'll say, they'll say, but he's a seminarian, how dare you, Nive? Are you put this seemin' in seminarian? (laughing) - What do you think they're trying to tell us? - They dislike his policy agenda. - I get it, I get the line of attack. And there is a universe where you can execute that line of attack, maybe in a way that's somewhat effective. Feels like if you're already calling him a gay pedophile in May, not a lot of runway left. Where are you going in, where are you gonna be in October? - I am curious about what is driving this attack. Like, is it in the data? Or are they just echoing the thing that Trump said on Air Force One two weeks ago? - I think some of it is like instinct, right? Like, they have, okay, the clips of James Telerico that have been, you know, all over the internet and right wing media are something, something vegan. He's not a vegan, which clearly these people just actually don't know that he's not a vegan. And they think now he says he eats meat because he's like gut caught or something. But he was never saying he was a vegan. That was not a clip. The clip of him saying that, you know, technically there's six sexes 'cause of chromosome abnormalities with a small fraction of people, which like great. And like a couple of other clips like that. And he looks young, right? And so they're like, yeah, he looks like their go-to is he's a beta male, but they can't just say that because there is an element of that. That's exactly what they say. Well, they can't just say that and like leave it at that because there's an element of, oh shit, we just nominated Ken Paxson and we could lose. So we've got to take everything to 100. Yeah. So I think a couple of things here. One, obviously there's strategy. The only way to win is to nuke Telerico. This is a way they're saying strategy with grand planters, we've seen strategy with whoever wins. And Michigan, particularly if it's Abdul Al-Sahid, like this is their approach. And it's really, it's the only thing they have, right? They basically, this is the weak, woken, two liberal attack that we talked about a few weeks ago. There are actually two separate things embedded in what they're doing here. There is James Telerico is a low T possibly gay beta male. There's not man enough for the Senate, which is really quite a thing to say. And then there is James Telerico is a liberal, leadist extremist who's out of touch with Texas values. That is the God is non-binary. That is the false attack he's a vegan. Those are two separate things. Obviously the second one pulls well. Like, we don't even, we know that that's, that we know that that is an average actor. I'm not sure the, he's a beta male is a particularly effective attack. I don't, I don't know that they're, I guess I would say I don't know that they're entirely separate because the, the out of touch, the typical out of touch liberal who is a male is obviously a low T beta male. Like, we are, we are also low T beta males because we are libs on the coast. And we're probably vegan. And we probably have pronouns in our bio, you know? That's a pretty deep, it's a very online take. It's a very online take. The other one is a, it's a deeply dishonest because it takes a lot of, quotes out of context and edits them some of them quite unfairly. But I think that there is, I'm just not in presidential politics, strength and toughness matters a lot, right? How you define strength and toughness is very important. You can define it in ways that are much better than sort of like brute force strength that, you know, Trump sort of has tried to swagger his way into the Oval Office. It matters much less in congressional incentives, right? You're not, no one sees you as being tasked with staring down the Iranians or taking out al-Qaeda or stopping crime in the streets or whatever else people associate probably incorrectly with toughness. And so I think that Trump has sort of sent them on this path and it is red meat for the fox base. And so it's one thing of like Jesse Waters and the Yahoo's on the Five do it. It was interesting to me that it was such a big part of Paxton's victory speech. I just, I just like took note of that. - Well, I mean, he is a politician who if not successful, will end up being appointed on Fox pretty easily. So the line is his speech. was interesting because he did, like he, very Trump-esque in that he was very excited and enjoying doing the Tallerico attacks and responded to the crowd and then he was reading with no emotion, lines about lower people's costs. No, not where his passion lies. His passion lies, of course, in theft, he likes stealing from people. Yeah, theft. Sometimes quite literally, he stole someone's pen, so like a thousand dollar pen, some of them lying around. There's like video of him just stealing it, which is. They're very friends and neighbors, that's what that's all about. So Tallerico's out there responding to the beta male line of attack. Here he is at a rally on Wednesday in Houston, his first stop on statewide tour and his first appearance since Paxton won the runoff. In a time when there's so much debate about what it means to be a man, my dad showed me. Every Saturday morning he would mow our lawn. And then without telling anyone, without anyone asking him, he would go next door and mow our neighbor's lawn. She was elderly, she was a widow. He never talked about it. He just did it because that's what a man does. He serves those around him. He takes responsibility and he does what's right even when no one is watching. So in addition to that, he also did a sit-down with CVS with Edo Keefe and he said that some of his past remarks were cringey and that he would say them differently as well. He's been. There's been plenty of photos that the campaign's been pushing around of him eating barbecue because he's said he's eating barbecue forever. So it's all of a piece, but if you were consulting on the campaign, how would you advise him to push back on this and I think more importantly, how much time and energy would you be spending on it if you were on the campaign? Before we do that, I just do want to stipulate that team celebrate, we're going to say very very real chance of winning this race. Yeah, well, we should talk about that for sure. Yeah, because I get why everyone is skeptical of Texas. We have been burned so many times, but this is our best chance in the generation to win State White Office in Texas. We have not won a Senate race in Texas as 19 to the 8th. We've not won the State White Office of Consequence in this century. And obviously, the closest that a Democrat has come was better or worse, losing by 2.6 percent to Ted Cruz in 2018, but this is a different world. 2018 was a good environment for Democrats. 2026 is a great environment for Democrats, as we sit here today at least. This is a hard thing for me to say, but Ted Cruz is much more likeable and. Ted Cruz has higher, much higher, much more likeable and more popular than Ken Paxton. This blew me away. In September of 2018, Ted Cruz had a, had a favoritability rating that was 9 points above water. Yes, Ken Paxton, depending on your poll, is 5, 7, 10 points below water, and will never be above water. That is just, he will never see the surface. But the most important thing here is that there is a demographic pincer movement happening in Texas in this moment. So in 2016, Hillary Clinton did better in Texas than almost any other state. The state where she actually had the largest improvement of a Barack Obama in 2012, it's one of the very few states, and maybe the only state where she did better than Obama in 2012. And the reason that happened is she blew the doors off of Latino voters. And Trump won by a decent margin because white voters of all stripes, college educated and working class voted for him and mess. What has changed since 2016 is those college educated white voters, of which there are a ton in Texas, particularly in the cities and suburbs around those big cities, have moved dramatically in democratic direction. And then, starting in 2020, Latino voters moved towards Trump. And Trump won Latino voters by 10 points in Texas, querying the exit polls. What has changed since then is that those college educated white voters have stayed exactly where they were before, and maybe even more fired up now than they were back in 2024. And Latino voters have moved dramatically away from Trump. Trump's appropriating among Latinos nationally is minus 50. In the generic, you need those, that's in the New York Times poll. In the unit, you need those US poll of battleground districts around the country. They looked at the battleground districts, this is a poll of Latinos, battleground districts in the Southwest, which is mostly without entirely Texas. Americans are winning the generic ballot by 38 points. And so if James Hillaryko, if he can get Kamala Harris, Joe Biden style numbers with college educated white voters, and something like Hillary Clinton's 2016 Latino numbers, he wins that race and he wins it by a couple points. Yeah. I saw that Nate Cohen said something similar, and then also said that even if you take the latest Times poll, the national poll, and you match the different, and you match the shifts with the different demographic groups in Texas. If you like make it, then you, then it would tilt blue Texas. Yeah. Even before you knew the candidates. Right. He has to navigate what we all talked about to get there, but this, like, this is not the previous discussion of Texas. It's not like a lot of other red states where we talk about, we're like, we got this popular candidate. Maybe they can persuade a bunch of these voters and maybe we'll get there, but there's another path. You can, the math tells you that this state is in play if Telerico can achieve what it should be achievable democratic numbers. So that's that. Okay. Now, I was going to say, yeah, now, that's a good setup for what I think the challenge the Telerico faces is, I've been thinking about sort of Grand Platter in Maine, and this, you know, I think there's been no bigger gap between what voters on the ground think of a candidate and what the internet conversation about that candidate is than, than Platner. And I, the reason I feel more confident about Platner is pretty much because the size of Maine. And I think that, like, Grand Platter may meet most of the voters he needs to meet in Maine. And obviously, James Hillary goes, not going to do that in Texas because no one can do that in Texas because it's a big fucking state. And so he does need to make some decisions on, like, how to puncture the internet caricature of him that a lot of voters are going to come in contact with. And also through, through television ads and other ads from the Paxton campaign, from the Republicans, and figure out, you know, like where to spend his time, what to say, what his ad strategy is, and your thoughts on all that. Yeah. So my thoughts are, I guess the way to think about this is the strategy they're running as Telerico is the strategy they're running as Kamala Harris in 2024. The goals to define him before he can divide himself. Like, Telerico very well known among Democrats and very political engage people to the extent that other people even know who he is, it's they kind of vaguely have this sense that he is like a Democrat who talks about his faith a lot, maybe as much as they know, and you know, the general vibes of these not a typical Democrat. And so that's a vacuum that the right is trying to fill before Telerico and fill himself. So what are the mistakes that Kamala Harris made that led her to be defined? The first is when the attacks came like the infamous they then add you she never took them all took them head on like we can debate the ad strategy around it. We know all the discussion from all the people who work there about which ad says it would good in which ads tested bad, but as thinking siloing that conversation and ads is stupid, she wasn't like she was out talking to voters to try to disabuse them of that notion like she didn't never took that attack on. So you're going to take these tack on. I find both even though I'm less concerned about the masculinity attack, then perhaps you or others may be the fact that he took it on the first day shows the right instincts. The fact that he sat down for the interview with Ed O'Keefe to take tough questions about the things he said shows the right things you have to take them on. Because if you don't, then voters are just going to assume that they're true because people are naturally cynical. And the second thing is you cannot allow there to be a vacuum. You have to be everywhere all the time, all at once. You have to be omnipresent in the media on social media. You have to be like, you know, it's always the worst comparison. You have to be like Mombani, like there should be no interview turned down. No podcast. You should turn down. You should visit every county in Texas or whatever is logistically feasible. I remember it took better like two years to do that. So maybe that's impossible. But do be everywhere so that people see you because when people see James Celebrico, they like him. He is like, he has real appeal with this segment of coordinate people who would who would have voted for John Cornyn over a Democrat, but we'll might vote for a Democrat over Ken Paxson. There is now, you cannot waste one minute every single day, every single day has to be out there communicating. And I think he ran his primary campaign like that. He's run his sort of career like that. So I think that that's what they're going to do. But like if you think you're being aggressive, you're probably not being, you should be more aggressive than that. And keep going. I have seen a lot of right wing folks who are quite religious online, make the argument that James, the idea that James Celebrico's faith and a pension to talk openly about his faith and being a seminarian is the idea that that's going to help him is like liberals idea of what a person of a person of faith is. And like liberals have no idea because the fact that he is using passages from the Bible to sort of talk about his progressive values is like blasphemy to someone the right. And I think that they have that wrong because like I don't think that James Celebrico's view of of his faith and the way he talks about his faith is going to win over evangelical Christians that are going to vote for Ken Paxson and voted for Donald Trump three times anyway. I don't think that's the point. In fact, I don't even think it's, oh, this guy preaches and his Christian faith is what's gonna do it for me. I think the fact that he speaks from, he speaks in the language of morality is refreshing to people who don't necessarily vote all the time or sometimes switch between the parties. It's all like the people in the middle that when you hear someone and especially a Democrat talking about how their faith has moved them and how it sort of animates their values and their decisions about politics. Like, I don't think, at the very least, I don't think it hurts, I think it perches people away. But I think for some people, they're like, okay, well, this guy has a moral grounding and even people who aren't religious necessarily or don't share his Christian faith, maybe like, okay, this guy believes in what he's saying. It gives him an authenticity that, again, when you meet him, you realize that that's what it is. He really genuinely believes this and it animates him and it drives him. And I think that that is worth a lot in politics today. - These things these right wing people are saying are so fucking stupid because if a literal meaning of the scripture was why these people voted the way they vote, these evangelical Christians voted the way they voted, they wouldn't have voted for Donald Trump. What I'm gonna take an even hackier view than you, like I agree with you obviously, the way he talks about, from this, he talks about things that I, from a moral framework is refreshing. The fact that he talks about his faith is a massive, it's authentic to him, which is incredibly important, but it's also a massive signifier that he is a, is different than your typical Democrat. And if he wants to win in Texas, he has to be different than a typical Democrat. That's why it's important. It is not because he's going to get into a theological debate with a three time Trump voting evangelical minister and persuade them to his side. It's that he can communicate with people. He can relate to people whose faith is important to him or their faith community is important to them 'cause that is a touch down to begin a larger conversation about where Texas goes, where the country goes. Like it is a way in with a group of voters. It is not the fact that his faith is not delivering votes among other people of faith. It's just one way in which he can connect to people. - I also think there's a way in which Teliriko has already started framing the race and he did this in a video right after Ken Paxton won where he is trying to make this about him and everyone else as outsiders trying to upend a corrupt establishment. And it's about the system, right? And so he attacks Ken Paxton as corrupt and he calls him the most corrupt politician in America, but he said he's part of a corrupt system that James Teliriko wants to change because it is the written, you know, this is also upset the same, says the same thing. This is the reason that you can't afford anything because these people are stealing your money. And making it about voters and about why Ken Paxton would be bad for voters because they are feeling like they can't afford anything and he's gonna make it worse because he's a thief just like Donald Trump. I think it's a very potent message. I have a greater worry that if it's about, you know, beta male, low-teet Teliriko versus, you know, criminal adulterer Ken Paxton and it's like a character versus character race, that's not one that he's gonna have as much of a chance to win as if he makes it about, you know, outside versus, you know, outsiders versus the system change versus the status quo. He's just gonna make it bigger than about him and Paxton. And I do think that, and it's not just for Teliriko, but it's for all Democrats because Paxton gives you so many, is a target rich environment because he gives you so much to talk about because he has such a bad record and he's corrupt and stuff like that. It is very easy to turn this into a race about what a bad person Ken Paxton is and I think it would be a mistake to just talk about Ken Paxton as a bad person. You've got to talk about how Ken Paxton has fucked over the people of Texas when he was attorney general and how he would continue to do so in the Senate. Like that is where the, that is where you win it, I think. (upbeat music) - Potsy of America is brought to you by Blinds.com. There's a version of your home you haven't lived in yet where the light behaves where the rooms feel finished where you sleep until you decide to wake up. Oh man, isn't it nice to sleep to you? It decide to wake up. You wake up and you're like, did I just do that? Is this another life? Blinds.com is spent 30 years being it easy to find the perfect fit with over 25 million windows covered in 50,000 five-star reviews. You can feel confident that you're in good hands. You can go full DIY. You can bring in a licensed vetted pro to handle the measurement install or you can land somewhere in between you're in control need help picking the right style. You can build a consultation. It's free with one of Blinds.com's award winning design experts believe in ship samples to your door fast and free choose from a huge variety of style options at prices that fit any budget. Everything is backed by the Blinds.com 100% satisfaction guarantee because at Blinds.com the only thing they treat better than windows it's you love Blinds.com. We have Blinds.com in our office. We've been, you know, we had no shades in our office for a long time and we like our office. It's nice gets a lot of light but sometimes we get hot. Sometimes there'd be a lot of sun that would be in our eyes when we're at our computers reading about the news. And then Blinds.com came in. We stepped out of our office for like an hour come back. Boom, incredible blinds, incredible blinds. Right now blinds.com is giving our listeners an exclusive $50 off when you spend $500 or more. Just use code crooked to check out limited time off rules and restrictions apply. C blinds.com for details. Policy of America is brought to you by Zipper Cruder. One of the big things we love about our team here at Cricket is the wide range of skills and disciplines that coalesce around our shared values and community that work we do every day. That's one of the things we love the most. I was a Peter and I talk about nerdy stuff all the time. We have a great team here at Cricket and you want people that have the skills and experience but you also want people that care about what they do and are passionate about the job. You can't get that often from a resume unless you post your job on Zipper Cruder's Iipper Cruder's Powerful Matching Technology finds quality candidates quickly. And Zipper Cruder has a new feature that shows you the most interested qualified candidates first. So you can meet the right people faster. Candidates can tell you in their own words why they're interested in your job. No wonder Zipper Cruder is the number one rated hiring site based on G2. We've used Iipper Cruder higher here at Cricket. It's always been a great help. That hiring is one of the hardest things you have to do. It's so important. The whole thing depends on finding the right people. And with Zipper Cruder, it makes it easier. Find candidates who really want your job on Zipper Cruder. Four out of five employers who post on Zipper Cruder to get a quality candidate within the first day. Try it for free at zippercruder.com/cricket. That's zippercruder.com/cricket. Meet your match on Zipper Cruder. (upbeat music) - All right, a couple last things to cover. Thursday was Marco Rubio's birthday. And his best present came from Emerson, which has a new 2028 poll out showing he's effectively erased JD Vance's lead as a top contender for the 2028 Republican nomination. In August, he was at 9% and Vance was at 52%. In this latest poll, Rubio's at 35 and Vance is at 36. One poll, Emerson poll, obviously, grain of salt. Does seem like there's some Marco Mentum here. Our friend Sarah Longwell, he's in the focus groups too. A couple different places. What's going on here? - I think Marco Rubio's greatest asset right now is that he's not JD Vance. I think that's it. I don't think he has done anything in particular that people love. It's not like he's just been crushing the job of the State Department. It's not like his stewardship of the Iran War is making people happy. It's not like the people are deeply dialed into his role as the overseer of the Viceroy of Venezuela. I just think he is a Republican who might seem slightly more competent and normal than your average Trump cabinet member and is not as awkward and off-putting as JD Vance. - You see that fun daily mail story. It has source to say that Vance is considering abandoning his 2028 bid and he feels more isolated than ever. Now that Tulsi Gabbard's leaving and it even got his team to respond, so he's saying that it was all made up and everything, of course, but. - I'm sure he and Tulsi were just plotting in the back on how to fail to stop Trump to do bad things. - I choose to believe that story might be real. I think that would be fun. - He has been very subdued lately. - He's offline. Never he quit Twitter for went. - Yes, and then after line he just kept it off his phone. He says he gets more done now. Good for him. - Just like offline listener JD Vance. - I was gonna say if he wants to come on offline, we can talk about it. You see that Gretchen Whitmer ruled out running for president in 2028. She may have like partially walked it back. - It's just weird. - She sounded it in the actual clip. She was pretty clear and she was not running. This is not surprise me. She has really done none of the things that the people who are obviously running for president are doing. She's not out trying to get a lot of national attention. She's not making herself a foil against Trump. She's not going to all these cattle call events like Al Sharpton's National Action Network and some of these other big events. She hadn't, I've not heard of her like meeting with donors, hiring staff, you know, talking to people. Like the people who are running, they're calling other people and they're making sure they know they might be running and trying to persuade those people. We hear from some of them, but so it's not surprising. One thing that I think is, I did occur to me when I read this is with Gretchen Whitmer does not run. They're really only two other women who were thinking of running and that's Kamala Harris and AOC. - Oh yeah. - I was going to say, and neither of them, I think are, I think most people will say the odds are against both of them running, so you can, with the point being, if you can end up with an all male feel, but should be kind of gross in 2028. - Yeah. - I think though for Gretchen Whitmer, it's like, Good for you. Like that is the, if you, no one should ever feel pushed into running for president because you are mentioned as someone who could be president. Like she is someone on paper who seems like absolutely she could run for president. She clearly like doesn't feel the fire in the belly, like doesn't wanna go through, like, and it's like good. That's the better decision to make than to be like, all right, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna put the, everyone through it. We're gonna go through the whole paces. Like, it's a very big decision. It's a life changing decision. And, I mean, also you're gonna think about the party and the makeup of the field. And like, if she doesn't wanna do it, then like good for her for bowing out early. All right, finally, speaking of deciding, not to run for president, I wanna just quickly take you back to June 27th, 2024. The night of Joe Biden's debate with Donald Trump. We were there, not at the debate, but you remember, you remember that we were together. We were together, Austin. You might remember that right afterward, Joe and Jill Biden dropped by a watch party to thank supporters, and here's what Jill Biden said then. - Joe, you did such a great job. You answered every question, you knew all the best. (crowd cheering) - Never gets old. Now, Dr. Biden's out with a memoir, which she promoted in an interview with CBS Sunday morning this weekend. And here's how she recounted actually feeling watching the debate. - I don't know what happened. I mean, as I watched it, I thought, oh my god, he's having a stroke. And it scared me to death. - That's the time of my life. I don't really wanna go back to. I mean, I will say, I maintain a deep well of anger at the Biden's people around Joe Biden, who help keep him in the race to be around Joe Biden, who attacked everyone as basically traders with the cause who thought Joe Biden should run for president there before or after that debate. Like, that still makes me very mad. I have come to the point this many years later that I just have to decide that I can no longer give a shit about the, who knew what when, like obviously she was lying, then she's probably lying now. - In fact, quite a few Biden advisors told Alex Thompson that they do believe she's lying because they pointed out, if she thought he was having a stroke, why did she take him to an after party and then go to the waffle house? - She did after that. - I mean, yeah, obviously lots of questions here. Here's my thing, right? I just, I have made a personal decision that I'm just going to try not to yet. That was basically a summer of pure unadulterated rage, the whole time what was happening. - I can remember my life pressure at the time. - Yes, I'm trying not to revisit that period in my life. I, so as I sit here today, I care less about what Jill Biden has to say about what happened that moment. I care less about what Mike Donnellan or all the other people who covered up for Biden have to say about what happened at that moment. What I care about is what happens going forward and what bothers me the most is not the timeline of events of 2024, but whether democratic leaders now will ever reckon with the massive breach of trust that came because of how all of that was handled. They telling voters that what they saw with their eyes before the debate was that they shouldn't believe that and then telling voters what they saw at the debate they shouldn't believe. And that lack of trust hurts us with our own voters, hurts us with the other voters. And we have to be thinking about way at all times about how to rebuild that trust. Like we should optimize strategic decision-making at the highest levels as party for how do we rebuild trust not just with our voters but with all voters. And that is, I think, as I try to find a way not just to throw my phone against the wall every time we see stuff like that, that's where I'm trying to direct my positive energy. - That was just remarkably disciplined and adult of you. And you know, now I'm gonna (laughs) Austin's boot. - Didn't you already do a YouTube about this? - I was gonna say, and I'm gonna take that path as well because if you wanna hear me flip out about it and Tommy, we have it on YouTube from this morning when it was fresh. But I really completely understood. - Was that today you did that today? - It was today, yeah, it's been a lot of fun today. - I know, but I agree with you. And that's the only reason I care about it now too. Because I, and I read that, I think I said it to you too, that tweet from Zade Jalani, who said like, you like I think people are underestimating how much the lack of trust people have in the Democratic Party is due to what happened around them. And I do think that, like, you know, you can ask, do you think Biden and what happened with Biden is going to be an issue in 2028 and narrowly know, but I think that the people are going to remember that the Democratic Party, when I say Democratic Party, I mean, the people in the White House, the campaign, plenty of Democratic pundits, plenty of people online who are still fighting that fight, lied to people. And didn't even lie to people in a way that was like, lied to people in a pretty obvious, obviously false, transparent way. And so that's like, it's worse than a lie. It's treating people like they're fucking idiots, which is basically what they did. They told the whole country. - That's the bigger thing. - They told the whole country, like, you know what? You know who the problem is. It's these fucking DC establishment bedwaters who think that Joe Biden did bad in the debate. Those, they're the problem. All, we're with all you people. And, you know, we believe that everything was great. We think you believe that too. And they think people are going to believe that? Like, come on. - Yeah, there was a level of delusion and deception that was bigger than, or like dismissive. I think dismissive is the right way to put it. - Yes. - It was bigger than just the Biden's age stuff. It was inflation. - Yep. - It was-- - Gaza. - Gaza. And the combination of all of those things have put the Democratic Party in a bad place with its own voters, not to mention everyone else. And we have to be thinking about how it fits in that. That's one of the reasons why I got so mad about the DSEC and Chuck Schumer coming in and putting their hand in these races. And in some cases, now putting their thumb on the scale, but not saying they're putting their thumb on the scale by funneling money through apex superpacks or these other superpacks in these other states. Like that-- - I thought you were going to say, well, I got so mad at the Ken Martin thing, too, 'cause that was the same idea. - Yes, that's exactly right, that's the tip, too. And that's allowed me to experience many of the same people 'cause I wrote that message box in two and a half seconds after the autopsy came out, Clevver, Ken Martin, and Rosiah. I really put myself at the front of the line for the people on the offline to come out to say, like, where's the autopsy of your work in 2024? - But pushing more good men out of jobs. And this is in the context of going forward. I just want the people running in 2028, the people who are gonna be talking about the 2028 race, like, when the Biden stuff comes up, when the DNC stuff comes up, whatever. Like, people were willing to say, totally fucked up. I was wrong, bad move. Oh, you know, wish I was more honest, wish I was more transparent, like, great. That's fine. But you gotta say that. People like, yeah, where's the autopsy of your work? We're fine to say when we fucked up. This whole company was started because of a fuck up. (laughing) Because we were so confident that Hillary Clinton was gonna win, we were fucking wrong. I wish that we had gone harder Joe Biden earlier than the debate. Said that before too, you know? Like, it's okay. You can say that you were wrong. It's fine. You don't have to issue a, you don't have to issue carefully worded statements that evade the question because you know what? People aren't gonna trust you. So anyway, good luck on the book tour, Jill. All right, when we come back from the break, you'll hear my conversation with Mississippi Senate candidate, Scott Cologne. (upbeat music) - Podsave America is brought to you by BUILT. Whether you're renting or paying a mortgage, one of your biggest monthly expenses should be working harder for you. That's where BUILT comes in. BUILT is the membership that rewards you with points on every housing payment wherever you live. BUILT started out rewarding members on their rent as of 2026 BUILT members can also earn points on mortgage payments too. Every housing payment earns you points that you can use with top travel partners like United and Hyatt or use your points toward LyftRides, Amazon.com purchases and so much more. Personally, I'd redeem my points for fitness classes, for Amazon, for LyftRides. But here's the most underrated part. BUILT members also get access to neighborhood concierge. It can make reservations at restaurants, book fitness classes and find new local spots all being rewarded at more than 45,000 merchant partners. It's like having a personal assistant baked into where you live. It's simple. Being a renter and now owning a home is better with BUILT. Join the membership for where you live at joinbilt.com/curgid. That's J-O-I-N-B-I-L-T dot com slash Curgid. Make sure to use our URL so they know what we sent you. US voters abroad. Go to votefromrabraud.org and click "Request My Ballot" as to receive it by email. Questions? Don't delay. Votefromabroad.org. Longplay, our docu-series exploring the people and forces shaping the South is back. Newsflash, the South is the new political epicenter of the country. Democrats are way on their heels in this region, but Republicans are going through their own reckoning in the South too. We're in the final stretch of the midterms, and the political map has only got more competitive with new states and districts emerging as potential flips. So we thought it was time to get back out on the road and take a closer look at what's actually happening on the ground. I'm Erin Haines, journalist and expert on all things Southern politics and I'm Jennifer Paul Mary, former White House communications director. Tune in on Mondays to long-play series on YouTube or wherever you get your podcast. Scott Cologne, welcome to Paz de America. Thank you so much for having me. You are a a district attorney in Mississippi. Your seventh generation. Yeah, yeah. Your mom is the first black woman elected to her region's chancery court. Your dad worked for Ronald Reagan before becoming a Democrat. When a Mississippi voter asks why a guy with your resume is running for Senate as a Democrat in 2026, what do you tell them? I tell them that we've got to have a senator that's fights for Mississippi. Somebody understands that the tariffs have been terrible for the farmers for the small businesses that it's been terrible for the people going to the grocery store and that are struggling and I'm not going to DC to be the Democrat senator. I'm not. We're not a state that can afford that, right? You know Mississippi's got three million people. California's got close to 50 million. You guys got two senators. We got two senators. We have to use that to bring resources and jobs and opportunities to Mississippi and our current junior senator, she's betrayed that. She's totally betrayed that. The people of Mississippi know it and that's why they're going to go in a new direction. This November. You are running in a state that Trump just won in 2024 by 23 points. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of people will hear Mississippi Senate race and maybe laugh. Yeah. Make the case to the skeptic. What do you see on the ground? Yeah. That suggests you could become the first Democrat, really the first Senate candidate to win a state with the incumbent president just won by 23 points. So you know, I get this question asked me a lot as you can imagine and I used to answer it like I was David Axel ride. I would say, well hold on guys, you know, in non-presidential years, you know, we get much closer, right? Like our last Democratic candidate for governor, God within three points of winning, you know, last year we broke the supermajority in the state Senate. But what I realized I need to explain to people why I can win, right? And the reality is when I ran for district attorney in 2015, I ran against a 30 year incumbent. I was in a district that people had thought I had no chance on winning. But what I realized is that under the right circumstances, with the right opponent and the right candidate, you can win a tough race in Mississippi. And those, those three things are totally at play now, right? I mean, I was with some, I got invited to on the golf course, some Mississippians who previously voted Republicans. Notice I didn't call them Republicans. Mississippians who previously voted Republican. They reached out to my campaign and they said, listen, we love what you're doing on social media. They I was on a podcast and they were like, we love what you say on the podcast. You're talking about Mississippi values. We want you to come meet with us. They said, maybe two or three people will see how it goes. When I got there was 20 people. Former, former Republican voters. And they talked to me about how in this particular moment, they feel like they're getting betrayed by the Trump administration with 1.7 billion dollars for people that assaulted cops, that the presidents, cronies get to control. And then you look at our junior senator, right? I call us sending high prices because all we got is high prices from. So, you know, you look at her and she's a part of the corruption. I mean, she's gotten campaign contributions from fertilizer companies that are under investigation for price fixing. Wow. The whole saying fertilizer companies are really hurting our farmers. The tariffs hurt them. Now we got fertilizer costs because the war not ran up price fixing. She's taking money from them. She is, you know, I mean, one of the Republican former, her Mississippi Republicans told me, he said, listen, when I heard about her going to Las Vegas, $10,000, campaign contributions to stay at luxury hotel to eat a luxury restaurants, that reminds me of the corruption we're seeing in DC. And, you know, we got it, we got to go in a new direction and just tell us what you're running on. And I'm running on making everybody's life in Mississippi better. You know, it's, it's how you do that. I mean, you got to talk about the issues. And the other thing that I think is important, and this is for everybody listening. It's a mistake I think people are making. We're making it too much about the candidates. We're looking for celebrities to do the profile. Oh my God, they're great speakers. Me, you know, I think I got a lot of charisma. I think I'm charming. I think I'm gonna give a good speech. I think you charming so far. But I'll tell you this, going out there campaigning, listening to voters, the no one I ask voters all the time. What matters to you? The no one answer? Someone who does what they said they're gonna do. It's not about us. It's about them. We have to make sure voters can trust us again. And that has to be not just running 30 second commercials. We can't advertise our way out this problem. We got to go back and touch voters. We got to get, we got to gain their trust. And we get power again. We have to deliver. We have to make sure people understand that their vote matter. That we make their life better. And so that's a big part of my strategy is I really get out there. I can't pay anybody following me, John. I don't know anything in the campaign that can't pay who wanted me. I mean, it's three events every day on Saturday. And I love voters. I love voters. And I listen to them. You know, I don't just do town halls. I do town halls. But at some point, you're just talking to people that, you know, for a motivator vote, right? I go to the festivals. I go to the housing projects. I'm gonna do a food truck where I pull up at the union. Halls go to the plants. We got to go to the voters and we got to gain their trust. So the former calm staffer in me believes you are totally right that you should not give the answer. Like David Axler would give the answer. That's what we would tell. Yeah. But don't be a pundit. But now I am a pundit. Yeah. So Mike SB loses by 7.8 in 2018. Yeah. And I remember on that race, consultants on the SB campaign being like, Hey, Mississippi, it's gonna happen. Talk to SB. It's it could. And then hoodlost the governor's race by five run five in 2019. And then Brandon Presley, you mentioned, like lost by only 3.2 right in 2023. So it's a narrowing margin. Absolutely. Still a margin. Yeah. Like what's the theory of the case that you're the one who can actually close it as opposed to being like the next data point where and then and then Scott got even closer. Yeah. I mean, some of this the environment, right? I mean, you look at 2018, the economy was pretty good at Mississippi. You look at the economy. Now, the tariffs have been terrible. Nobody talks about how the tariffs have hurt Mississippi. You know, I was talking to a woman, a dollar general manager, right? And I was shooting a little commercial in there and I didn't ask her permission first. So, you know, you try to, you know, you're like, what are you doing with this camera? Let me do a 15 seconds real quick. Get out of here. A director camera real quick. And she noticed me and she said, what are you doing? I said, well, listen, I'm a Senate candidate. I'm running against a Senate House. If she had no idea who that was. And I was like, well, listen, don't worry about her. I'm the guy. And so I started talking to him. I said, listen, how the customers doing? And she said, you know, they're struggling. I'm seeing them every month trying to figure out can they pay for diapers? Can they pay for groceries? And prices keep going up. And she was like, I don't know what it is. I don't know what I can do. I feel helpless. So I asked I said, what do you be thinking about the tariffs? It was almost like a bull with off. She was like, yeah, you know what? It is the tariffs. It is a term. You're right. They're bad. And the people that you talk to connect that to the guy they voted for about 23 points. Do they say like tariff bad, Trump tariff, like do they put it all together? You know, I think tariff is a bad word. You know, I don't know that they always do. I mean, there's a lot of voters that say they know it's bad because it became a popular term here recently. But we need to change the name of it. It really is a working class tax. It's not a tariff. It's a working class tax. It's a sales tax. I mean, and it's unfair to working people. It's a terrible way to collect revenue because if you make, you know, 15,000 a month or you make 2,000 a month, you're paying the same tax. Yeah. And so, you know, we're connecting the dots form. But I'll tell you who's really feeling it and they understand it. All the farmers. You know, I mean, I could tell you story after story about how farmers are struggling in Mississippi and now the fertilizer cost. And the problem is, you know, you're talking about the corruption and how she's allowing the corruption, how she's part-taken in it. But then you have to add that what she's totally absent in the state. I mean, she had done a town hall in six years. She does not campaign. I mean, she, her only strategy is scare tactics. 30-second commercial to scare the voters. She, uh, yeah, a recent Democratic internal poll had her, I think, at 55% unfavorable. Yeah. Uh, it's like 12 points underwater from Trump right around state. Why do you think she's so much weaker than the brand? Yeah. You got a senior senator in that state. I'm sure Roger Wicker that's more popular than her. Like, what is the specific hide Smith problem as opposed to generic Republican? Man, you have to think about it this way. You know, when I was, uh, this is a great way to really bring the story home. When I was a child, my dad was a Republican, uh, before he supported Obama in '08. Uh, he actually was, uh, a Republican for Obama, a Obama swish them. But, uh, anyways, uh, when I would go to, like, Jackson State football games, at halftime, you would see Thad Cochran on halftime with a $50,000 check going to Jackson State. That's a hard guy to beat. You know what I'm saying? It's hard to get motivated by the guys bringing $50,000. Yeah. You know, and we actually have a tradition in Mississippi of having a senator that understands this position, has to bring resources back to Mississippi. You know, Trent Lott, I don't agree with him on a lot of things, but he did a lot to bring jobs back. I mean, it was majority leader at one point. The majority leader was from Mississippi. So with her, a big problem is that people, even Republicans are like, excuse me, voters who used to vote Republicans. They are like, she is totally MIA. We can't find anywhere. She doesn't do anything. You know, I don't think we've ever had a senator that's this absent. And, um, she thinks that All she has to do is It was being 100% mad and she can win. But the reality is, I've been out there talking to voters and they want somebody that's 100% Mississippi because they understand the stakes. It's not like things are going well. If you ask, I mean, you can ask the most loyal Trump support right now, our thing is going well. They ain't saying yes. - Right, you know, they ain't saying yes. - So if you become Senator, you'd be the junior Senator for Mississippi, seniority in the Senate, you'd rank towards the bottom, like all new senators do. So like, what do you, you're making the case that she's not bringing home resources to Mississippi. How do you make the case to voters that like if you go to the Senate, you'll be able, even though you're one of a hundred and sort of, you know, a junior Senator help bring home resources to Mississippi. - Yeah, I mean, one I'm gonna use my vote in my voice to really, to really represent Mississippi. I'm not going there. Like I keep saying this. I'm not going there to be a celebrity. I'm going there to deliver for Mississippi. And so that gives me leverage because I'm not, you know, if a Republican offers something that makes sense for Mississippi, I'll support it. If a Democrat offers something that makes sense for Mississippi, I'll support it. Now, of course you're right. You know, as a junior Senator, you got to be smart. And what I'm going to do is I'm going to find issues that Republicans already support, right? Like economic development is a big thing in Mississippi. How do we bring in industries to develop capital to get our state moving in the right direction? I mean, we're not like L.A. where you can't build it, I mean, you know, every, you know, it's really-- - And we spend it wisely. (laughing) - Well, you know, all the job control now. (laughing) But, you know, but for Mississippi, we need capital. We need economic development. We've got to be even Republicans, you know, leaders know that. And so that's an area where I can be impactful that's really bipartisan. And the other areas, we got to find, like for me, I got to find smaller problems that I can help solve. Like I had a good friend of mine who mentioned to me that dental care is really bad at Mississippi. It's at the bottom. And so, like that's a problem that I can help solve as a center for Mississippi. That's not a partisan thing. So if trying to find solutions to practical problems that makes people's life better, it's the other thing that I'm going to do, and I've learned this from campaign so much is, you know, we can't stop campaigning. Right? I mean, I know what you're wearing, you got to govern, but you also better steal campaign. Because a place like Mississippi, if they feel like you go to DC and you're just making money or, you know, just a celebrity, it's not going to work. So for me, we got to have strong anti-corruption legislation that makes clear that we're not in there making money. You know, that's why I support a ban on stock trading. That's why we can't have people become lobbyists right after they become senators. We got to get the corruption and the perception of it. Because that helps the people that are openly corrupt. Yeah, right? Because they can say that people are like, well, you know, they're corrupt, but so is everybody's corrupt. We got to show them we're not corrupt. We're public service, we're not there to make money. And it's beneficial to me that, like you said, my mom was a chancellor for a judge. And I learned my ethics and values from my parents. And so I was, you know, I'm really trying to honor their legacy. That's why, you know, it's important to me to be transparent and be somebody that people can trust. Because I want to honor my parents. I also want to honor the ancestors that sacrificed so much. For me to even have this opportunity to talk to you. You, I was just thinking, like the last Democratic Senator from the state that voted by double digits. This many double, like in the 20s for Trump, is that was Joe Manchin. Yeah. And his model was like, cut deals, pissed off your party constantly. And then, you know, vote with the president when it suited the state. Is that your model too? Well, I think said a match it, try to get a little bit more attention than I'll try to get, you know? I mean, he does love it, you know what I mean? So, for me, I'm more going to be trying to use my leverage and voice to cut deals that make sense and benefit Mississippi, but not try to be just somebody making constantly complaining about things. If I'm sure you'll hear this from voters, if they're like, okay, you say you're not going to be a typical Democratic Senator, you're going to be a Mississippi Senator. Yeah. I don't like the Democrats. I don't like what they've done. Where do you think the Democrats have gone wrong? Where do you break from the party? Where would you be different than a typical Democrat? Yeah, but we've got to talk about economic issues. That's the first thing. I mean, because of people, like, I knew this, 'cause I had a friend of mine that was a barber. Unfortunately, he passed away, shout out to Jasper Pittman. He was a great political head. And so, in 2020, when President Biden won, there was a lot of enthusiasm, there was high turnout. And 2021, 2022, he was a Democrat. He started getting sour on the party because of inflation. And then, what he felt like was, man, we're talking about Senator's money to Ukraine. We're talking about foreign stuff, like, man, my life's not gotten better. Prices are up, like, we got to talk about me. We got to talk about the voters. And, you know, I was able to convince him that it made sense that we made sure Russia is over here. And Putin didn't take over Ukraine. But I was a trusted messenger. And there's too many people that didn't have trusted messenger to help them understand that Democrat party did care about the fact that inflation was out of control. That we did care about the fact that the border scene, like it was out of control. And, you know, a lot of people feel like that hurts workers. That hurts workers. And so, we got to talk about economic issues. The other thing is that we have to, like, I feel like the last couple of years, we've been trying to figure out, you know, the answer to Trump is, no, President Trump wants to make everything about himself. He loves that all the attention is on him. And we've been either making every campaign about him, or trying to find somebody that can be as much of a celebrity as him, somebody who can convince these voters. I think we got to go back and we got to make our campaigns about the voters who can't. We had to have candidates that not can only go on a podcast and make a case, but they actually should be able to be comfortable taking 75 selfies, right? Going to a festival where nobody knows them. - You got to like people. And that's great for me because I love people. And my opponent, she can't stand Mississippi. I mean, she does not campaign at all. So the challenge for Democrats, as always, is like, okay, we want to talk about economic issues. We want to talk about making people's lives better. And the Republicans don't let you because they make all the attacks about their favorite, right? Which issues? Hyde Smith's campaign manager called you, the transgender defender said you were a hand-picked by Schumer, bank role by Sora, soft on crime. All the radical sex changes for children. I just unloaded the clip, all the favorites. Walk me through how you answer that. Like, not for our audience who knows it's garbage, like for a voter in Mississippi that will hear those ads. - Right. - 15 times between now and November. - So I knew that she was going to do that. I knew exactly all those attacks. - Like one play, yeah. - Yeah, I mean, and so if you look at my campaign announcement and I tried to preempt it, right? So for example, I know in Mississippi, the way to counter a lot of that stuff is to show people that your life is like theirs, right? So my announcement and standing around my family. I've got two daughters. I coached their soccer team. Listen, I mean, come on. I mean, thank people who are going to fall for that. Like my dream, this is what I tell my daughters. I say, listen, you know, there's not many ways you can disappoint me. But if neither one of you become a basketball player, I am going to be disappointed. I mean, the joy of one of my youngest ones is starting to work because I say, you know, when you get older, if you ever complain, I'm going to always remind you, I want it one thing and you didn't deliver for me. So, I mean, and the other thing is, we got to leave what I values. You know, for me, you know, and I do soulful Sundays where I talk to church faith leaders. And I center them and talk about, you know, there's a lot of, for whatever reason, we've allowed people like Sydney High, Smith to trick voters in the thinking that we, Democrats don't believe in faith, Democrats don't believe in family. Like, I have much more in common than to the average Mississippi family than she does. You know, my wife, she makes me drop the kids off at school sometime. She, Sydney High, Smith is never doing that, right? I go to the soccer game, watching my kids play. She's not doing that. I, my wife, who made me go grow up with him and keep stuff with him, my wife makes me do it. As a good partner. (laughing) It's a good partner, my wife is trying me well. As a good partner, sometimes I have the grocery shop too. And so, I made the grocery store talking to people, listening, you know, my wife is like there. So, I'm going to cut through that mess by showing them how my life is like there. Showing them my family and centering the voters. Because, you know, every, every Monday, I drop a video called Mississippi Matters Monday. And I'm having voters kind of man on the street style asking people to say what matters to them. All the stuff she's attacking me on, no voter has ever said that what matters to them. It's not on their mind, it's not. So, her, you know, for me, if I can raise enough money to counter her lives with the truth and tell the truth about her, we're going to win. I'm telling you, we're going to win. The win is at my back. - So, what's the message to a donor in California or New York deciding between writing a check to your race and to say North Carolina, Maine, Ohio, even Texas? - Yeah, yeah. - That's probably higher on the DSCC list. - Yeah, but whoever's making those lists, I mean, what's the results? - Right, so. (laughing) Maybe we need to redo the list a little bit because Mississippi is a cheaper state to compete in. We're a cheaper state to compete in. But, you know, we have Christian as you and I agree, we have Christian as pie say Mississippi day. - Yeah, this is it. - 28 from now on. - Now, oh, we're going to talk about Mississippi. And the reality is, you can't save American, unless you say Mississippi. I mean, we have to matter. When the country has done well, everybody's paying attention to what's going on in Mississippi. We focus on the voters in Mississippi, making sure that they have quality education, quality of health care. We don't let these people that want to take our country back, control everything. And when we got, you know, when we done poorly, is we ignore Mississippi. And there's plenty of examples of it. Mississippi being ignored and we've seen the results of that. And to get ourselves out of this mess, what we have to remember is rural America matters. We have to have candidates that understand rural America, that are not afraid to talk to former Republican voters. And people that are not scared to talk to folks that don't even know who their senator is. - Yeah. - You know, man, I'm gonna win. People are gonna be, other people outside of Mississippi gonna be surprised. I'm not gonna be surprised. It's been trending that way as you pointed out. It's been trending that way. But also, we're running a different type of campaign. We're centering the voters, not me. You know, if you look at my videos, I have other people talking. I mean, can I tell you a quick story? - Yeah. - I had a waitress at a restaurant. You know, it was kinda like he was star-struck in a moment, right? He's like, oh is that Scott Claw? I go, oh my God. I said, listen, I'm not, I'm not celebrity guys. What's going on? Tell me, tell me what's on your mind. Let me tell me what matters to you. He said, first I love that you do that. And I've been waiting to give you my answer if I ever saw you. He said, what matters to me is like the drug prices are up because I'm on Medicaid and I had to get worse insurance. Now I'm paying more to get less. I'm struggling. But he told me, listen, I never voted before. I never voted before. I'm gonna vote for you because you're centred voters. He didn't say centred voters, right? He said, I love that. You have regular people on your videos. You have the barber, you know, you have two kids, just, you know, looking at the camera saying, you know, this is why voting matters. I mean, you know, for me, I can feel the momentum and the movement because I am out there listening. And you can do this in Mississippi. You can't do this in every state, but you can do this in Mississippi. And I'm excited and, you know, Mississippi matters. We're gonna show the country, Mississippi matters. - Well, it is not an easy thing to do to run for office. Certainly not an easy thing to do in a state like Mississippi when you're a Democrat. And you are, I really appreciate that you're doing it and doing it so joyfully. - Yeah. - So good luck out there. - I appreciate it. - Thanks for coming on Podsave America on Podsave Mississippi Day. - Absolutely. Hey, you know, if you want to be a part of the movement, go to ScottColombe.com. We're building some special Mississippi. I'll come back May 28th next year. We'll be talking about, you know, how I keep my promises. - We're gonna use the senator. - Yeah, we'll be, how I keep my commitments, how we're delivering, because the good thing about you is you understand. This is not a, I mean, run-off office is hard, but run-off office and being a leader is also hard. - Yes, it is. - We can't stop. - That's right. Thanks for keeping going. So thank you so much for having me. - Thanks Scott. - I appreciate it. (upbeat music) - That's our show for today. Thanks to Scott Colombe for coming by. I'll be back on Sunday with a conversation with our pal Ben Rhodes. He's got a new book about speeches, American speeches, and American identity. And so we'll be geeking out about speech writing and talking about America's 250th. So check it out. - Bye everyone. - Podsave America is a crooked media production. Our show is produced by Austin Fisher, Saul Ruben, McKenna Roberts, and Ferris Safari with Reed Charlene, Elijah Cohn, and Adrian Hill. Our team includes Matt DeGroat, Ben Hefcoat, Jordan Cantor, Charlotte Landis, Carol Pelavib, David Toll's, Mia Kelman, Ryan Young, and Naomi Single. Our staff is probably unionized with the writer's Guild of America East. (upbeat music) - But long play, our docu-series exploring the people and forces shaping the South is back. News flash, the South is the new political epicenter of the country. We're in the final stretch of the midterms and the political map has only gotten more competitive with new states and districts emerging as potential flips. - I'm Erin Haines, journalist and expert on all things Southern politics. And I'm Jennifer Paul Mary, former White House communications director. - Tune in on Mondays to long play series on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.