Political Experts Break Down the FINAL Ads of the Midterms

Hey, Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. Now, I don't know if you've heard, but Mint's premium wireless is $15 a month. But I'd like to offer one other perk. We have no stores. That means no small talk. Crazy weather we're having. No, it's not. It's just weather. It is an introvert's dream. Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. Upfront payment of $45 for three-month plan, $15 per month equivalent required. New customer offer first three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See mintmobile.com. It kind of makes you perk up. If you haven't been paying close attention, you're like, Jesse Waters likes him? It showed what a complete asshole he is. It lit a match. Welcome to Political Actors React, where we break down political ads in media, experiment with the people behind them we're trying to accomplish, and decide whether or not they did a good job. I'm Dan Pfeiffer, former communications director for Barack Obama and co-host of Pod Save America. And joining me today is my old friend, Jen Psaki, the host of the briefing with Jen Psaki on MSNOW. Jen Psaki, welcome back to Political Actors React. As a listener, I'm very delighted to be talking to you. And I am just nervous about the election and excited in every emotion at one time. Yes, we were recording this on the Friday before the election. So we have a few days left. Everyone is very nervous. Everyone's freaking about the polls, not because they're bad, but because they're too good. Everyone's worried about good polls. Yes. They're too good. They're too good. Add five points to everyone. Yes, I saw someone whose name I can't remember on Twitter tweet that Democrats are using a very advanced model. It's called PTSD, where they're taking five points away from every poll. Yes, that was my version. Like add five points for the Republicans to every poll. Well, in the past that has happened, but this is not Polar Coaster. This is Political Actors React. That's right. I know. But I see your face. I think. Yes, I know. Which is, yes, exactly. I give people the haunting sense of foreboding incorrect polls. Yes, they see me and they think undersampling white working class voters. All right. We're going to start with two ads. One from Abdullah Syed and one from Keith. Aisha Lance Bottoms, who is running for governor in Georgia. This they are thematically similar and you will shortly see why we're doing them together. My name is Abdul. I'll say you might have heard a bit about the D.C. elite spent millions trying to blame me for things other people said. But we agree on a lot. Washington is a corrupt swamp. The big corporations and elites run the show there and it raises our costs. Release the Epstein files. And yeah, free speech is under attack and we should make America healthy again. Stop wasting. Our tax dollars on overseas wars and bad trade deals don't want to take my word for it. How about some folks, you know, a little bit better. You got to respect Abdul because he beat the machine. He's very charismatic campaign now. It's America first. And Abdul Al-Sayed, who, by the way, was captain of his high school football team. Mike Rogers wants to pick a fight with him about it. He's a good looking guy. I think he's better. He's a great speaker. I wouldn't vote for Mike Rogers at gunpoint. Democrats spent a skyrocketing sixty five million dollars to defeat him. He shows the muscles. And this guy is a force that Mike Rogers is going to have to deal with. I approve this message because for me, it's Michigan first and we can agree on that. An ad on Fox News for me. They won't say it, but they don't think you'll vote for someone like me. I think they don't know Georgia. I think you won't vote for snake oil salesman who got rich using corruption and tax loopholes while our hospitals close and drug costs rose. Now he's buying our governor's mansion. I'll cut your taxes. Stop data centers, fund our schools and hospitals and lower costs for families like mine and yours. All right. Both these ads are very clearly targeted at Fox News viewers. The second one ran on Fox News. The other one is making the rounds on sort of right wing media to try to reach people. What do you and I should stipulate that I originally picked these ads to talk with you about a few days ago and then this morning the Abdullah Sayed ad became quite controversial because there is a push from several people, including Haley Stevens, who think that this ad is that the use of Tucker Carlson is offensive to black voters. And some people have called for him to pull the ad down. It's been up for weeks at least. I think Bill, before we get into that political controversy, what do you what do you think of this approach? Are these the right voters for Democrats to be going after in the final days here? I'm not 100 percent positive. I mean, look, look in Michigan and I think the issue for some time has been whether Abdullah Sayed could and he has, to his credit, done a lot to reach out to the black community, to black voters and also Jewish voters, which is a very small percentage, of course, of the voters in Michigan. In recent polls as of this week, it seems like he has about 95 percent of Democrats with him. So maybe they knew that and they made the calculation like we still need to win over independent and obviously a lot of white voters in Michigan who or more modern or more conservative voters in Michigan who may be seeing or who I'm sure who I've seen, I should say, the massive Islamophobic campaign being run by Mike Rogers. So it it may be, but I guess I guess I'm still a little skeptical that he has won over as much as many of the Democrats as maybe he needs to. But I think the strategy is clear. Keisha Lynn's bottom's interesting because she's. Obviously running behind John Ossoff in Georgia, and she has more work to do with winning over independent voters and Republican voters, too. I mean, they both do. I guess I'm a little more skeptical in Michigan because of of kind of what the challenges have been. One of the challenges, which has been winning over black voters, the other challenge is running against like an Islam, the most Islamophobic campaign in the country. But what do you think? So let's start with Keisha Lynn's bottom. I think that's easier and yeah, which is. Yeah, she's running behind Ossoff because Ossoff is doing better with Republicans and Republican leading independents with Trump voters, and she's looking for those voters. And she's she doesn't say it exactly, but she basically it's so it's so it's so unimplicit that's basically explicit, basically saying people are saying you won't vote for a black woman. But she's saying they don't know Georgia saying she's saying like Georgia is less racist than people in the national media or the punditry. Think it is. And then she goes after her opponent, Rick Jackson, on a host of things that theoretically appeal to those voters. Sometimes you got to get caught trying. Yeah. And there have been a calculation, which is we always sometimes treat these ads as in a vacuum, as if there aren't a whole bunch of other ads and campaign. Sure. She's doing a whole bunch of things to ensure she has the sky high black turnout she needs to win. Yeah. But then there's this other set of voters and we're going to get caught trying by doing this high profile kind of viral way to say, oh, look, she's reaching out to me. Like, is that going to be enough? I don't know. But I think it's worth trying to win in Georgia to win the governorship in Georgia as a black woman is quite challenging. Rick Jackson is a bad candidate, but he's a self funder and he spent he's outspent her by an ungodly amount. And so you've got to kind of like attention hijack and go viral. And this is a good way to do that. The thing that also they share the two of those ads is also like, don't be scared of me. Right. They're trying to scare you because I'm a black woman. You know, and also in Michigan. Like, you've heard that I am like, you know, I don't even know. The Muslim Brotherhood endorsed by Hamas. Yes. Exactly. Wearing a Bin Laden jersey. The worst thing she possibly did. Yeah. Anyway, continue. Now, the Abdul thing is a little more complicated. Yeah. I think the like there there is a belief. I think Abdul has it. I think Abdul's campaign has it. It's been present in sort of the like a strain of strategists on the left about the horseshoe effect. That if you can run a populist America first campaign, you can get these right wing voters to be for you. Some of how Abdul has campaigned. He has spent a lot of time for a Democrat in the upper peninsula of Michigan, which is a traditionally Republican conservative rural area. Now, he did very well with those in those parts of the state during the primary. But that can also be a false signal because they're still Democrats or at least or at least democratically an independence enough to vote in a Democratic primary. And like you were right that the the. Easiest path to winning the Senate seat in Michigan, a state that has not elected a Republican senator for almost 30 years now is to win, win independence and then max out black voters in Wayne County, primarily Wayne County, Flint, et cetera. And there are questions about whether Abdul's campaign has done enough to do that. I don't feel prepared to know enough to judge whether that's right or not. Some of this is lingering resentment from the primary. What I like about the ad is what it uses is and it works not just on Fox News, like technically like this is an ad for Republicans. It's not exactly an ad for it's also an ad for independence, because the idea here is that you see these conservative like if you are watching TV in Michigan, all you see are ads that say that Abdul is a terrorist. Like the most, as you said, the most offensive things you can possibly imagine, the most blatantly Islamophobic racist campaign we've seen in a very, very long time. Here you have a bunch of faces that are familiar to not just Fox News viewers, but Americans saying nice things about conservatives saying nice things about Abdul. That is a way to try to defang the the racist caricature they're trying to pitch. You know, will it work or not? You know, it doesn't mean you're going to get like the target audience here is not the guy who watches, you know, who put Sean Hannity in his DVR every night. It's more casual Fox News viewers who. Maybe if soured on Trump, don't really love mike rogers and are skeptical of abdul it's like oh you know it kind of makes you like perk up if you haven't been paying close attention you're like jesse waters likes him yeah tucker carlson hates mike rogers like that's interesting like it's just like this is like the concept of trusted messengers right where it's like i trust this person and they're saying something so now i'm going to listen as opposed to just like a yet another political so i think it's like there's a broader strategic question about it but in a vacuum i do like i do like this spot yeah i i like it too i think it's a question and i'm not i don't feel i'm qualified to say whether they've done enough either we'll see next week but it's just sort of a strategic question between that and who you're trying to target and then like i don't know what the ad would it would be focused on if it was like let me just like drum up democratic voters but i guess that's yeah exactly and he's going to be in um black churches on sunday in detroit with james cliburn yeah which raises the fundamental question for me why james cliburn is not in a black church in south carolina on sunday where people know who he is but that's neither here nor there yes um anyhow i know everyone's getting ready for election night and there's no better way to follow what's happening than to sign up for my newsletter the message box i'm going to be breaking down the results telling you what happened why it happened there's going to be a chat for paid subscribers on election night where i'm going to give you real-time analysis i'm going to send out a watch guide so you can understand what to look for what races are going to tell us whether it's a blue wave or a blue tsunami if you sign up today at the link in the description you off your subscription for a year i think you'll really enjoy and it's going to be a very helpful guide for election night and beyond pod save america breaking news is brought to you by pds debt are you tired of making monthly payments without seeing your balance go down pds debt can help you break free minimum payments aren't designed to get you out of debt they're designed to keep you stuck pds debt is the way out they can reduce up to half of what you owe on credit cards personal loans and medical bills and it starts with a free 30-second assessment at pds debt.com crooked pds debt thousands of americans become debt free the average savings per client for all pds debts programs is twenty thousand one hundred and twenty three dollars stop juggling multiple payments and get one lower monthly payment savings start the day you complete the 30-second assessment checking your options is fast free and won't impact your credit if you're carrying any balance on your credit cards it's costing you money every single day no minimum credit score required pds is the top rated company in the industry with thousands of five-star reviews and an a-plus rating on the bbb get your free 30-second assessment at pds debt.com crooked pds debt.com crooked pds debt.com free 30-second personalized assessment today at pds debt.com slash crooked that's pds debt.com slash crooked our next ad is an attack ad being run against troy jackson in maine democrats struggle to defend his unhinged behavior has troy lost his temper now and then sure he doesn't lose his temper in a gendered way he doesn't lose his temper with women any more than he loses a temper with matt he tries to get his way by screaming and throwing his colleagues reported him to the governor with everyone watching he can't even get through a debate without an outburst this creep can't deliver for maine slf pack is responsible for the content of this advertising so this ad is from the senior senate leadership fund which is the republican senate republic the senate republicans main super pack uh susan collins has had has a similar ad about this what do you think about this approach in your opinion about this ad what do you think about this approach in your opinion this race down the stretch i think um it's kind of a smart one on behalf dare i say of the collins and and the republicans world i was in maine a couple weeks ago and obviously things changed quite a bit and we've all seen this in polls and focus groups and all of the things i mean troy jackson to his credit he's been the nominee for like three months right it's a really hard thing to do and when uh grand platinum self imploded um i think it republicans were like it's over and troy jackson has made that not the case and he very well may win but i think what you see in polls there um is that people aren't voting necessarily for troy jackson they're voting against donald trump right and they're voting against the fact that susan collins has voted with donald trump 95 or whatever percentage of the time um but the but he's not likable and he's kind of an asshole is the message there right and what she's trying to betting her um part of her message on i think is um i deliver for maine right i'm on the approves committee or i'm whatever she's chair or whatever she is um i can have private conversations with trump which is such bullshit but like fine um so i think it's actually smart um that they're doing that i don't know that it will work because um in maine people are so pissed off at trump and they are so mad about i mean home heating is a massive massive massive issue there um and the cost of diesel um but yeah i i think um even though i'm not rooting for them it's a smart strategy yeah i i agree with that maine is one of the oldest states that has the oldest one of the oldest electorates in america it skews the electorate skews female so this group of older independent women are the ones who have continuously put susan collins into office that's why she won in 2020 and troy jackson's kind of did himself no favors by telling him that he's going to win her to shut up in a debate now how many people saw that i don't really know um but like ultimately you got a bunch of people who have voted for susan collins because it's normal to say they voted for her multiple times you have to convince them to not vote for them so you had to create you know what we like us nerds would call a permission structure you got a career permission structure and there's all kinds of reasons to create that permission structure now you hate donald trump costs are too high susan collins has changed she's quite corrupt she's involved in all these pay-to-play scandals one way to try to reverse that permission structure make it go away is to say that the guy because it's not an easy thing to do to change your vote to someone else and it gets harder if you think the guy is a jerk unqualified you know misogynist all of that that becomes challenging so it's very clearly targeted at that group of people like i said will it work i don't know but it's i guess it tells me a couple things it tells me who their target audience is which is older older women uh two that they're probably going to vote for susan collins and two that they're probably going to vote for susan collins probably behind in their own polls right now because this is a little bit of uh you know when you see ads like this at the end usually means you're getting kind of desperate yeah and that um they know they can't win on the issues yeah right so that's sort of sort of where we are but it's it is an interesting it's an interesting strategy i'm not sure it'll work when you may not want to vote for the guy these sort of things may probably matter more when home heating oil is not through the roof when you can pay for your you can fill up your car you can put food on the table this is a might be a different situation where people are a little more focused on the main thing ryan reynolds here for mint mobile with a message for everyone paying big wireless way too much please for the love of everything good in this world stop with mint you can get premium wireless for just 15 a month of course if you enjoy overpaying no judgments but that's weird okay one judgment anyway give it a try at mintmobile.com switch up front payment of forty five dollars for three month plan equivalent to fifteen dollars per month required intro rate first three months only then full price plan options available taxes and fees extra see full terms at mintmobile.com yeah yeah yeah i mean it's um it's also because there were a couple stories do you remember the water bottle story of how he threw a water bottle or something it's like you know and actually when you watch this moment of shut up i i would it would have advised him against it but it's like really not as bad as the story of it is um which you can tell because it's not in the ad right it's not in the ad that's true um all that and he and janet mills have kind of weird relationship anyway it kind of like feeds into like the rumor mills in a very small state but yeah people are like i'm picking between food and home heating i'm not sure like if he's a jerk maybe that's good i don't know you know and see if that works and then the the in addition to just like the immediate concerns maine's a democratic state come on yes one at by almost seven points uh in polling taken earlier this month uh by a margin of like 11 points main mainers wanted democrats control the senate yeah and so like she doesn't have a lot of arguments here i think that's the main thing this is kind of what she's left with yeah yeah all right the last ad we're gonna watch is from my what might be my favorite race the one i'm most excited about uh maybe naively so but i'm quite interested this is an attack ad from the kansas race if you knew a doctor who sued his patients when they couldn't pay you'd never make an appointment if you had a neighbor who said catching sex predators was not of much interest to him you wouldn't let your kids go there alone so what if you had a senator who did all those things and voted for a war you don't want and for tariffs you can't afford you do have that senator it's roger marshall but you don't have to give him your vote lower cost now is responsible for the content of this ad all right this is obviously from the kansas senate race where adam hamilton is taking on incumbent republican roger marshall what do you think of this spot well it's one of my favorite races too i'm not trying to copy you but it's also one of my favorites i imagine you you say that because you've you have interviewed adam hamilton and he's awesome yes he is awesome um this is um such i think it's smart ad um because um adam hamilton it's one of those races where adam hamilton is a good candidate i mean he is um a preacher from the largest methodist am i getting this right methodist church um i think in kansas and he speaks in a way it's very talarico it's very warnock uh where he is very comfortable speaking of the about his faith and morality and empathy and humanity in a way that's not partisan which works in a state like kansas I think we'll see if it works to get him to the Senate, but I think it works it with a population of people who have not voted for a Republican Democrat for Senate since 1932. So he already had a good baseline, but that story that is referenced in the ad, I think it was in the New York Times, right? About how Roger Marshall was suing his patients, women who he had helped deliver their babies for money that wasn't paid. It like showed what a complete asshole he is. And it kind of set, it like lit a match in the race, right? I think it opened things up or it lit a match in the race. So smart to mention that. And then everything else that followed. But I think ultimately Adam Hamilton is going to have to get people to vote for him, but also against Roger Marshall because they have. And so to me, I think it's, I think it's smart. What do you think? Yeah, I think this is a great ad. This is from a Democratic super PAC. Yes. And which generally the division of labor is the campaign does the positives, particularly true when the candidate is the minister of the larger, of a mega church. And then the super PACs do the dirty work of taking him down. What I think this ad gets at, and it goes to the contrast of in this race that makes it possible for Democrats to win this seat that, as you said, they haven't won in 94 years. Yeah. Even we weren't alive then. Even, even Donald Trump. Donald Trump wasn't alive then. True. Even Donald Trump was not alive. Even Donald Trump. Yes. The young man that he was. Yes. Yes. The, is that just Adam Hamilton radiates decency. Like you just can't be around him. Nothing like this is a truly decent human being. Obviously he's a preacher. It comes across just like everything about him is decent. And Roger Marshall's the opposite. Yeah. And it's the, he had a woman arrested who owed him $50. Yeah. $50. $50. And he charged these people, which is one reason why they couldn't pay him, these truly ungodly predatory interest rates that are not mandated by law. They're not even standard industry practice. It is a number he picked to make as much money as possible. And when he didn't get paid, he sent the cops to arrest his patients who owed him pittances of money. And then in the office, he's done nothing to help people. He's protected Jeffrey Epstein. Like it is like this ad gets at. And this is like, this is somewhat a little bit like the Abdul and bottoms, as we talked about, which is you got a bunch of people who have never voted for Democrat Senate in their entire lives. And they could be in their nineties when that happens. And, um, and they're trying to explain like, you don't have to do that. Like you can do something that you haven't done before. And so this is that side of that argument. So I think it's very, very effective. I, I would say also about this race, like Roger Marshall, Sandy Hyde Smith is in this category for me too, is like in this category of like, sir, ma'am, how did you ever get elected to like, be the dog catcher? It's like, they are so incapable. Ken Paxton, put Ken Paxton on that list. I'm like, what is happening here? It is wild. Yes. Watching some of these candidates. We've got a lot of, I might say the same thing about JD Vance, honestly. Yeah. Yes. Him too. Yes. People all lacking a shred of evident humanity. Yes, exactly. Jen Psaki. Thank you for joining us. Always great to talk to you. Always great to see you again and good luck making it through election night. You too. Thank you. Thanks for having me. Prize picks packs are here. RIP digital packs and get real basketball, football, and Pokemon cards. Sell cards instantly for cash or ship them home. Prize picks packs gives everyone the opportunity to pull the one of one Cooper flag rookie card worth $8 million and a Pikachu illustrator card worth $2.8 million and packs as low as just $1. Download prize picks and use code Spotify to get $25 instantly and bonus packs when you buy your first $5 pack. Prize picks run your game. 18 plus eligible areas terms apply, collect responsibly. Starting at $25. A business can seem like a daunting task unless you have a partner like Shopify. They have the tools you need to start and grow your business from designing a website to marketing to selling and beyond. Shopify can help with everything you need. There's a reason millions of companies like Mattel, Heinz, and Allbirds continue to trust and use them. With Shopify on your side, turn your big business idea into sign up for your $1 per month trial at Shopify.com slash special offer.