Will Tucker Carlson Inherit Trump’s GOP?

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Your old pal Tucker Carlson, always starring the pot and there's speculation about a third party run. I host the show with Tucker for many years at Travel to the Lecture Circuit with him. We have very different ideas and the friendship is kind of lapsed as you can imagine. He never used to express the slightest interest in third parties. I believe he'll run, he'll run as a Republican and he'll win the nomination. He will be the Republican candidate in 2028. JD Vance, be honest, he's an oaf. I'm sorry and I know we went to Yale. We're supposed to be all in press. He was a Hillbilly DEI admission to Yale. He is a no-town. Okay. It Tucker knows that. Everything he says, he's just Tucker sock puppet. Okay. And when he and Tucker pulls his hand out of that puppet, JD's going to have nothing to say. I'm serious. Tucker will mop the floor with him. Welcome to Raging Moderates. Scott free August rolls on, but today is a very good day because Paul Begalla is here with me. CNN political contributor. He's a resident scholar at the UVA Center for Politics. Long time democratic strategist, very funny and charming guy as well. Paul, thanks for joining me. Oh, just thank you so much. This will be fun. Yes. I hope that it will be. No, I know that it will be. Let's be glass half full. Yeah, but if people are, if people are, they're turning for you. Thank God. If they're turning in for Galloway and they get me, that's like buying a ticket to Springsteen and then Barry Manila walks out. Sorry. Just that substitute. Yeah. He says he doesn't pay attention to what's going on. And then I'll get texts that are like, Oh, really love so-and-so or like, I don't know about so-and-so, but he's going to love that. That he's the Springsteen to your Manila, though I don't feel that way. And I'm proud to have you. Especially as we are talking about these deep divisions that have been brewing within the Democratic Party for a while, but seem to now be really at the surface. I'm curious as, you know, someone who obviously worked in the Clinton 92 campaign, then within the administration, a long time, I don't use this as a slur, but establishment Democrat, moderate Democrat, old guard, whatever. How do you view this conflict between the middle of the party and the DSA left? Well, I think that's the right way to do it. There's the progressive set up, the progressive Democrats, by which I mean Bernie AOC, that's not exactly my flavor, but they're perfectly, they're not just welcome. They're essential to the Democratic coalition. But then within, I think the left, there's a divide between the more, sorry, sensible, practical leftist, like Bernie AOC believe it or not. And then the truly crazy and destructive cook left, by which I mean like Ms. Javalle, who just won a primary New York, congratulations to her. And some others, this Hassan Pekker is a young influencer. He's not a politician, but we got a lot of controversy because he's campaigning for a duel. I'll say it in Michigan. Those folks, I don't want. They hurt more than they help. And I think their politics is really destructive. But I take AOC and Bernie all day. Not my flavor. I mean, I'm not likely to support either them for president, but I think that's the real, and if I may, the, the, the trope that we always get is, oh, all the energy is on the left. Well, certainly it's with young people. And old guard like me need to really pay attention to what we're doing wrong, what we've forgotten and what we've lost. Barack Obama won under 30 voters by a margin of 34. Kamal only won them by nine. Okay. So Abdul, AOC, they really, really electrify young people. I respect that. I want to learn from that. I, I need to. But once you get past that, all the energy is in the center because the only thing that matters to me is winning. That's it. Within the bounds of ethics and law, winning, winning, winning. I am a member of Holy Trinity Catholic Church except on election day one of my members, our lady of victory. You win or you die. I mean, that's it. That's the only thing I care about. So when I look at who's winning, I use Kamala's not very great performance as a benchmark because she's still only lost by two, three points, the national popular vote and each of the swing stage she lost, but she lost them narrowly. So these Kamala's a benchmark share a brown of the hated establishment is running 19 points ahead of Kamala, Roy Cooper, the governor of North, governor of North Carolina is running 17 points ahead. Josh Turk in Iowa, running for Senate and moderate is running 17 points ahead. My boy Telleriko in Texas is running 18 points ahead of Kamala's performance. Mary Peltola in Alaska, another moderate running 11 points ahead of Kamala. The weakest nominee we have in an important race is Abdul. And he has six points behind Kamala and it is not because he likes talent. He is absolutely brilliant communicator, brilliant. And yet he can make it up. I hope he can't. I want all my fellow moderates to support him. I've asked folks to in public, but let's just be honest, the moderates are winning everywhere. And the leftist, but Graham Platner before he flamed out was running five six points behind Kamala in the only swing state Senate seat in a state Kamala one. So the truth is the winners are coming out of the center. And although they're interesting and they're wonderful with young people, the far left so far has improved that they can win anything. Yeah, I think, you know, Ram, Emmanuel put it that the true leftists, like the DSA leftists were making blue districts cobalt blue. And then Abdul also had one his primary, which will be the big test for this on a statewide scale. And I hope that support will consolidate around him. And the latest polling shows that 27% of non DSA Democrats in Michigan right now are saying that they won't be supporting him though. And they're going to support Mike Rogers, which feels very dangerous to me and to have huge implications. This isn't a seat that we hope to pick up. This is a seat that we are defending, which is very different when you look at the map. And you think about what kind of work we need to do in order to get back control and try to blunt some of the damage that the Trump administration is doing. I want to touch on something that you said about Hassan Piker or the kind of DSA cookie left. Are you in the group that says flat out, we don't want you here? Like you can't be part of our big tent because the party did a lot of work after mom Donnie won in 2025. You know, it was a big night. It was Mikey Cheryl, Abigail Spanberger and Zora on mom Donnie. And we all had to explain how this works. And we just said, okay, well, we're a big tent. We're big enough for a real moderate like Spanberger and for mom Donnie who had some of these DSA positions. So where are you on the scale of you can't sit with us? Oh, I don't want to. The DSA has their own party. They do. And they have, here's what they've done for America. Okay. They elected George Bush by supporting Ralph Nader in 2000. They elected Donald Trump by supporting Jill Stein in 2016. They helped to elect Donald Trump in 2024 by doing this uncommitted nonsense in Michigan. So their contribution to America has been the Iraq war, the Afghanistan war, the financial crisis and the Trump presidency. Okay. So I've had just about enough help from the, I need the cook left. They have their own party. And look, like Ms. Shavalli won a primary fair and square. I'm not election denyer. She'll almost certainly win the general election. And she should have a vote in Congress, obviously. But she doesn't have a right to caucus with the Democratic party because she's not a Democrat. Those far left DSAers, they hurt far more than they helped. Like I said, go, go ask Al Gore Hillary Clinton, or even Kamala, how much the left helps. They hurt, and they tear, not only do they siphon off-modes by forming these third parties, but they tainted and poisoned the brand. So there's this wonderful woman in Omaha, I was in Omaha in June, actually for the college world series, not for campaign stuff, but I checked the politics. This is Denise Powell, suburban Omaha, mom, small businesswoman, just like exactly who you'd want. A picture in a Nebraska Democrat. They are calling her DSA Denise. She's not DSA, she's a very mainstream, good Democrat, but the Republicans are trying because they can't defend Trump to smear the Democrats with the coup-left. Now, some of this again is on my wing. My folks haven't done a good enough job of engaging young people. We haven't done a good job of defending and advancing capitalism. My son Billy, genius, and he works trying to get young men engaged in politics. He had the best explanation. He's got this group called Sam speaking with American men, let me plug them, and he can read, he's like, young guys, and he's much more interested in guys, maybe like Scott. He loves Scott. They're in crisis because here's capitalism, in a sense, you have buster-ass you get ahead, and he's like that. These guys are busting their ass and they're falling behind, and it's not their fault. It's because capitalism has been rigged against them. The Reagan tax gets the Bush cast, the Trump tax gets the transfer of trillions of dollars to the rich and taking away opportunity. My side has to find a way to tell them, yes, the system is rigged, so that sounds a lot like AOC or even Abdul, and here's how we're going to unrig it for you. Here's how we're going to make capitalism work for you, because destroying it is not going to do you any good. That is on me, and I think my fellow otters have not done a good enough job in the post-Omama era of engaging young people or advancing new ideas. I agree with you, and I talk about this a lot. I'm a millennial, so by nature, I guess a little bit less conservative than maybe a blue dog just kind of moved along as people reposition. My concern with bringing that reality to life, which I desperately want to, is that if you chuck out people that young folks look up to, right, figures for their brand of politics like a Hassan Piker, and you say, we're not interested in you, you're just the Ku Klast, that we can't make a good case to them, because we've cut their movement off at the knees, right, and said, we don't want any part of this, and that maybe the fractions or the groups within the left, like within the DSA, you know, AOC says, oh, no, I'm not part of the national charter, right, or chapter, I'm just part of the New York one, to distance herself from the spokesperson who went on the New Yorker and came on Fox News Sunday and said absolutely wild stuff about abolishing the Senate and prisons and no one is illegal, et cetera. So I'm curious to someone who's so good at communicating and making coalitions happen. Like how do we make that case to people and also not seem like we're just trying to court moderate Republicans instead of young leftists who probably ideologically have a lot more in line with us than some of the people that are in our coalition now because of Donald Trump. Yeah, I think it's good point. And I think AOC is pointing the way she now has said work 1.0 went too far. And AOC and Hassan Piker get along just fine and support some of the same candidates. You know, I don't know Mr. Piker. I'm told he's only 23 until I look at him a little bit. No, he's 35. Okay, I don't know. I don't know. I wouldn't know if he bit me in the shower, okay? You would know. It would hurt. He's a guy. But here's the thing. I am old. So I remember 9/11 and I know he apologized and renounced it, but when he said we deserved it. He much friend less than died on 9/11 with her husband, Charlie and her three and eight-year-old girls. So we didn't do that. They did not deserve it and I'm told he has been framed picture of the plane sitting the twin towers on his podcast. That's beyond the pale. Look, if you're from Medicare for all fine, I'm from Medicare for all who wanted a public option like Obama. So pretty close. We can work those things out. Some things that all Americans should have decent health care. Right. On our side. Yes. And so we can work out those differences and we've been working them out for generations. That's fine. But when you go so far as this woman did on Fox and in the New Yorker to say we shouldn't have a Supreme Court. We shouldn't have a Senate. We shouldn't have a presidency. We shouldn't. Look, the real definition for the hardcore far left DSA is Marxism. They believe that the commanding heights of the economy, as Hair Mark said, the means of production, distribution, communication, finance must be owned and controlled by the people by which they mean the government. I think that's crazy. And I think it doesn't work. So that's where that's not where the line is again, I don't want to purge the progressive caucus. There's like a lot of really actually personally get along great with Bernie. I like him a lot. He's a great guy. I don't know AOC, but I know Bernie and I like the hell of him. We just at some point have some different ideas that we can work out. But if you are saying those kinds of things, you're saying that we shouldn't have private capital at all, that's nuts. And I understand why a lot of young people feel that way. But that's why I say my side's got to make the case. But the truth is if you expel that last 2% or so of the real crazy DSAs, you're going to gain 10% in a middle who just want you to be normal. Man, this country doesn't want Republicans, they don't want Trumpism, they don't want Maga, we just got to give them something that they can get behind. So rather than court the 2% fringe, I'd rather take the 20% middle. Yeah. Well, those are bigger numbers also, and people do eventually get smart to the idea that you would rather be in power and have a few quibbles with the party in power versus absolutely hate them. Yes. It is going to the Hassan Piker 9/11 comments. What he was talking about was American foreign policy that had ended up leading to this. Okay. He's apologized now, Abdulals. I had to ask to answer questions for this if Francesca Hong had won that primary God for bid. We would have been talking about this. And you know, Wisconsin is not Tom Tiffany would have just cakewalked right into the governor's mansion. So it is definitely a good thing that David Crowley and frankly, you know, Tony Evers, that he just knew what to do and could figure this out. Hey, what's up guys? It's Babish, host of In the Booth with Babish. On this week's episode, I sit down with Dominic Cessah, who plays Anthony Bourdain in the new A24 film, Tony. We talk about getting into character as one of food's greatest icons, and of course, which castmates he'd fuck marry or kill. Across the full episode on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts. But let me ask Abdul something. By the way, this is like the great blessing of working where I work and I speak where you work. Is that Abdul worked at CNN for five minutes. So did Mike Rogers. Oh, so did JD Vance. So you get to know these guys. And I think part of being a liberal is trying to see the best in everyone, trying to give people the benefit of the doubt, not hating people just because you disagree with them. So I believe all that. My question is, I feel like I know Abdul a little bit. He's a very good person, at least my experience with him. Kind, thoughtful, big-hearted. But as a strategist, what does this guy bring you? Okay, young people. Believe me, he doesn't need help with young people. Now, Abdul does not need help getting younger voters. He is electric with them on his own, but he costs you enormously, enormously. He's not from Michigan. He doesn't advance any, I think, sort of useful ideas. I mean, Abdul has actually got a PhD in public health and he's an MD and he's got a serious ideas. I may disagree with them, but he's a serious man. So I don't understand the cost benefit here. And if he tells me, oh, I need young people, he's wrong. He's got them. He needs working class folks and black folks. If he wants to win in Michigan and right now, they are not coming to him. He's got time. But he needs to be thinking every day about working class folks in Detroit, in Wayne County, in McCone County. Yeah. It does seem to her great credit that Haley Stevens is laser-focused on helping him build those collisions. We have seen, with the exception of Texas, which I want to go to next, some incredibly gracious losers. And that is a very good thing. Even Francesca Hong sitting at the Unity breakfast, the day after the election, it was constant. It is a very good thing. I'm curious and you introduced him. He said, my boy, James Tallergo, you have known James for a very long time. We have had him on raging moderates and think very highly of him and are very hopeful. He's raised more than 70 million in the race, more than any non-incumbencent candidate nationwide. He just hired Jacob Smith, who was a former aide to John Cordenen as his deputy political director, which I think is completely genius. And he is running against Ken Paxton, a, I think, uniquely flawed candidate and someone that they were warned about. I want to play a clip of Mike colleague Jesse Waters talking about Paxton. - I agree, you got to hit him on the issues. And Paxton should be doing that. Where's Paxton? I've seen Mitch McConnell more than Paxton. McConnell's been in the hospital all summer. Get out of your whole Paxton and do something. I can't win this race for you. It's not on Fox, erase some money, do a hit, and lay the lumber to this guy. I mean, he's younger and he's got a little energy and he's new or whatever, but come on. If you lose this seat for Republicans in Texas, you should seek asylum in Mexico. - When Jesse's right, Jesse's right. - Yeah, and you see, people are running from him like the devil runs from Holy Water. They're running from Paxton. He is a uniquely scummy individual. And he's going to lose. Tallerico is going to win. And I know Lucy in the football, blah, blah, blah. - So you think this is it? This is the moment actually that Texas turns purple. - At least the Tallerico wins. Okay, here's what's going on there. The Republicans had the most exciting expensive primary they've ever had in Texas, in at least in decades. They spent $95 million and they turned out 2.1 million people in a blood red state. The Democrats had an exciting primary as well, but they only spent about 27 million and they turned out 2.3 million. So significantly higher turnout for Democrats and I need a red red state. Okay, that's number one. So there's much more enthusiasm and interest. Second, Beto, who I love, never led. Well, he trailed in 90% of the polls. At this stage, the race he was behind by six. Tallerico is leading in the last five polls. That average of four or five points is still a very, very tight race, but he's already leading. Second, third, who do you like? Tallerico's favorable is plus seven above water, even after a tough primary and Republicans attacking him in his mandated dollar-squared shit. Paxton is underwater by 12. Okay, and now Tallerico is on to something. He's doing a brilliant thing. You think of Paxton, you think corruption, but voters are thinking about cost. They really care more about cost. And so Tallerico's saying we have a cost of living crisis because we have a corruption crisis. His corruption is costing you. That's what's holding us back, Texas. And it's a wonderful way. This is what the Hungarian opposition did to Orban. His personal corruption was hurting you in your pocketbook. And I think that's a genius formula. I think every Democrat should say that happened to believe it's true that the mega corruption is costing you at the pump and at the grocery store. But Tallerico is doing that with Paxton. I think it's going to be very effective. How effective do you think the attacks against tomorrow? I mean, you already kind of made fun of a few of them. It's a big thing that they're calling him a vegan and he has a great comeback line about seventh generation tax in and it has been eating barbecue longer than Paxton. Just before Paxton's first indictment. Since before Paxton's first indictment to bring it back to the corruption, he has the great new ad about stealing the pen that Paxton stole a lawyer's pen out of the security when you go through the mags. And he says, I'm the guy who wouldn't loan you a pen. I'm trying to be part of Texas, not to take from you. But we do know that the conservative echo machine is incredibly powerful and that the woke one positions, like AOC is running from hers. And Taloriko has addressed some of his, but there are tons of clips out there that are very deceptively edited. Like what he said about immigrants, for instance, that the welcome mat, right? But also a lock on your front door. He's like, that's how we have to run the country as well. And then they just have it as a welcome mat. Like those kinds of things can stick to people. So I guess what do you think besides this corruption argument, which I totally buy into an ad. I can see it in the numbers that it's working. How will he get past all of that? Because it's just going to get worse, even if Maga Inc. is starting to spend, which it, Paxton wasn't spending any money. No one wanted to give him a dime from the institutional side. And that is changing. Oh, yeah. And they'll have tons of money. And they always try to otherwise the Democrat. And sometimes it's effective and sometimes it's not. I believe it is effective when two things happen. When it appears that you're pushing out an open door. OK, if you really are a kind of elite, if feet at a touch, et cetera. And second, when there's not some other dominant issue. Neither of those apply here. James looks like what he is. Middle school teacher and a seminarian. He just isn't scary, weird, out of the mainstream. He's just not. He's just this nice young man with this very nice girlfriend that's none of my business who likes his Texas barbecue. Everything is all of our business, apparently. I mean, having to explain to my colleagues because he was gay, then maybe he was a little bit trans, then he was inappropriate because he had a hot Latina girlfriend. Jesse did like that, though. He got excited. He was like, oh, she's Latina. He's like, yeah. And she's also like Texas royalty, too. It's definitely a good pick. But they're searching for what's going to stick. Right. And as we say in Texas, that dog don't hunt. After all of that, he's still seven points above water. Seven points more favorable than unfavorable, which is very hard to do as a Democrat in Texas. Keep in mind, Trump won that state by 14. - Yeah. - He won a colossal landslide. Guess what? Today, he's underwatered by 13. He said a 27-point erosion, okay. James told me this himself. Trump's approval, particularly with Hispanics, where calorie goes very strong, is collapsing. Trump got 45% of Hispanics, he did better than even Bush, which I find astonishing. But you have to respect that. That's down now to like 19 and dropping. So, Tel Rico is working it, I think, very effectively. And he is motivating the base and reaching out. This corn and aid coming on board, you mentioned. That's so smart. And believe me, there's no way that guy does that without corn and permission. So it is my sort of favorite shrink phrase these days with permission structure. James has to get a lot of people who voted for Trump to vote for him. And so one of the things I hate about the left is they love to lecture. Oh, you dummy. Now, or you racist, 'cause you voted for Trump. 75 million Americans are not racist. - They're not. - And I can't hate 75 million. I just don't know, I don't have that. - It's exhausting. - It is. So how about we love them? And we say, you're not the villain in this. You didn't vote for a forever war. You didn't vote for high costs and terrorists. You didn't vote for corruption. You have been done wrong. You didn't do wrong. You've been done wrong. And I think that's what Taloriko is saying to these Republicans who feel comfortable coming over. It doesn't hurt that he loves his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, and can actually quote the stuff that Jesus actually said. While that loves I neighbor stuff, Taloriko takes it seriously and a lot of us Christians do. And I think that's a wonderful common language he has with a lot of Republicans in Texas. - Yeah, it does seem to be a good olive branch tool for people who might think that your policies are a bit to the left of where they might be comfortable, though he has moderated on some things. And frankly, just we're learning more about him. So you know that actually a lot of the things that he thought were pretty moderate fundamentally. But when you hear him talking about oil and gas, for instance, when you hear him talking about guns, when you hear him talking even about healthcare, you know, it's very personal for him because of his own diabetes, diagnosis, and the work that he did in the state house to make sure that people could get affordable healthcare and insulin in particular. You can see people's eyes light up thinking, like this is not the caricature of the left that I was, this is not DSA Denise. - Right. - But you know, still a tough road and I'm curious. Coattails-wise, so two questions. Like, there are a lot of exciting candidates in Texas also all across the ballots. I got to meet with Bobby Polito. I loved him. - Love Bobby. - And he is. Well, I'm a New York City liberal. Like, you know, it was probably some sort of Disney world thing to me that I was like taking a tour through Texas and like meeting a real Tejano music star and someone who, you know, talks about guns that way and has a kid named Remington, like, about the rifle. Not, you know, not just like the name. Do you think that this pushback against Trump and this surge of support for change, frankly? 'Cause that's what people are choosing now. We've had a series of change elections. We had it when Hillary lost. We had it when Biden won as a reaction to COVID, then we had it back for Trump. And I think it will happen again that people are, just the status quo is unacceptable. So do you think that more of them can get over the line or do you think that James will be the standout? - Right now, a rising tide is lifting all boats, okay? Gina Hinoza, the candidate for governor. She's doing such a great job. First off, she's mostly camping in South Texas where the Democrats have a ton of work to do. You know, the real-grand Valley was the most democratic part of Texas and then we have tested away and squandered it. One of my college roommates from there, and I called him after this last election where Kamala only carried two of those counties. We just carry everyone, Hillary. carried them by margins of 50 points and common a loss most of them. So I could call this buddy mine. And he's like, look, we're the poorest people in America. And here's how you get out of poverty here. You join the customs border patrol, you join the sheriff's department, you join the Marine Corps, where you go to work and fracking. He's like, you guys against all that. So we got a lot of work to do. But Taloriko is doing it. Gina is doing it. Understandably, Greg Abbott last I checked had 110 million dollars cash on him. Gina is taking him on and she's tied with him. A tricky good win is running for Lieutenant Governor, which weird wrinkle in Texas. Lieutenant Governor runs the state is much more than the Governor. Lieutenant Governor is huge, awesome power in Texas. Vicki is taking on Dan Patrick, the very powerful ruthless Lieutenant Governor. And she's tied with him. So this is working right now. And it is because these Democrats understand where the votes are. And again, whenever I'm in DC and people talking about the Democratic base, I know what they're thinking. They're thinking of an assistant professor of a rheumat therapy candle making it Wesleyan. Okay. That's what I always wanted to be. And I ended up a cable news content. But they're thinking about white over educated over caffeinated over updated studies, blue hair. And yes, just that's not the base of the Democratic party. That is precisely 11%. Let me know if I've got the data. It's 11% of the Democratic party. The base of the party is black and brown voters and increasingly Asian Americans, Native Americans and immigrants. It is non white working class voters are the heart and soul in the base of the Democratic party. So Taloriko, Gina, good win. They're focusing on the real base. They're going to get, believe me, all of my fellow. I mean, I'm now teaching at my fourth university. So okay, I'm much more faculty lounge than factory floor. But I had a couple of college jobs and factories. And I have huge, like I grew up in the part of the middle class. So I get that world. I hope. But they know, Taloriko, Gina, Mickey, that the real base of the party is not these kind of academic elites. It is working class. And the fact that the Democrats lost the working class to a corrupt billionaire who was potty trained on a gold toilet is an eternal source of shame to me. And they're winning them back. But that's how you do it. And it's not even so much left right is it is up down. And we had a rebuild from the bottom up. I totally agree. And I was interesting to see that coalition come together and so quickly in Wisconsin, right for David Crowley. Before we swing over to talking about the Republicans, on that point, you know, you name black and brown voters as a core faction of the base. How do you think black voters in this might be more relevant to Taloriko's race than others are feeling about him? You know, Jasmine Crockett kind of shapeshifts around questions of whether she's going to be out campaigning, you know, for him and with him, et cetera. Are you concerned about that at all? Very. I'm really glad you raised it. Because even I'm going immediate to Hispanics because that's where Taloriko's doing so much better. He performed poorly with black voters in the primary or more accurately, Jasmine performed wonderfully, which is incandescent. She is really. We had her on Scott loves. She's amazingly charming and also incredibly smart. And it all comes across. And so it was not unexpected. And it was a, you know, a huge feather in her cap how well she certainly did, you know, consolidating that group of support. That's the most important cohort that Taloriko has to earn. And he's working on it. Then not just going to come because of Jasmine, I don't put it on her. It's now James's job to win James's race. And he's he's working on it. But that's critically important. People don't know this. Texas has more black folk than any other state. More black people in Texas than New York or people black, more black people in Texas in California. But even I as a Texan neglected to focus on that as much as I do the Hispanics because they're moving right now. They're coming to James. He has to earn those votes. And I think he's doing it. He's doing it by showing up. He's going to churches. I'm from Fort Van County. I just saw on his feed. He went to the big black church in Fort Van County. Texas outside of Houston. He's working it. And he has to. But he has to earn those votes. You can't take him for granted. You can't just say, Oh, my opponent will endorse me. And that will get me those votes. It won't. And so I don't put any of the onus on Jasmine to win this thing. It's all about James. I didn't mean that in that in the sense that this is up to her. And if she says like go that everyone's going to suddenly fall in love with James, Taloriko. Anyway, I was just saying it feels like a bit of an obstacle on his path towards consolidating the base. If she's not as enthusiastic about him as one would hope, you know, pushing a boulder up a pretty big hill. Yeah. She has endorsed the ticket, which means she's endorsed him. And that's kind of all you can ask after a tough primary. I will note, look at who Taloriko has asked to come in a campaign. First, he's hired a corn and aid. Second, he's already had Barack Obama come in there, which is the biggest gun you could get in Texas, which Obama lost twice. But he gladly had him in there. But he's not having Mamdani come in there. He's not having Hassan Piker. He's not having the far left or the cook left come in there. He's having the sensible moderate mainstream, the president of Obama being the epitome of the establishment. And so that's going to help enormously, but he has to do it on his own. And you know, my long experience with this is the reason I'm happy the Democrats have changed their calendar, put South Carolina first is that the real heart of the party is a church lady in Orangeburg, South Carolina. Okay, they tend to be much more moderate. So that's maybe why I like him because I'm moderate too. But that's the folks Taloriko needs to think about and how to get them. And that just takes work and relationships. You know, Bill Clinton earned those votes because he had been working in those fields of his life. You have to have a relationship. And he's James is having to build that because this district didn't have many black folks in it when he's in the legislature. So he's trying to build that as he runs. And you're seeing that it's a challenge, but he's he's going to do it because he's committed to it. And I think to respect you show by showing up and asking people for their votes rather than taking them for granted, like a lot of Democrats do, is very important. Yeah, he's definitely doing the work. You know, one of those who's always out there. I want to cross over and talk Republicans a little bit. Your old pal, Tucker Carlson, always stirring the pot. And you know, there's speculation about a third party run, you know, him or there are other some folks in the talking space or influence or space, whatever. How realistic do you think it is that Tucker Carlson could get himself onto that debate stage in 2028, where I imagine it's going to be a pretty big primary field. You know, we tend to focus on JD Vance versus Marco Rubio, depending on who gets to go in the in the cart and get onto the safe plane or whatever. But like, you know, they're going to be more people up there. As you mentioned, I host the show with Tucker for many years that traveled the lecture circuit with him. We were close friends, honestly, like real friendship. And so I've never spoken ill of him. I don't want to. We have very different ideas. And we, the friendship is kind of lapsed, as you can imagine. Oh, you guys don't hang that much anymore. We don't anymore. That said, I've debated it more than anyone in the world. And he is a brilliant debater. He, here's one of the things he always says, third parties are like bees. They stay and they die. So I believe this is not having talked to him in years. Here's why he has the most talent. Here's the first hop he's going to run, which I would have never guessed because he never thought of himself that way when I knew him. But I've known a great many people ran for president and they always make the decision this way. None of them look in the mirror and say, oh, it should be me. I should have trillions of dollars just spending in a three million army. They always say, well, not him. He's terrible. He's a jerk. Tucker's looking around that field. And he's saying JD fans, be honest. He's an oath. I'm sorry. And I know he went to Yale. We're supposed to be all impressed. Okay. He's a dumb dumb and an oath and a charmless. He is a no talent. Okay. And Tucker knows that. Okay. And when he Tucker pulls his hand out of that puppet, JD's going to have nothing to say. I'm serious. I think Marco Rubio right now is on a bit of a sugar high because he doesn't have a partisan job. I saw this with Hillary. As soon as she left Secretary of State became a politician again, she got hammered. They started hitting on her again. Yeah. So I plus, I think he's a little hollow. I think he's got a glass job. Rubio. So then what do they have? He hexeth is in Iowa today and his personal capacity. Governor Sanders in Arkansas. Arkansas has produced one pretty good president. Tucker will whip them all. He will kick their asses. And he's putting together what I believe may be the future of the right, which is populist economics when it to populist culture. You know, they always had this elitist economics when it to populist culture. And I think Tucker is going to come full Bernie on the economy. He's going to attack concentrations of wealth. He's going to support unions. Maybe I'm wrong, but do There's a holistic argument here, a seamless garment of populism, where he's going to hate the male factors of great wealth and the immigrants, and you know, to piece that all together. And I think there's a lot of power in that. I'm terribly worried for my country. I wouldn't support any of that stuff, but I think I'm telling you, he's the most talented guy out there and candidate talent matters. I mean, I'm a little scared by what you just said. I don't disagree with a lot of it. I knew Tucker far less well than you did, but got to know him for a few years when we crossed over at Fox. And he was always incredibly charming, obviously, but so generous with his time and knowledge and connections and he and to someone, you know, I was ideologically swimming upstream there also. So I could see that world, I just for Tucker Carlson to become their nominee, it feels as if a lot of traditional Republicans who were maybe hanging on, you know, were maybe tried Trump in 2016, left 2020 for Biden came back in 2024 because they thought the economy was so terrible or that we had gone too far to the left. Like, I don't see how they can stick around for a Tucker Carlson. Right, I think that opens up, so we just get more voters if the opposing army abandons Vienna. Take Vienna. It's about that art. Right. I think I'll walk away from the center. Let's us take it instead of chasing some mythical socialist dream. I think it offers enormous opportunity for Democrats, because I don't think Tucker would reside in the sensible center and I think Democrats ought to. Yeah. No, I'm happy to be there. So I'm into all of branching in a lot of direction. So yes, I'm the middle child of divorced parents. Okay. I love everybody. I want everybody to get along. And you want everyone to love you and to notice that you're there. That's right. Middle children are the most psychologically interesting people to me. By the way, I'm an older, we're only two. Me and my husband, first children and so our second child is endlessly fascinating to us. We understand our siblings now that we have a second child who's demanding that she be treated as a first class citizen, not the second class, like all the hand-me-downs. But then when we have friends with the three children, we're like, oh, these middle kids just lost. Oh, you like raised yourself. We had four and I wish I wish we'd have had 24, but then there's something to me in the birth order. There really is. But they're also their own people. We can screw them up, but my kids are extraordinary because they're extraordinary. They're pretty great mom too, but it's mostly, it really is just them. I honestly believe, now that my kids are all adults and God, they're just perfect in every way they are. You make me cry. But it's because of them. It's not anything I did. And like I said, my wife is extraordinary and, you know, MBA, Army, Brat, Sunday School teacher, business woman, and raised the four best boys you ever met in your life. Four boys. She's the luckiest woman in America. I actually, I know that boy moms feel that way, but those are like the dirtiest bathrooms and. Oh, the car, picking them up from. They're all jocks. They're picking them up from football or rugby. Oh. Did anyone play hockey? That is the skin case. We did not have hockey players. We had rugby, baseball and football. But now, two oldest are married and the third is engaged and the fourth is involved in a wonderful girl. So now I have these women in my life, these young women who I didn't have to raise, who are brilliant and interesting and challenging and fun. It's just great. I now I kind of wish I'd been a girl dad, but I can be a girl father. Well, you can be a girl grandpa. Yeah, that may be coming. I mean, whenever your time comes, I think you're going to nail it. So that was an all-time great dad answer to a non-sequitur or to a side conversation, I should say. And I'm going to try to weave this somehow back to Natalie Harp, who was someone's daughter. So Natalie Harp, one of Trump's closest aides, his executive assistant, known as the human printer. She was featured heavily in New York Times reporting by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan. She had very sadly a bone cancer and credits president Trump and his policy of right to try with her surviving and this become this extremely hard working and trusted assistant for him. Maggie Haberman calls her Trump's binky, which I thought was a particularly funny one. And she's written letters to Trump saying, you're all that matters to me. And Trump has noted that she will never leave me. So Natalie Harp has become a topic of conversation because John Ausef, another candidate who I think is absolutely nailing the corruption conversation mentioned her in one of his Sunday rallies. So let's play a clip of that. And while the sailors on the Lincoln fight his war, while he fruitlessly drains our munitions and oil reserves, the president sleeps through his meetings. He golfs and trades stocks. So he doesn't want to do the job. He wants to build his ballroom and travel with Natalie on their apparently defenseless flying palace gifted by the Emir of Qatar. So I'm unabashedly in an Ausef mood. I am one of his top heroic camera angle too. I know his glow up like everything is just working for this guy right now. And it's all also incredibly intentional and political maker before he became a politician. Well, it makes sense. I would go to the theater and I would pay $50 for a ticket to watch John Ausef talk about how Donald Trump is enriching himself and destroying the lives of average Americans and getting us into these wars of choice. This particular line has struck a chord and you know the crocodiles hears from the right on this saying that this is just sexist and the message that we're sending to young women working in politics, calling out Natalie Harbing, you know, there is an insinuation. He certainly didn't say like Donald Trump and Natalie Harp are having an affair. But we do know from Ausef that he hand picks every single line. There is nothing that he says or that goes out from that campaign that he has not rubber stamped himself and that he feels very strongly that Democrats have been seeding races in Georgia for a long time that we could have won. And I almost believe him that he is solely focused on winning his Senate seat again before he moves on to 2028 where he's not interested in running. So what do you make of all of this and their intentional choice to put Natalie Harp into the ecosystem and get us all talking about her? Yeah. I don't like it. Okay. I don't. First as just a principle, always attack the organ grinder, not the monkey. Okay. I was a staffer. Staffers are all interchangeable. We're all fungible. We can all come and go. The Gauls said the graveyards are filled with indispensable men. Well, now women too. So that's number one. Just as a strategic matter. And you don't agree. So you would have advised, if a speech writer wrote that, you would have said, John, I don't like, you know, you can do the the secret card going off the guitarry jet thing in a different way. Don't involve her. Correct. I don't think you. I don't like it. I don't think you gain anything. And what you gain is attention, right? So we all pay attention to it. And by the way, you don't do that to win a Senate race. Yeah. That is looking forward and I'm like, you deeply impressed with him. I'm blown away. I think he's absolutely top tier talent. I hope he runs. I hope they all run. But that said, I don't like that. I don't like attacking staff when you should be attacking Trump. And then the insinuation, I mean, I've lived through all this. So I have the scars and I really do have a thing happen. I don't remember. But as as a faithful Catholic, I was raised to believe that sex is a dirty, vile, disgusting act. And that's why you say, but for the one you love. I don't want to hear about it. I don't want to think about it. I don't want to know about it. It's none of my damn business. And I'm much more interested in like the jet and the knocking down our East Wing and spending a billion dollars, maybe our money, maybe special interest money, I don't know, to build them. So there's so many things to attack with Trump. I just wouldn't do it. If we are going to be attacking him, which we need to and all stuff is one of the candidates who has never taken the bait to go off message on this. I mean, besides the Natalie thing, but that was structured and obviously they made that estimation. And I completely take your point on that. Within the White House right now, they are not stupid. And they have James Blair and they have Tony Fabrizio who are coming in and they're showing them the numbers, right, on where they're underwater, which is basically everywhere, but crime and policing. And they need to decide what to do about the war in Iran and how they're going to get people, you know, decent healthcare money back in their pockets. What do you think they're thinking about the midterms and what they can do in just a few months? I, this is uninformed, but I think they're lying to them. Trump does not strike me as a leader who welcomes bad news. A good leader, especially a president. The highest form of loyalty is to go to the president and say, you're wrong. No sir, we're not going to do that. [BLANK_AUDIO] loyalty. Being a yes person is very easy. I worry honestly that this president did I don't know. I want to know. Did someone come to him and say, you know, if you start a war with Iran, they can close straight away. I don't know. General Cain seems to be saying that they did do that. I just don't know if it was in our quiet voices that like I used with my toddler. But smart people in there, not like Pete, but the regular rank and file. Well, I worry politically, not as much because I want them to lose politically. I want America to succeed internationally and domestically, but politically I want Trump to fail. And the truth is they're screwed. They're screwed. There's nothing they can do in the next 77 days that's going to turn this thing around. They're screwed. Build an arc because I thought it was going to be a wave. I was wrong. It's going to be a wipeout. I'm telling you, when the Democrat is leading in Alaska, when the Democrat is leading in Texas, when the Democrats are going to Ohio in Iowa, these are all places Trump won by double digits. Okay, we're going to win everywhere. We're going to win Greenland. We're going to win British Columbia. We're going to win places where the Republicans unopposed. I'm sure it's going to be the biggest dagum wipeout. And I know they're going to cut the margins with their corruptory district in their racial gerrymandering. So that may put a little bit of a damper on it. But I'm telling you, I've seen these things. The most likely scenarios right now Democrats have a commanding lead. And in the last 10 days, the most likely thing is that the bottom falls out for the Republicans. That a lot of these folks you were talking about before, these kind of thoughtful Republicans who they didn't sign up for any of this nonsense. That they're either going to stay home or they're going to say, okay, Talorie goes tolerable to me or shared brown or white cooper or Mary Pell's Tolo. Sorry to do. I think that you're looking at a total wipeout. What do they say to the mad king about that? I have no idea. I mean, I did work for a president who lost his ass in the midterms and we told him. He didn't do it again. But I know President Obama's team went to him and said, you know, there's a structural problem. They're going to lose them out of what? Because they have the trifecta. But you add to that an unpopular president, unpopular war, high inflation, terrible corruption. And by the way, some pretty crummy candidates when the Democrats have recruited some pretty great ones. It just can't be. I know you're not supposed to say it. You know, we're all supposed to pretend the other side is 10 feet tall with an IQ of 300. But they suck. And if we don't wipe them out this year, we should find another country to run it. I would agree with that. And we also need some good news before the 2030 census where everything becomes really terrible. So get your wins in while you can because it's only going to get worse. And he could get another Supreme Court appointment. And on that uplifting note, Paul Vagalla. This was fantastic. Thank you for joining me. [MUSIC]