Trump's Mile-Hide Club

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Welcome to Plot's day of America.

I'm John Fabra.

I'm Dan Fyffer.

On today's show Donald Trump catches a ride on a catering truck to escape the Iranians

who are trying to kill him and or cause him to lose the midterms.

Whoever comes first.

We'll also talk about how your tax dollars are being used to buy brand new gloves for ice

agents that can deliver an electric shock to anyone they touch.

That is true.

Also, a wild story about DHS spying on everyone from labor unions and climate groups to

random citizens just because they can.

Then with the last of the major contested primaries behind us in Wisconsin and Minnesota, we'll

talk about why the polling was so far off and why that won't stop us from speculating

about November.

Finally, we'll bid a fun farewell to White House press secretary Caroline Levit and compare

our rankings of who we think is most likely to get the job next.

Can't wait to hear your list, Dan.

It's really outside of the box.

I like that.

I like that.

One quick note before we start, friends of the pod tickets for this year's CrookedCon

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All right.

They're starting to use the keyword to describe Trump's disastrous war in Iran.

You know what the keyword is, Dan?

There are all kinds of jokes I was going to make, but none of them seem to work.

So I'm just going to go with the right answer.

Is it Quagmire?

It is.

The headline and one of the most red political stories of the week, the Iran War is a whole

new level of Quagmire for the US.

Both Trump and the Iranians are claiming that they're in control of the straight-of-form

moves, which can't be true.

And the straight remains functionally closed, I think only 14 vessels went through yesterday.

Gas prices are higher than they have ever been at this time of year in the United States

ever in history.

The war also continues to deplete our military, the Washington Post reports that we've lost

about a quarter of our supply of reaper drones.

We're using up our limited supplies of both Patriot and Tomahawk missiles.

And some of our service members have been deployed so long that on the USS Abraham Lincoln,

which is an aircraft carrier that's been in the Middle East since November, several of

the 5,000 sailors and Marines on board have tried to jump overboard due to the stress

and horrible conditions.

That's according to both the military times and stars and stripes.

But nothing better illustrates just how badly Trump is getting his ass kicked by the

Iranians than the story of how our president was forced to hide in a catering truck and

board a secret plane to escape a potential assassination threat involving Iranian proxies

in Turkey launching surface-to-air missiles at Air Force One.

When Trump was asked why it was too dangerous for him to fly on Air Force One, but not

any of the reporters and White House officials who weren't told they were flying home on a

potential target.

The president said the dumbest thing possible.

I think actually the plane that I flew on was at greater risk.

I think it was at greater risk because that would be the plane I think that they would

be more likely to go for.

Fucking idiots.

Yeah, yeah, they'd be more likely to go for the plane you were on.

Of course, which is why they tried to put you on another plane that they didn't know

about.

You fucking moron.

Yes.

I don't know why I say that in such a shocked way, but like, it's just like new levels of

Trump being adept.

Yeah, what did you make of the whole, uh, the catering cart, Caper?

On one hand, it is very, very funny that he hid in a catering cart that he flew home

on a secret plane that he hand picked the people who would survive with him, like Pete Higgs

F and the woman who prints all of his documents.

But he said, Dan Schimino is former caddy.

And Dan Eskivito, everybody's then he sent Mark Rubio to die with the press.

And Mark Rubio was the only one on that other plane who knew what was happening.

Scott Besson was with Mark Rubio, none the wiser.

And it's there's no protocol here for the reasons like maybe hexat you could possibly

fabricate some reason.

But the fact that he picked Dan Eskivito and Natalie Harp, the once again, the woman

who follows him around and prints his documents for him were the ones who got seats in the

life raft.

And Mark Rubio didn't, it should be a real tell to Mark Rubio.

Also, how do you even process information?

You get looped in and you're like, which way the Trump's playing?

They're like, you didn't make the cut.

I mean, what were they, where did they think Trump was?

I mean, they just assumed he was in his cabin, I assume.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, I know that's what the reporter thought, but I was wondering about the like Scott

Besson just sitting there.

It has no idea with his buddy, Mark Rubio has no idea.

He's just a sitting duck for me.

Normally you would see the president walk up, well, I guess they saw him walk up the steps.

And there were plenty of times we've been on the plane when we used to fly on it where

the president would just be in their cabin.

And we would be seated where we would sit, which is not in his cabin.

You would have no idea until the plane landed.

And he did not walk down the front steps.

Who do you think was making it in the secret plane with Barack Obama?

Definitely wasn't me.

I don't know.

It might have been you.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, quick.

I need a speech.

Well, how so we would have done it by actual protocol and not by who he likes most.

There isn't like a more serious thing to this, which is that the that Aronion proxies

in Turkey were potentially going to take down Air Force one.

Yeah, that's a.

Well, I mean, that, yes, that, that, but there's something like this probably sounds really

quaint in like the dystopian fucked up world we live in.

But there is just something terrible about the fact that the president lied to the press,

lied to the country to hide a threat to himself.

No one knew where he was.

He could have that plane could have landed anywhere in the world and no one would have ever

known.

And the only reason we know about this now is because the Washington post did some really

great reporting.

Like there is a world where obviously he has secured the president's security, whether

it's Trump or Nile's comes first.

So you could, I understand the rules.

I don't really understand why you would take Air Force one off.

You would just fly the other plane that he, they don't think he's on.

Right.

It definitely seemed like there was a need to protect Trump, even if it was now we should

say to since this story was first reported.

There's been more reporting that suggests that this intel about a potential assassination

plot came from Israel, from the Israeli government.

And then the CIA, our CIA judged it as low, low confidence, meaning they didn't think

it was, they didn't think it was like a serious, serious threat.

But clearly they thought it was serious enough to put the president in a catering cart

and send him on a separate plane.

It's probably not surprising that Israel is one who told this to Trump because if you

read regime change, the Maggie Hayroom in Jonathan Swan book, like one of the themes in

there and she and Maggie talks about this interview with Ezra Klein a few weeks ago, is

that Trump is secretly obsessed with the idea that Iran wants to kill him.

And so you tell Trump Iran wants to kill you at the same time you're trying to keep Trump

fully focused on the war in Iran.

It's not a bad idea.

Right.

BB did not want him to reach any kind of peace agreement.

Clearly.

So, yeah, I thought it was, I thought it was, so it's wild to me that like, it's one thing

to protect the president.

It's another thing to unnecessarily put the rest of the people on Air Force one in danger.

Yeah, you just hold Air Force one on the ground.

You take the president, let him fly on this other plane, no one knows what is.

Right.

After he lands, you say Trump has landed.

The Iranians know he's on the plane, then you fly the other plane home.

Right.

And we're not in the CIA.

We're not in secret servers of the CIA.

You know, we could figure that out.

Yes.

I mean, it's, it's crazy.

It's also crazy.

They didn't tell anyone afterwards.

Like, that's also not.

That's the, well, yes.

Thank you.

That is the biggest problem.

Like, you could do this whole thing and then once everyone lands, be like, oh, by

the way, this happened and we couldn't tell you at the time or whatever, but like,

that is, it's wild that it had to be broken by the Washington Post and that the administration

subpoenaed New York Times reporters for the leak about them not taking the new Cotari

force one home because it didn't have like the right defensive maneuver capabilities that

they might need if, if proxies on the ground were shooting surface air missiles at Air Force

one.

Like, this is entirely a hypothetical.

Mm-hmm.

Just want to point this out there.

Uh-oh.

But in a world in which, uh, uh, oh, it's right.

In a world in which the president can get on a secret plane without the press and have

no one over.

He is that plane can land anywhere.

It could land on Epstein Island theoretically.

Oh my God.

Well, you're really looking for a viral clip, aren't you?

I'm just, I'm not one of our clips.

I do not want this posted.

I do not tell the socially, but I do not want this posted.

I'm making point just to our listeners, the people who tune into this podcast that I'm

just using the extreme example to make a point that if when the press is not with the

president, the president can do lots of things.

We don't know what are.

He could have stopped in UAE and cut a crypto deal.

He could have, he could have stopped in Moscow to hang out with his friend, Vladimir.

He could, he could have picked up the p-tap.

He could have picked up the p-tap, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

All these things were possible.

A lot of positive things.

A lot of positive things.

Because he was a protocol.

Okay.

Well, bigger picture, um, there's new reporting this week that Iran is tracking Trump's

political problems very closely.

I guess they're just, they're looking at the, looking at the RCP average.

It's at the silver bulletin, Trump approval rating.

And they're looking to continue pushing negotiations far off past November, um, so that, so that

Trump pays a maximum price in the midterms.

Seems like a, if we're just going by political strategy, it does seem like a smart strategy

on, on Iran's behalf, no?

On Iran's part.

Yeah.

I mean, there's no question that they are correct to understand that Trump has very,

very little leverage during election season because the things that would allow the sort

of military maneuvers that would allow him to gain an upper hand over the straight,

over Iran would raise gas prices in a way, which would hurt his party in the midterms.

So they figured that out.

Now I think the question for Iran is what happens when Trump doesn't, and no one Trump cares

about has to face the voters for two years?

Like if you're counting on Democrats to pass a war powers resolution to stop the war,

I don't think they're getting to a veto proof majority of that.

No.

Could a Democratic Congress make it harder to fund the war?

Possibly.

But this idea, but Trump may feel that this is bad.

I'm going to say, this is bad.

But it's not clear to me that Trump, well, it's not clear to me.

And maybe it's probably shouldn't be clear the Iranians.

What Trump does after the midterms?

Well, after, let's talk about what's after the midterms.

It is the beginning of the 2028 presidential race.

And you've got presumably JD Vance who wants to be president, maybe Mark Rubio, maybe both

of them together.

And so there is an incentive at that point for the administration to finally give Iranians

what they want to get this off the table so that they don't have to.

Or win the war.

Or win, well, how they're going to do that?

Well, I mean, that's ultimately what Iran is trying to forestall right now is more true.

Like not that I think the anything is going to happen per se, but like Trump taking

carg island, for instance, one of the things that was on the table earlier doesn't happen

the midterms.

Could that happen in 2027?

Maybe.

Trump launching all the other bombing.

Yeah.

Like those sorts of things, like the right now Trump won't use the military stick against

Iran to the extent he has the keep the capacity to do so because of gas prices election.

In the calendar year of 2027, he is relieved of that political, the restraining nature of politics

potentially.

So I don't think it's, I don't know when Iran doesn't know either.

So like this works in the short term.

What happens in the mid event long term?

Who the hell knows?

Yeah.

Horrible story though about the Jesus Christ to USS Lincoln and all those soldiers and,

you know, the families have been describing like moldy showers and broken toilets and shortages

of hot water and food.

They've been trying to like figure this out to these the sailors and Marines have been sending

messages like just to end.

And of course someone asked Phexath today about it and he's like, it's all overblown,

overblown.

I respect all these guys.

They're great.

They're doing a great job.

This always makes me feel bad that we talk about the war purely in terms of gas prices and

oil prices because of the effect that it's having on politics here.

But it's also like, there's a lot of fucking US forces deployed in the Middle East who

are in harm's way and who are also just have been away from their families forever and

for what?

For what?

And the military did not prepare for this.

Hence the conditions on the ships.

Yeah.

They had no, they never believed because they gave this zero thought that many, many months

later they'd still be in a conflict with Iran.

Missile stockpile estimates are that it won't recover until 2030.

That's a whole another thing like God forbid someone else attacks us.

There's another war like we're not going to be ready at all because we have now depleted

all of our military.

We've sent soldiers for long, long deployments.

We don't have missiles and drones and all that kind of all those capabilities because

of this stupid fucking war, it is it.

I kind of think that this is, what do you think about like Democrats, like how they handle

this over the next couple of months between now and the midterms?

Because to me it seems like it is the main issue and it's not your use.

It's like it combines both forever wars which people hate and it's causing high prices

which people hate.

So it's like I feel like the whole, you could run the whole campaign about Trump's disastrous

war and what it's doing to prices and all that.

Yeah, it should be the centerpiece of the campaign.

Obviously it's best when tied to affordability and gas prices and that one of the message

I've seen tested is they told us there was enough money for healthcare and food assistance

but now we have billions of dollars for bombs in the middle least and for wars and

abilities like that tests very well.

It is, I think absolutely hammer it.

Democrats should have no fear.

There's a lot of sort of anxiety at the outset of this that what if we get on the wrong

side of the conflict and we must begin every statement with a long throat clearing about

how bad the mules in around our, like we don't, like we were past that.

This is an incredibly unpopular war.

It goes at affordability.

It goes at Trump's incompetence.

It goes at Trump's weakness.

It goes to the chaos of his leadership style.

I think really importantly it goes to the broken promises and when you see this in both

focus groups and then in polling of people who were great, who voted for Trump who are

now to disapprove of him, one of the top things that comes up is that he broke his promises

and one of those big promises is the war, which is tied to the other big promise, which

is lowering prices.

Right.

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Speaking of unpopular, we haven't checked in on ice in a while.

And it won't shock you to hear that the news is really bad.

Here's what will shock you.

I apologize for that.

I apologize.

The new, well, do the joke and then apologize.

The new electric gloves ice plans to spend $20 million on so that agents can deliver a painful

jolt to whoever they touch, rendering the person powerless to move or even stand.

Now Tom Homan, he was on Fox talking about this.

This is, we don't want to shoot everyone now.

This is supposed to be deescalation.

This is a deescalation.

Here's a compilation of the gloves being put to use from some of the videos that we're

circulating on Twitter.

Oh, my God.

That's green like a little girl and pee myself.

Go back with your gloves.

I have your hands.

Go get me a hand.

We're trying to get his hands off.

Stop him, this video.

This video.

This video.

This video.

This video.

Oh, thank you.

Tell you, we've turned the red.

It's fucking insane.

A bunch of men just shocking each other for fun.

I know.

Yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

That's a whole separate conversation.

The manual, this, this, this company that makes the product that they put out, the manual

says no more than two gloves on one person, generally no more than 15 seconds, never against

verbal defiance, never as punishment and not on the elderly children, pregnant women

or people with serious disabilities.

That's what ICE has done already, like violated all of those things with how it has handled

people before the gloves and the people that it has assaulted, injured, detained.

And so I don't know, I think this is fucking awful.

Well, I mean, it's just so ridiculous that Tom Homan's, he, like, it's a binary choice.

We look, we have only two options.

We can kill them in the street with our guns or we can electrocute them.

Those are the only two things, guys.

You pick, you choose electrocution or bullets.

Also this is one that leaves not a lot of evidence.

And so the idea that ICE is just going to be roaming the streets.

And if they see someone who, they don't like what they said, they, you know, sort of made

fun of ICE or criticize them whatever, they can just walk over and just put hands on

them and chalk them.

And then like no one's going to know, I mean, like who's worried against who's worried,

it's just, it's the, the potential for abuse on this one is vast.

Yes, that is very, very true.

And as Elijah pointed out in production meeting today, it's only a matter of time until

one of these ICE guys goes pee with the gloves on.

In this administration that will almost certainly happen.

Yes, it's guaranteed.

And also with the kind of people they're recruiting now with ICE.

Yes.

People who meet no standards whatsoever.

Yes.

Meanwhile, there's been a new uptick in terrifying videos of people being confronted by ICE agents.

On Monday, a masked agent pointed a gun at a US citizen named Carolina Molina at a shopping

center in Virginia, ICE and DHS accused her of trying to run them over with her car.

An assertion that's not it all backed up by the video evidence.

Afterwards, Molina told the Washington Post that it felt like a Renee Good situation.

Here's some of that seen as well as other recent ICE confrontations that are making

the rounds.

You own those ranons over.

I didn't own those ranons.

You're the full of shit.

Stop playing.

You are a full of shit.

All right.

You're not funny.

You're not funny.

I wall arrest you.

Keep it up.

I'm a legal citizen.

I don't care.

Oh my goodness.

Keep it up.

You are.

I have no faith.

I have no faith.

I have no faith.

I have no faith.

The Domingo family self-recording the tense moments when Border Patrol pulled them over

Sunday afternoon.

The couple, complying with the officers orders, then hugging during this emotional goodbye

when separated from their five children and detained.

I know there's like not a lot of new things to say about this because it's just horrific,

but I think it is worth noting that it is still happening.

It is happening all over the place.

ICE has not deescalated at all.

They are still trying to meet Stephen Miller's dumb fucking quotas.

Mark Wayne Mullen, the new DHS secretary, is already in trouble with like MAGA activists

and the base, Laura Lumer and Steve Bannon already have said he should be fired because

he's not detaining and arresting and deporting enough people.

He's already feeling pressure to be even more aggressive in order to keep his job.

This is all happening still.

It is just the only thing that's changed is they're not sitting on a press release before

they do it.

They're not inviting.

They're not inviting the MAGA influencers along for it.

They're not inviting the Fox News crews.

They're just doing it and hoping no one videotapes them when it happens.

Did you see, I heard Tim Miller talk about this in the Bullwork pod.

The letter in the nation that this woman wrote, she is, so this is a Iranian family.

They have green cards, legal residents, a couple of professors.

Yeah, the husband and wife are professors and then they have a child as well.

And because the husband is the son of a woman who was an Iranian official during the hostage

crisis, I believe she was the spokesperson during the hostage crisis in 1979.

And her son and his family moved to the United States, became college professors, had a kid,

a permanent legal residence.

And because people online decided to make an issue of their association with Iran, then

the State Department just decided to on their own revoke their visas.

They picked up the husband.

They also picked up the wife and the child.

And they separated them and they have shipped them to Texas where they've been in detention

facilities for the last four months, four months.

With just holding them hostage for no reason, no due process, not even deporting them,

not doing anything, just jailing them just because of an association of family member,

because some fucking idiot online decided to call them out.

That's terrible.

It's just the whole thing is so gross and morally bankrupt.

I don't like, I get that this won't be, you know, I think when Minnesota is happening,

we probably thought maybe this would be a big issue in the midterms.

I'm guessing it will not be as big of an issue in the midterms.

But is the best play here?

The Democrats have to just hope we get Congress back, be able to conduct some kind of oversight,

price, hold hearings, subpoena, officials and documents, and then just change everything

if a Democratic president wins.

It doesn't, what else can people do at this point?

So you are right that this is not going to be the biggest issue in the midterms and

it probably shouldn't be the voters we need.

Care about immigration, they absolutely do, but it's not their top issue.

But it's not as complicated as I think a lot of people make it.

Trump is 11 points underwater on immigration right now.

This is not an issue of strength for him.

He doesn't win by shifting the issue to rain to immigration.

It doesn't help him.

The videos like this hurt him when you track his approval rating drops since 2025.

Some of the biggest ones happened during both first the Kilmar, a Braco Garcia, C-Cott

stuff in the spring of 2025 and then after the killings of Alex Predey and Renee Good

in January of 2026.

So it matters when these things come up.

So we don't want to shy away from talking about it.

Absolutely not.

It's also worth pointing out to voters that once again, not only is ICE bad, but we gave

I $700 billion and we paid for it by cutting healthcare and food assistance.

Like that's what the priority is.

People don't like that.

But when we, so let's say we get to, we get a majority right and we'll talk about the

prospects for that later in the show.

People should be realistic.

We cannot, we cannot realistically abolish ICE, but we can hold hearings.

We can, you know, shine a light on this.

There can be accountability.

We also have, if we have the House and the Senate, but even if we have just the House,

we have real leverage in budget negotiations of Democrats are willing to use it.

So the one challenge on that one is because they passed so much ICE funding through reconciliation,

like they could shut down the government, like we went through this, right?

Like the Democrats could theoretically shut down the government if we control Congress

again or hold up the whole budget over ICE funding, but because they have so much funding

left over from reconciliation, like they can still do everything they want to do.

Yes, I mean, we're right back in the same spot, but you can, you're a couple of options

here.

One is you can take, I hate to use this terminology, but you can take it in different

hostage and the ransom is changes in ice.

Other things, Trump's want.

You can not give them.

You can shut down the whole government over it.

You can put repression on them.

Once again, ICE has money.

Like there is a limit to what you can do here.

Up until the moment you have a trifecta where you, well, you have, if we have a trifecta,

you can do the following things.

One, you can take that money and redirect it elsewhere.

You could with a trifecta abolish ICE in some way, shape or form.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah, if we have a Democratic president, then you do all those things, but yes.

But for the next, it'll be even winning back Congress.

It'll be hard for the next two years to do anything outside of threatening to shut down

the government over ICE, but like you said, take a different hostage.

Or probably the most likely path is to hold all kinds of hearings and oversight.

And you can get, which will hopefully sort of till the ground for the battles to come

when you have the trifecta, but you can't, like some of the policy changes we did not

get in this time, you can make another run at in 2027, 2028.

I also think it's worth saying that just from a, and we talk about politics and campaigns

and what's most likely to help win an election, but when these stories are in the news

and when public officials, whether they're local, state or national, talk about them

and lift up the stories, like the politics are bad for the Trump administration.

Usually when they are, when Donald Trump's appropriating is in the shitter,

he turns to immigration to try to get his mojo back.

And it is telling that they have chosen, you know, the democratic socialist communist threat

over immigration this time around because they just went through a cycle back.

I don't know when it was earlier this year, last year, when their immigration agenda

was underwater and became pretty unpopular, not as unpopular as how he handles cost

of living or jobs or any, or through around war, but still unpopular.

Yeah, it's not an advantage for him anymore, which is a huge change in the huge change.

Yeah.

All right.

This week's Democratic primaries were one of the last contests before the midterms.

A week after Abdul El-Sahia defeated the establishment backed Haley Stevens by just under a point

in the Michigan Senate primary, the more moderate David Crowley eaked out an upset

over democratic socialist Francesca Hong in the Wisconsin gubernatorial primary.

In Minnesota, the more progressive lieutenant governor Peggy Flanagan beat Congresswoman Angie

Craig by 20 points in Connecticut, the center left mayor of Hartford, Luke Brannon, knocked

off 78 year old Congressman John Larson, making him making Larson the seventh house Democrat

to lose a primary this year and the fifth past his retirement age.

2026 is now tied with 2012 is the worst year for democratic incumbents and primaries this

century.

When you step back and squint at all the primary results this year, do they tell to you

any kind of cohesive story about democratic voters and the Democratic party?

It's complicated, but yes.

If you look at all the results, all the ones we've had, all of the the DSA wins, the incumbents

who got elected, they come as who got defeated.

I think you can take a couple of things from this.

One, Democrats are furious that Donald Trump is president.

Two, Democrats are incredibly skeptical and distrustful of their own leaders, their

own institutions, and the way the party has done politics in the past.

Democrats are incredibly fired up about voting.

They are turning out in huge numbers like in Wisconsin.

This is a statistic blew me away.

Nearly 250,000 more people voted in this Wisconsin primary than in 2018 the year of the

big blue wave.

I know.

That's wild.

What I think is when you look at all of this, it's sort of belies the overly simplistic

narratives that people who talk about politics will have been trying to GM this through.

DSA versus centrists, left first right institution versus anti-institution, even generational.

It's a lot of these races.

The thing is the Wisconsin and Michigan races come by.

If 18,000 votes between the two of them had gone a different way, we would have been

like, DSA is dead.

Long live the moderates or like go comrade.

The did it socialists of one.

It's all more complicated.

Voters looked at it and made decisions.

There were some local factors in all of them.

I think the one thing that is true is that voters are looking for fresh faces.

Those fresh faces are often younger.

We saw that in all the income that you mentioned.

It is a fresh face who has come in and beaten them and almost always a younger one.

I think that that democratic voters are done with the gerontocracy.

To your point about how many more voters are participating in this year's primaries versus

2018 or at least in Wisconsin, is part of that that people who usually just vote in a general

election but not a primary are now voting in a primary.

I thought I saw somewhere that just the interest is so high that even a lot of normy Democrats

quote unquote who usually just turn out in a general but not a primary are now interested

enough and engage enough that they want to participate in the primary.

Yes, that's definitely happening.

Wisconsin is particularly impressive if you have the runoff because Wisconsin is one of

the highest turnout states in the country.

I think the stakes of these primaries feel very high to people because I think there

is a real question about where our party is going and people want to have a say in that.

So they are turning out and it like it does.

It felt that way.

Wisconsin felt that way in Michigan in these races.

It's only I think that to the people in New York city in those races or in the Colorado

one.

It felt that way where it's like our party is going to go one of two ways and I want to

have a say in which way it goes because the direction we choose is going to matter not

just in the 2026 but in 2028 beyond.

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So on that note, the primary results have inevitably led to another round of electability

discourse.

Probably one of the top five discourses in the Democratic Party.

What else is on the list?

Let's see.

Motivation versus persuasion.

Motivation versus persuasion.

Left versus center left.

Let's see.

Orange man bad is the best political strategy.

Disporacist.

Yeah.

Yeah.

How much should we focus on Trump?

Right.

Right.

Wokeness.

That's kind of a relatively new one.

I don't know.

I'm just kind of shooting from the hip here.

How are Democratic voters judging?

Which candidate is more electable here in 2026 based on everything that you have seen thus

far this year?

I think like the pundits, the voters don't know who's more electable.

That is showing up at these races as people are making different choices.

What I think is interesting is electability.

There's been this big discussion.

In the Trump era, Democratic voters care a lot about electability.

That is true.

But it's also always been true.

It is also an axiomatic thing, which is you want someone who can win or someone who

is less likely to win but agrees with you.

People always expect the one who's going to win.

Even before Trump in 2004, when the Democratic primary that you were working on was going

forward, people all of a sudden were like, wait a minute.

We're going to run the anti-war governor of Vermont against George W.

Bush.

That's not a good idea.

Then they immediately shifted to John Kerry, the war hero.

Did work out great, but I understand the thinking that got them there.

In 2020, electability drove Biden's nomination.

Six and ten voters in a gallup poll at that time said they'd rather someone who was more

likely to beat Trump than someone who they agreed with on policy issues.

In the exit polls of the primary states, six and ten voters in most cases said electability

was their top issue.

People care about it.

What is different now?

I believe you see this in both Wisconsin and Michigan is that the voters no longer trust

the Democratic Party establishment and the experts to tell them who is most electable

and they have to see it with their own eyes and make their own judgment.

You haven't missed it.

Unless it's Tony Evers.

Well, I mean, I think we can debate Tony Evers.

Tony Evers obviously played a huge role in this, but this is different between Michigan

and Wisconsin is all of the voices were saying Abdul is less selectable.

Voters looked at that race.

They looked at him.

It was not patently obvious to him to meant to enough of them that he was less electable

than Hillary Stevens.

Wisconsin.

Evers made electability number one issue down the stretch by announcing that he thought

Hong could not win or was unlikely to win if she was the nominee, but then Hong went

on a media tour where she did not acquit herself great and sort of amplify the questions that

Evers had raised and voted so voters looked at that.

I think if Evers had said she can't win and then she had done fine, they probably would

have still picked Hong.

But because of that, enough of people changed their mind in the final days to do it.

Then in Minnesota where Angie Craig made electability of the centerpiece of her issue, no one thought

we would lose that seat so they didn't care.

I think that's a really important point that's getting lost in the Minnesota example because

I think a lot of voters, especially highly engaged voters who pay attention to this, who

are the voters that vote in primaries, they try to make rational decisions about who they

think is going to win the race.

If you're in a state like Minnesota where it just seems like the Democrat is going to

win and now Minnesota is not like a deep blue state, but you could make a good argument

that Angie Craig or Peggy Flanagan, whoever won that nomination was going to, was going

to be a heavy favorite, right?

Like a likely D.C.

And so in that scenario as a voter, you look at the choices and you're like, well, now I

am free to just support whoever I want to support that I believe in the most.

And Peggy Flanagan wins by 20 points.

And in Wisconsin, you have to imagine there were a bunch of Francesca, people who really

liked Francesca Hong and probably agreed with her more on the issues or found her campaign

more inspiring or whatever it may be than David Crowley, but looked around, looked at polls,

looked at her performances.

Maybe looked at their governor that they like very much, even though he's older in establishment

and said, you know what?

Can't do it.

Can't do it.

It's too important to win this day.

And that seems to me like I, I know everyone always says like, like, debilities all subjective

and it doesn't matter, but like I do think there have to be some sort of objective standards

to by which to judge electability that I think voters are trying to sort of figure out

on their own.

There are, I think the way I like to think about it is no one knows for sure who is

electable and who isn't.

And the political environment is much more important than the quality of any individual candidate.

But there are things we can look at that give us an idea on people's electability.

One of which is how they hit, what is their history of winning tough races?

Do they have it?

Is there actual evidence of them winning every swing voters?

This is quantified by split ticket and their wins over replacement model.

But you can just like we know that Andy Beshear and Josh Shapiro can win over Republican

voters.

They have proven that in multiple occasions.

Do we know that Gavin Newsom or AOC can do it?

We do not know that.

Can they maybe, but they've never proven it before.

So that's an untested proposition.

We should say back because it's actually very useful for people, I think, is the wins

above replacement sort of calculation.

Basically what split ticket has done is, and other people have done similar, but what

they've done is they come up with like a baseline, right?

So if like the baseline, how would a generic Democrat do?

Right.

How would a generic Democrat do?

So what was like the national sort of, was the national house vote or, and they put a

whole bunch of factors into it.

And so if a regular Democrat, if a generic Democrat would win this race by two points and

X candidate wins it by four points, then there plus two win above replacement.

If the other Democrat still wins the race, but only wins it by one point, then there

minus one wins above replacement.

And you can do this with all the different House candidates and all the different.

Now what was interesting in the case of Michigan is, first of all, a dual had run once for

governor and lost.

So he did a primary.

And a primary.

So he didn't have a long record there.

Hayley Stevens was sort of the lowest wins above average of any of the Democrats in

the House in Michigan, which I hadn't realized.

So in that scenario, you actually didn't have, like it seemed like Hayley Stevens was like,

because she was more moderate and backed by the establishment, like maybe it's thinks

she was more electable.

But in terms of the objective measures you had, that wasn't necessarily the case.

Sure enough, the argument, which is, you know, Laksha Jane who's the pollster for the

argument and does the, and also is split ticket does the wins above replacement.

He said that they had in their model if they have a dual is a 70% chance of winning the

general.

And Hayley Stevens would have been 80% chance.

So it's like 10% difference is it's something, but it's not.

It's big.

It's actually, we can, it's between 70 and 80 doesn't feel huge difference between 50 and

40 feels quite big.

Yes.

Would you get there?

Well, that gets you to the other measures, which not, then you get past data.

Right.

And so then there is the question of extremism.

And it is a, there is, it's not always true, but it is mostly true that the candidate

who is seen as more extreme loses.

This is the thing that always makes people want to throw their phone in the ocean, but

Donald Trump has seen his more moderate than Kamala Harris in 2024.

And Joe Biden has seen his more moderate than Donald Trump in 2020.

And so you look at that and you say, does that do, like if you take Michigan, for

instance, you would say does that dual have positions and statements that could be used

to make him see more extreme than Hayley Stevens?

Possibly.

Yeah.

I think that's probably where you get to the, that net difference for them.

Then the third thing is candidate quality.

And this is all subjective where you're like, does this person seem like they can stand,

this is going to be particularly true in a presidential debate, can the presidential

election, can they stand on the stage with JD Vance or Marco Rubio or Tucker Carlson

like, hold their own, do they, can they go on podcasts, can they give a good speech,

can they do those things?

And that I think is where Abdul seemed like he could, like he really showed a lot of candidate

skill.

And Hayley just ran a campaign in the end that where she was is not very present in the

media.

So people didn't see her.

Although I would say she, her post election media tour, she has crushed.

And then Hong went on this huge media tour, did every interview, seemed ill prepared

for a lot of them.

And that people saw that with the Rona.

So it's like, yes, Eva said that.

But then everyone actually saw clips that made them say, maybe this person cannot win

or is less likely to win.

Well, that's what she was like.

Yeah, it is subjective and no one really knows who's electable or not is technically true.

But all of this exists on a spectrum.

And there are some people where you're like, who's the more electable candidate?

Well, they're both kind of good on TV and sometimes they make mistakes, but one's inspiring

for this reason.

That's a close call.

With like, when Francesca Hong goes on TV and is like, well, it has to have to talk about

canceling Thanksgiving and why police exist to uphold white supremacy.

Most people, most people who don't pay attention to politics, if you showed them that clip,

they'd be like, yeah, that's weird.

No, thank you.

So like that's an easier or or let's take another example.

The Biden Trump debate, right?

And Biden performs so horribly that afterwards it's like, okay, yeah, there's like nitpicky

debate, you know, figure skating judge quality to analyzing debates, but that's an easy call.

Most people will be like, that's awful.

Right.

See, these are extreme examples, but the problem gets harder.

Like it was where we get to the presidential election, right?

And so imagine you're down to at the end and just picking these sort of randomly.

Gavin Newsom, Pete Buttigieg, Kamala Harris, AOC.

Like they're all that's a tough one.

Yeah, see, they're all like you can make a case for all of them.

And then it gets more subjected.

And then the thing that I think is important to note, and this is like a huge problem in

2020 is the electability discourse is very racially engender coded.

And there's just like, there is this is particularly true in 2020, where it's just we filter

the election through the mind of a white dude and Wisconsin.

And like who do they want?

And people, you hear this in focus groups all the time.

People project onto voters.

They do not know biases.

It's like Kamala Harris did with Pete Buttigieg is the VP, right?

You say, well, he's a gay man.

That's too much for America.

And that's like that very, and if you take that, but if you take that, you never, like,

you would have said, you also would have said Brock, you say, Obama, too much for America.

They're like, it's just, it is, it's just it, I think the discourse is, there are some

things you can look at that for real.

There are some things that makes it quite complicated and, and sort of can narrow the

aperture of what you're looking for.

Absent, you're not even doing it based on data.

You're doing it awesome of perceived biases to the electorate or small, sample sizes of

women losing presidential elections.

Sometimes I think we confuse in the electability discourse, the very real perceived biases

in the, in the, in the electorate, right?

And the fact that a lot of this electability discourse is absolutely gender and racially

coded with, okay, but that's, that is true.

That is how people think and what is a candidate in the campaign do to overcome that.

So yes, people thought that Barack Obama was, couldn't be president because we're, how

are we going to elect a black guy named Barack Hussein Obama from Chicago as president of

the United States when we just lost with the war hero against George W. Bush and, and

even black voters in South Carolina at the beginning of the campaign did not think that

Barack Obama was ready to become president.

So what did Barack Obama do?

He won over a bunch of white voters in Iowa and proved that maybe it's not so crazy to

think that a black man named Barack Hussein Obama could become president.

So part of this is realizing the biases that exist in the electorate and then, and then

putting together a strategy to overcome those biases and prove yourself unfair is it

may be it is the world that we live.

Yeah.

And what makes it more unfair, and this is where it played in 2020 is there's a lot of

the campaign that ever happens before you get to actual voters.

Yeah.

And so it's like you need money, you need attention.

And when people like, it, there was a, Elizabeth Warren was at the top of the polls.

And so there was a newer time story about how Elizabeth Warren probably couldn't be

Trump.

And she really tanked after that because the hyper engaged Democrats, particularly once

in Iowa, New Hampshire were like, oh, wait, we love Elizabeth Warren.

We like her policies, but she probably can't be Trump.

Well, then we six and ten of us would prefer to have someone who could be Trump.

And this is going to absolutely shade a lot of the discourse going into 2028, particularly

because we have lost to Donald Trump two times now.

Yep.

You know, and so like, you know, unfairly or not, it's going to be a huge part of it.

It's going to be, it's going to be, I think, hard for a lot of these candidates to overcome

it, but, you know, stranger things have happened.

Barack Obama became president.

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Hi, my name is Mitch Landry.

My name is Aaron Haines.

My name is Jennifer Paul Mary and we're hosting a new series called Long Play.

The South is the new political epicenter of the country.

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Where Republicans are going through their own reckoning in the South too.

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The polls were off by a decent amount in Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota for different reasons.

As the host of Polar Coaster, you are therefore required to defend the switch craft that you

keep telling us will predict the future with near certainty.

Yes, that is.

That's been your message.

That's been your message.

That's been your message.

The poll are not a snapshot in time.

They are not an imprecise measure.

They are perfect.

Sucing.

Yeah.

Look, I think if we look at these, the polls were very wrong, but let's talk about what

that means in this case.

One, it's worth noting that primary polls are often quite wrong.

Yeah.

Like they have a long history of being wrong.

That has become more true in this era where it becomes almost impossible to get anyone

to take a poll because polling is now looks much more like election modeling where you're

guessing what the electorate looks like in advance and then waiting your very random sample

to match that.

If you guess the, if you model the electorate wrong, you are going to miss everything.

It's easier to model in a general election, particularly now we've had a bunch of them

in the Trump era, which is why the polls were more accurate in 2024.

That's even harder in a primary.

It's particularly hard in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Minnesota because those are open primary

states where independence and Republicans can vote.

It's one of the reasons that even it appears that the internal campaign polls were all wrong

because in those states, you can't even go off the voter file to poll.

Yeah.

We're basically doing either these media polls, so it's relying on self-reported party ID

and the campaigns are using modeled support where they sort of guess whether someone's

repulping in a Democrat, but you go into it.

You have no idea how many independence are going to, like they walk in to the voting booth

and they pick a ballot.

They get to choose right there.

It's very hard to know.

It also seems very clear that in these states, the pollsters oversampled young voters and

these young voters tend to be more progressive.

They're the one supporting Abdul and Flanagan and Hong.

That's a misjudgment of how many people vote.

They are under sampling, working class voters in particularly in Wisconsin and Michigan,

Black voters.

The other thing I'd say is most of the polls that we saw were not high-quality polls.

We don't have New York Times, Seattle polls of these races.

Marquette is a highly-reliable poll in Wisconsin and we're wrong, but their poll is actually

more than a week old by the time the election happened.

One thing that we get a poll a week out and it says the race is tied and then one

candidate wins by three.

Everyone says the poll is wrong.

It's like, well, it's also possible, in addition to that, just being the March and

Vairer, people changed their mind, undecideds move.

In Wisconsin, in particular, it seems very clear that there was real movement at the end.

You had in that state navigate did a poll that was like five days out that ended up being

quite wrong, but in that poll, so you had nine percent of undecided voters.

All those voters seemed to have gone to Crowley.

You had a bunch of other candidates in the field, including two in Mandela Barnes and

San Diego Regas, who had dropped out of the race.

They had supporters and some of those supporters went to David Crowley.

We have to see that.

She hit her.

Francesca Hange was basically polling around 40%, which is what she got.

Some of these polls she was over, she was four or five points over, 40, but yes.

It basically got her within a reasonable polling error.

They got her number.

What happened is everything else moved towards Crowley.

He had momentum.

She was struggling down the stretch.

He spent $4 million in the last week, 10 days or so on broadcast and linear television,

which I think made a huge difference.

We have to remember that people changed their minds, undecided voters decide, and that

is what affects the final margin.

It's certainly a huge factor in what happened.

At least in Wisconsin, probably to some extent Michigan as well.

Minnesota is a little more confusing to me because in that one, the polls towards the

end showed it kind of close.

And then instead, Peggy Flanagan, the more progressive candidate won by 20 points.

So they underestimated the more progressive candidate in Minnesota.

Yeah, those polls might just been wrong.

It just goes to show you, I think, that it's a number of different factors.

And I wouldn't think to ourselves as we go into the midterms and you tell me if I'm

wrong, that like, oh no, they're always going to oversample younger voters and the polls

are all going to be off because that didn't happen in Minnesota.

It hasn't happened in other places.

It's possible.

It's also worth remembering that in 2025, they polls in New Jersey and Virginia were off.

They were very far off in New Jersey.

And they undersampled Democrats in that case or over-semple Republicans.

And it's going to be interesting.

This is the, I mean, we're getting super nerdy here, but they're in, they were wrong in

16.

The polls were right in 2018.

2018, pre-haved like a normal midterm because all of these low engaged Trump voters did

not turn out in that one.

2020, they were incredibly wrong.

2022, they were actually quite right.

Every no one believes that because everyone thought that red wave is coming, but the polls

were historically accurate in that race.

And then in 2024, the polls were right again.

But the pollsters for the most part, there are some exceptions in Nate Cohen of the

times included.

But they used basically like statistical sledgehammer to jam more Trump voters into the polls, which

worked.

How they're going to factor in and model Republican turnout in this election and how

they're going to try to accommodate it.

Like what is the baseline?

Are you, if you do it, what are you waiting, they waited, basically in 2024, they waited

the poll to the 2020 vote share.

I don't know how they're going to do this here.

It's going to be very interesting to see.

I should probably bring this up since it's sort of breaking here as we're talking.

But Fox News released two Senate polls, Michigan, Mike Rogers 51, Abdul 47, and then Sherid

and Ohio is up by the same as he was last time, which is 5345.

I don't know if I buy either of those.

I mean, Sherid Brown is not winning Ohio by eight.

That'd be a 19 point over performance.

That's what I'm saying.

That to me seems further off than the.

Yeah, I would say that both of those races end up being closer.

Closer and like two point races.

I think there's a world where Abdul could win by four or five.

I find it highly unlikely that Mike Rogers could win by that much.

Yeah.

But I think there's work for Abdul to do.

I think he has real work to do.

And like he in all of the polling, even the ones that showed him doing the same as Haley

Stevens against Mike Rogers, he was dramatically underperforming the political environment.

It should be this is Michigan.

It's 5050 state.

It should be he should be starting with six points in his pocket, right?

Because yeah, for because so everyone knows even though Michigan's close, if the national

environment is six points more favorable to Democrats than it was in 2024, then yeah,

that's how you get that.

Speaking of election forecasts, the promise 100% accuracy Nate silver dropped his midterm

model this week called forecast with leading indicators polls and expert ratings or flipper

for short.

We want to call it flipper.

So Nate's forecast have historically been closer to the mark than I think most other

models.

He's not known as someone who's who's biased towards Democrats or Republicans in his in his

modeling.

But it is notable that he gives Democrats as of this recording an 86.1% chance of winning

the house.

And I said as of this recording 56% chance of winning the Senate, but I bet once he throws

in that Michigan poll, that might go down a little.

Yeah, the Fox is an a rated poll.

And so that will bring that down.

Yeah.

And since it just came out, I'm sure he isn't updated yet, but by the time you listen to

this, it will be updated.

What do you think of Nate's forecast and what should people know about what goes into

that besides just polling?

Because I think some people probably just assume that it's a polling aggregator where

you just throw in a bunch of polls together and average, which it's not.

Yes.

For a long time, the real clear politics polling average was what everyone followed.

And that really was just math where they added all the polls together and then divided

by the number of polls at the average as if they were in fifth grade math.

What Nate does and others like Laxajaine do as much more complicated is they build a statistical

model that takes in polling.

They then Nate at least waits the pollsters based on quality of the poll.

He actually has it in the past.

I don't know if he's doing this in the case of established.

It calls a house bias that some pollsters over time are tend to be more democratic or

more Republican.

And then he will factor in that house bias into it.

He will also includes fundamentals like how much money the campaigns have raised, the

larger political environment.

There is a benefit to encompassing in these races and fits that in.

And then this time, actually, he has three versions of his model, the deluxe model, if

you will.

And then he actually factors in the expert ratings from political report and others.

It's interesting too.

If you read his methodology page, because the polls have been so wrong, he's overweighting

towards fundamentals this time.

Or he's putting that over.

He's putting more weight on fundamentals than he has in the past.

Interesting.

Interesting.

And I'm going to be very, very interested to see what the Michigan poll, by the time you

answer, listen to this, you may be able to go to his site and check it out.

But how that changes it.

Because if I recall correctly, I think maybe this was actually a shame, but I don't want

to smear him with cases that was an incorrect take.

But basically, some people's model, if Democrats chances of winning the house, the Senate

are, let's say they're 57 or whatever it is, if they lose Michigan, that number drops

to the 30s.

So that if Michigan is a, you really need Michigan to take the Senate.

And if we are a poll that shows us losing Michigan badly, we'll probably move the Senate

forecast a little bit at least.

I also think the Senate forecast started even higher than 56% and it went down to 56 today

because there's a 57 on the first day.

Yeah, there was an Emerson poll that shows.

Texas.

It's Texas.

I'll tell you what though, that poll shows, it was 70% of the black vote.

And if he is down one of the 70% of the black vote in Texas, then he is going to be,

he's going to win by fair amount.

I think that is a bad, probably not enough voter stuff, should have it, but he's going

to get a lot more than 70% of the black vote.

Now we're not in the prediction business and we always warn you about these things.

So what good is an election forecast for all of you?

I do think that one of the more interesting parts of Nate's forecast, Nate's model is

for the House races, they show you what are the closest House races in the country.

And that list can update.

And I think if you want to volunteer, if you want to donate money, it is helpful to look

and see the closest House races, the closest Senate races, and then you go to votes of America

and we can make sure you're connected with the right people so you can have something

to do and someplace to donate.

So I do think that is very helpful to have what races are the closest and to see it

updating over time.

It is emotional management for most people.

They were going to live and die with several point drops in the forecast.

Yeah, don't do that because it's going to be quite a polar coaster, if you will,

for now until November.

All right, last thing before we go, White House Press Secretary Caroline Loveit announced

on Wednesday that she's leaving her post at the end of the month to quote embark on a new

chapter and spend more time with her kids.

She will of course be missed.

And as former White House Com staffers, we thought it only fitting to say farewell with

a tribute to some of her finest moments.

She's become a star.

It's that face, it's that brain, it's those lips, they way they move, they move like she's

a machine gun.

Hey, Trit has no place in the United States of America under President Donald Trump.

The president's face spotted out and about a number of times with bandages on his hands.

The president is literally constantly shaking hands.

Why was Renee good, unfortunately, and tragically killed?

I'm asking me, my friend, because a nice agent acted recklessly until we don't have to

fight.

Oh, okay.

So you're a biased reporter with a left-wing opinion.

What are you wanting to do?

Yeah, because you're a left-wing hack.

The president had a feeling again, based on fact that Iran was going to strike the United

States, was going to strike our assets in the region.

At this moment in time, of course, the ballroom is really the president's main priority.

He believes that Canadians would benefit greatly from becoming the 51st state of the United

States of America.

It's well past time that President Trump was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Because it was 2011, when Barack Obama and Seth Meyers said you'll never be President

Gloppyty Bob.

No.

Here we are with President Trump going on stage as a two-term president.

For the first time, this speech tonight will be classic Donald J. Trump.

It'll be funny.

It'll be entertaining.

There will be some shots fired tonight in the row.

Very, you know, just North Korean propaganda threw him through.

Yeah, it's not dead, Bob.

Yeah, he will.

I love the Canadian.

He does believe that Canadians will benefit from being the 51st state, just said with

a straight face.

Which was a thing that actually happened in American politics.

Yeah.

Well, Kudos to her for saying that all with a straight face.

As for who might replace Levit at the podium, names are already being floated.

All across the mega media ecosystem, lots of exciting possibilities and it's a wide

open field.

So each of us, without sharing with each other yet, has ranked our top five most likely

picks.

So why don't we, I think we should each go five, five, four, four, three, three, and

then we get to get to that.

That's what it was hoping for.

Okay.

I really kind of missed that punch line of mine, but we'll do it this way.

Okay.

That's fine.

You want to go for who's your number five?

Who's your number five?

Number five is Marka Rubio.

That's funny.

That's funny.

I already saw some of the Rubio and the couch memes where he's got a blonde wig on.

So yeah.

Yeah.

The internet.

I use this.

Now, my number five, Erica Kirk.

Now, that is an interesting suggestion.

You think it's crazy, but you're like, wait a minute.

She's, you know, she's, there's a lot of public speaking, big, you know, big favorite

of the mega world.

Who knows?

Number four.

So before I give number four, I would like to just point out my thinking here, which

is down to Trump has had five press secretaries.

Can you name all five?

Wow.

Oh, because we have to go back to the first term, huh?

Yeah.

I can do it first.

Sean Spicer.

K.

That's funny.

Yeah.

Oh, what's his name?

Scare Mochie.

Never press secretary.

He wasn't for 14 days.

He's a communication structure.

Oh, he didn't step in for the, oh, yeah.

Oh, Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

Yep.

Um, Caroline's a bit.

And so now I'm just one, I have one, right?

That I'm missing Stephanie Grisham.

Oh, Stephanie Grisham.

Yes.

Okay.

Okay.

So five press secretaries.

The last four have been women.

Mm-hmm.

I don't think down Trump's going to pick a man.

I don't either.

So my number four is, although I have one, I have one man on my list.

I did too, obviously.

But my number four is Anna Kelly, who's currently the deputy press secretary.

You know, I keep seeing that around, but it's like, I feel like he always wants to go

for someone who has been on TV a bunch.

He's also lazy.

So yeah, that's true.

He's a man so lazy, wouldn't even pick a new national security adviser.

Yeah.

That's true.

That would be the, that's the lazy rat.

I don't think it's, obviously, what I, not what I think is most likely, but I think

it's on the table.

My number four is, my favorite in yours, Trisha McLaughlin.

Oh, God, that's definitely not happening, but that is a good suggestion for content purposes.

You don't think it's, I think, well, I did read somewhere that she might be pregnant.

So that would be tricky, at least if it's happening soon.

I don't know how pregnant she is or what, but like, but I could see, I mean, she was

clearly auditioning for White House press secretary her entire time at DHS.

And she has not taken a new job yet.

Okay.

It, look, it is on the table.

All right.

Which is my number three, Carrie Lake.

Yeah.

Carrie Lake is, it's a possibility.

Trump loves her.

Trump loves her.

She's a loyalist.

She is crazy.

She's crazy.

She'll fight with the press, which is what he cares about most.

She's very, she's a former reporter.

She's good on TV in a Trumpian way.

She's good on TV.

Right.

Right.

Yeah.

I thought about her and I was like, is she, you know, Trump likes his spokespeople, like,

young, like Fox News anchors.

Yeah.

It's this one's the only thing that, yeah.

Well, in my number three, same thing, which is a departure from this, which is Scott Jennings.

Interesting.

See, I was thought about Scott Jennings, but then I went with my whole man thing and

then I had to do the very cheesy and funny Rubio joke.

I would not put the money on Scott Jennings, but I put him on my list because I like

we are betting all of these on CalShi, right?

That's, yes, of course.

Yes, obviously, as we do with everything.

My number two, Katie Miller.

So I was going to have Katie Miller on there and then I, of course did some research for

this segment and in one of the political stories about the search, a source close to Miller

said, not happening.

Absolutely.

That's exactly, oh, no.

You think that's what Katie Miller's word?

Yes.

Maybe.

What was she, she, she has a wildly successful podcast.

Maybe she just do the podcast in the briefing room.

Yeah, that's probably good.

She likes attention.

She's very combative.

Yeah, I mean, she would, yeah, I could say it.

I have, is it on my number two?

No one.

Just doesn't fill the role.

Continues to have a bunch of dipshits, jump into the briefing room once in a while and

says, fuck it, I don't even want the press.

I don't want to deal with that.

He's the press secretary here.

Yeah, I thought about putting that on my list too.

And then I, I thought that was maybe like a little, a little too, trying too hard for a

viral clip, if you will.

What?

That no one or if I said Trump, if I don't Trump, never one choices, Donald Trump.

Yeah, that is what that is.

That seemed like a bit much.

Yeah, no, that is a bit much.

I think he really cares about the briefing.

He wants to watch something.

He's going to watch something.

He watch, well, there, it is a wall in the Fox schedule during the day.

I think he does not watch Wilkane.

So usually he put the briefing is during Wilkane.

And so that's all that problem for him.

Wilkane.

Too dumb.

Yeah.

All right, number one.

Number one, this is a totally out of left field.

It's a crazy choice.

Rachel Campos.

Duffy.

She's on a Calche, but she fell.

She started it like 40% like, I don't know how they got there.

I think it's like 40% or something and then she's like falling down to less than 1%.

Yeah, I think I'm not sure the people who are betting Calche.

We have to watch for us.

If all of a sudden there is a surge behind one person.

Yeah.

That's the only thing you can trust.

She's a Fox News anchor.

She is very, she's reality TV star.

She's in the family.

Very toughy.

Very toughy.

In the family.

Yeah.

Loyal Trump likes her a lot.

He talks about her a lot.

Back before Sean Duffy was in the cabinet.

He used to tweet in truth about her all the time.

Oh, big fan of hers.

Oh, I could see that.

She was on my list.

Yeah.

I should have had.

I should have kept her on my list.

I have Alina Habba.

That's yeah.

I knew she is the favorite right now.

I knew in my soul you were in Piccalina Habba first.

And so for content purposes, I took Alina Habba off my list.

I know I almost didn't want her first because I was like, I think it's more it's boring

as this selection, but I actually think if we're just doing most likely, I would put

money on that.

Yeah.

So you were trying you were taking this as a serious game.

Yeah, of course.

Yeah.

Just like I did.

I was terminally online, you know, I mean, I was doing this for totally content purposes.

Of course, of course.

Yes.

Of course.

Yes.

Well, good luck to everyone on our list.

And hopefully it was good to do some outside the box ones that are not on Calgary like Eric

Kirk and Tricia Boglawflin because maybe if we say them, you know, the MAGA, the MAGA

verse listens to us.

So we just, if we put it out there, maybe we can build some buzz behind these.

If you are listening to positive America and then you think that we said something about

who Trump might hire as his press secretary and then you went and put money on that, get

help.

Well, that might describe Elijah.

This is probably so far behind.

He's so far behind help.

Yeah.

I can hear us still laughing.

All right, Dan.

Well, that's our show for today.

Tommy will be back in the feed on Sunday with a conversation with tech journalist Casey Newton

about the terrifying AI moment we're in.

Exciting.

And what we can do about it, Casey's awesome.

That's going to be a great conversation.

And then, uh, and then John and Tommy and I will be back with a new episode on Tuesday.

Have a good weekend, everyone.

Bye everyone.

Positive America is a crooked media production.

Our show is produced by Austin Fisher, Saul Rubin, McKenna Roberts and Ferris Safari

with Reed Charlene, Elijah Cohn and Adrian Hill.

Our team includes Matt DeGroat, Ben Heffko, Jordan Cantor, Charlotte Landis, Carol Peliviv,

David Tolls, Mia Kelman, Ryan Young and Naomi Single.

Our staff is probably unionized with the writer's Guild of America East.

Hi, my name is Mitch Landry.

My name is Aaron Haines.

My name is Jennifer Paul-Merry and we're hosting a new series called Longplay.

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.

I mean, the South is always shaped American politics.

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The stakes could not be higher, but to win the South, you have to understand it.

People in the South feel really misunderstood, left behind, put down on and they want to explain

that to somebody.

We're traveling across six Southern states to explore the people, the issues, the assumptions

that no longer hold and what the rest of us are missing about a region that will shape

the future of our politics and our country.

From left right and crooked media starting July 27th, watch Longplay series on YouTube at

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