MAGA's Big Fat Greek Scandal

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That's a mouthful.

Welcome to PlotSafe America.

I'm John Favre.

I'm Dan Fyfer.

On today's show, we'll talk about how the great Republican midterm panic has begun.

Trump throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks, including more money.

The week of big Senate debates in Maine, Michigan, Iowa, and maybe Texas.

Now that Trump has weighed in.

And of course, we'll discuss the absolutely in the world.

And I'm going to talk about the great Republican midterm panic.

Iowa and maybe Texas.

Now the Trump has weighed in.

And of course, we'll discuss the absolutely insane report about ambassador Kimberly

Gilfoil demanding that a Trump donor pay off her $100,000 AMX bill in exchange for influence

pedaling and so much more.

Then you'll hear Love with Conversation with Florida Senate candidate Angie Nixon.

But first, CrookedCon is coming up.

November 5th through 7th and Washington, DC.

We really want you guys to be there.

We are excited to announce 24 different conversations and debates across four stages, everything

from the Democratic brand, which is awesome.

To the future of AI, to building the winning campaign.

We've also got a live taping of still counting with Nate Silver, Claire Malone, and Galen

Drouk.

And that's in addition to Pots of America, Love with Relievit, and Strix, Groot, and

the live shows.

It's going to be so much fun.

Go to CrookedCon.com.

Get your tickets now.

We want to see you in DC.

It's going to be a good time.

Everyone's going to be talking about it.

You're going to need to be there to know what happens.

And maybe you can ask a question yourself and there's going to be all kinds of fun surprises.

So get yourself to DC, CrookedCon.com.

And right now, the staff is trying to figure out fun surprises.

I mean, I don't want to reveal anything right now.

I don't think I'm supposed to.

So now maybe we can get to work.

Yeah.

All right, Dan.

25 days out from the midterms and the Panikens are panicking.

As they do.

As they do.

Trump's approval keeps getting worse, not better.

The Democratic lead on the generic ballot keeps getting bigger, not smaller.

I think Nate Silver has it at nine points as of this recording, which is a new high.

The New York Times just did about three dozen interviews with some extremely unenthused

Trump voters in Western Michigan.

Here's a little taste of what they said, a couple quotes from the interviews.

He's losing touch.

He's not making sense.

There's very low energy on the Republican side.

He's just not there in my head anymore, devastating.

But this is my favorite.

President Trump has been saying vote as if I was on the ballot.

And that's exactly what I'm going to do, not vote.

These are all Trump voters, Dan.

They were Trump voters.

Meanwhile, Trump's top two political advisors fled the country to advise a Putin align client

in the Balkans had some better business overseas.

So they skipped town for a little bit.

Mike Johnson told Fox News that if he loses his job as speaker, he would move back home

to start a lawn care business if that's what God wants.

Drew.

That's a true story.

But Trump himself, well, the president is locked in on what the image of Trump is.

American people want him to be focused on handing out medals to AI billionaires and to

himself.

Let's watch.

Elon is our modern day Thomas Edison.

And Elon, I want to congratulate you, my friend and all of that.

But you are a very, very special guy.

Mr. President, we have been able to find the medal from your uncle.

And we here want to present it to you in a beautiful frame.

What a fucking glaze fest.

He's got his given medals to Elon, to Jensen.

Twong, as Trump said, through the offense.

I mean, the amount of money that people on that stage had given Trump or Joe nature

of all can cause this was shocking.

Yeah, like what a surprise.

All the science medals went to the billionaires that have been, you know, supporting Trump

in some way or another.

And the guy from Microsoft at the end, who obviously he's, they've done their share

of like Trump coziness, but it's not in the same group of people going like full

mega.

He's kind of like three steps further away from everyone else.

And and and some of the white house was like, well, we can't be having Trump giving

all these medals away without giving Trump something.

Well, obviously, let's take the weird story.

He always tells about his uncle and being a genius at MIT that he weaves into every fucking

anecdote and turn it into a video and a special prize just for Donald Trump.

It is truly fantasy camp and all times you're not in Trump.

But it's also like 20, it's 25 days to the midterms.

This is what they're doing.

This was the, this was the public event today.

It's donor maintenance, John.

It's donor maintenance.

Yeah, that is true.

That clip really pairs well with the New York time story that I mentioned with all those

voters.

What do you think of that piece and didn't make you feel any better about the scary possibility

that I know is keeping all of us up at night or waking us up early in the morning, that

the polls, the very good, exciting polls that we're all seeing are somehow missing all

these Trump voters who just won't answer the phone or.

I love how you turn this question about Republican voters hitting Trump into a, are the polls

right discourse?

What else is there to say?

Yeah, that is basically it's basically,

five days trying to go down the checklist of worries here, you know?

I don't want to be too, I don't want to be too excited and get carried away.

Yeah, what would it be the worst thing that happened if you were happy for 25 days?

Me any less.

Am I not laughing?

You're good.

You're not going to be any less sad on election night if you were sad now.

I told this to someone working on a very competitive campaign who was saying that they were

feeling cautiously optimistic and I said, that is a good way to be because it's not going to

change the outcome of the race to make yourself feel miserable for the next couple weeks.

I want to be very clear, do as I say not as I do because you've worked on races with me and

you know exactly how I operate and my goal is to emotionally prepare for the worst and hope for

the best.

And I have done that before.

So here's what I take on this.

One, this is hard for me because I loved every single word of the story.

Really, there was usually there's like some to be sure, but everything was, it was just gravy,

the whole thing.

But I've also been running a 20 year campaign against made on the street journalism,

because I think it's so fucking stupid.

We're just going to go to it.

You know, we spent a lot of time in the Trump 1.0 yelling about the diners.

This is basically like they went to the diner and now the diners are good.

I have that same thought.

The reason I think it's important now is because so much of the data,

like the thousands and thousands of interviews and all the data points that we're getting in

the polls are pointing in one direction.

And so you kind of want a qualitative focus group style gut check.

And now this is not scientifically like a focus group.

I was going to say you should have a focus group.

I know.

But if you listen to Sarah Longwell's focus groups or other people's focus groups or interviews like

this, you start to get sort of the sense on the ground that like, okay, maybe this is sort of in

line with the polls.

Yeah, this is, if you listen to Sarah Longwell's focus group podcasts or you just pay to,

you have the access to the focus group data, this in Navigator research is a bunch of

really interesting focus groups like this.

It is, this is, there was nothing surprising in this near time.

This would you been hearing from Trump voters, the quantitative data backs it up,

not just the Trump's approval rating, but also in this Navigator poll that came out this morning

on Thursday, one in four, 2024 Trump voters regret their vote.

So they either have, so there's this obviously, you know, whether the numbers are exactly right

or the poll, the focus groups are exactly representative.

It is very clear that there is a wide swath of voter Trump voters who either have turned on

them hard, who are just disenchanted with him or have stopped paying attention to him.

Right, he's no longer the centerpiece of the Republican identity or their own,

you know, personal identity.

He's sort of faded into the background and all of those things are bad news for Republicans.

And the only way that I was reading through these interviews and that story,

the only way this could be down to the Republicans benefit is if these same people who are saying

this about Trump are like, well, but you know, Mike Rogers isn't so bad and he seems more

like a normal Republican or Susan Collins seems more like a normal Republican or, you know,

that's the only way that this could go south, I think at this point, because I do feel like,

and I thought this for a long time, the backlash to Trump is real.

And I think the only question is does it extend to all the other Republican candidates who are

on the ballot? Well, every Republican candidate is running ahead of Trump.

Right. Right.

Except, except, except, except, except, even Ken Paxson is doing better than Trump.

Yeah, I think that's true.

And he's getting in Texas by a few points. He just has the smallest, you know, smallest

edge ever Trump with the rest of them. The other, um, to think about this too, I just want to

get to the polls for a second is this is very against brand. So I just want to stipulate that.

I'm not saying this is true. I just as a mere factual and statistical possibility,

it is also possible that the polls are wrong in the other direction. I know I have done it.

It is not a guarantee.

You don't want to speak it out loud, but I think I think I think, and maybe not we're talking about it,

I will do it. I'm going to write this for the message box. Oh, I bid up until now because

like you have been afraid if I say it, because as a number of statistical person, if I,

I'm also very superstitious, so if I say it, then it can't happen. And if I write it, it definitely

won't happen. But I know that's nonsense. But it's just in 2025, particularly in New Jersey.

Yeah.

I say that swung far to the right in 2024. The polls dramatically overestimated the Republican

share of the vote. And you can see that playing out because some of the statistical methods being

used to get more Trump voters in the polls, maybe giving a false impression of what Maga turnout

will be. And so it is possible. They have, they were wrong. They were pro-Republican in 2012.

They were pro-Republican in 2025. They could be pro-Republican this time again.

Also, it could all even each other out because they could be missing some Republicans who don't

want to be answering pollsters. And they could be missing some low propensity data, you know what I'm

saying? Like some of these things could just even each other out. But we'll see, we'll see.

I just, the Trumps focus and not just like the lack of focus on what matters, but the focus on

specifically what's pissing people off. That's the real, that's what's really incredible here.

Like in addition to that AI glaze fest at the White House, there was also, you see his truth

social this morning where he was like the White House, just a random announcement, like in response

to nothing. The White House considers anyone that uses the term artificial intelligence as opposed

to the highly accepted new and more accurate term superintelligence, the enemy. Donald Trump says

he considers people who don't use the new name for something that he has given himself

at the enemy. If you don't use Donald Trump's preferred language, you are the enemy.

This is where we are. Yeah, it's not really, it's definitely focused on the big things, you say?

I like you do things. He's also failing at the small thing. Like people are not using the term

SI, if you will. Well, the AI overlords are, they're all like, yeah, no, absolutely. No, you're right.

Jeff Bezos, someone asked Jeff Bezos about an interview and he switched halfway through the

interview to start saying super intelligence. Yeah, I like super intelligence. Yeah, I'm going to

start saying that now. It's so fucking soon. But they're looking losers. You're fucking, how many

billions do you need before you can fucking grow a pair? The fact that people are taking to the app

that we still call Twitter to litigate this debate explains why it's doomed to fail.

Yeah, it's something. The guy in the time story who said he's going to pretend like Trump's on

the ballot and not vote is a 24 year old Trump voter, one of the many young men who are really

pissed at Trump over Iran among other things, breaking his promise to stop endless wars.

Politico has a story today about how the person tasked with winning back these young men

is none other than JD Vance, who electrifies the youth. And here he is today offering his own

unique definition of socialism. I don't know what the term means anymore. I think in reality,

what it actually means in the American context is that you want to replace American workers with

foreign workers and you want boys to play in girl sports. That's what unites the socialist and

I see running across the United States of America today. Foreign workers of the world unite so

that boys can play in girl sports. Is that a quote from Das Kapital? It's really hard to

overstate how stupid this is. I mean, like we can like we could sit here and debate and explain

how this has nothing to do with socialism in any way, shape or form. But it just also shows that

like, JD Vance fashions himself and all the JD Vance second fans of their fashion is like the

intellectual engine of megaism or political, you know, popular.

Vanguard of the movement down. Vanguard is moving, if you will. And he's given no thought to a

question like this. I thought it was notable because back in our day, most Republicans would have

just said, you know, socialism is the government controlling the private sector and deciding how much

money everyone has and taking away from the makers and giving it to the taker, you know, like they

would have done something like that. Yeah, they would have bit Romney Paul Ryan did up. Yeah. And

JD Vance maybe sees that that's not as effective. Well, it's a little hard when the government is

literally seasoned the means of production by taking ownership stakes in companies in exchange

for giving them access to foreign markets. Yep. I think that might have gone through his mind as well.

Well, he's well, we're megaism or whatever you want to call it. The movement is now big government

authoritarianism. It's not small government capitalism. It's socialism for the people that they like.

Yeah. For the rest of the people. Yeah. And the people who support them and it is everyone else can

go fuck themselves. Trump himself has been going with the strategy of trying to bribe people

into voting Republican. The government's putting $1,000 deposits into Trump accounts for children

born in 2025 or later. That was an announcement this week. They're sending one time $90 payments to

20 million Medicare and rollies, $90. Woo. And mailing $500 refund checks to some Obamacare

customers. And Trump continues to pretend he will give everyone $5,000 if Republicans win and

then control government, which apparently they don't do now. Here he is repeating this promise

again in Texas on Wednesday. We just sent out to the victims of this Democrat fraud checks for

$500 each, including 139,000 families from Texas. If the Republicans win, you'll each have $5,000

in your pocket and economic success for our country. We call it the Trump dividend is approximately

$1 trillion, but we have a record setting $21 trillion that's being invested in the country.

So when you think of it, it's really easily handleable. It is easily handleable.

Handleable. Handleable. It's easily handleable. It's just $1 trillion or just given away. How

confident do you feel that all this bribing and attempted bribing won't have any impact on the

midterms? Pretty damn confident. So I think there's two ways to look at this. One is

by various estimates, including one by Mark Zandee of Moody's Analytics, the Iran War,

just since the Iran War, the average American family has spent an extra $1,000 for increased

gas prices, increased groceries, interest costs, mortgage rates. So $1,000. And so he's giving a

tiny fraction of people in the country somewhere between $90 and $500 or $100.

The numbers, even if the checks, you get a separate between the checks people are actually

getting and the checks the Trump is promising them. If you focus on the checks they are getting,

even if they were incredibly persuasive and people are like, you know what, I know it's going

to cost $90 to fill out my tank over the next two weeks. This $9 check is so impressive. I'm

going to vote for Trump. Those people are distributed, it's not that many people that are

distributed all across the 300 million Americans. It doesn't make a huge difference.

So let's talk with Dan about the checks that Trump is promising. So

GLE at Morris over its strength and numbers did a big pull in this. And when you ask people to

do $1,000, $5,000, this will shock you. But a majority of Americans would like the government to

send them $5,000, $3,000. They do like free money. And even if you tell people it's Trump's idea,

they still will take the money even if they hate Trump. Just like they, even if they hated Biden,

they gladly took their stimulus checks out of from during the pandemic. They'll take their free

money, even if it doesn't matter who the president is. But then if you tell people that the checks

only come in for Republicans keep the majority, the net support drops 36 points.

Wow. A majority of Republicans think it's inappropriate.

That's not a good price, Patriots.

A majority of Republicans think that trying to give people money in exchange for

electoral outcomes is inappropriate. A majority of Republicans think that. And then this is

most important number of them all. Only 13% of voters believe the checks will actually come.

Yeah, I was, thank you. I was going to say that to me is that's the only number that really

matters. No one fucking believes this guy. And they shouldn't because he has a Republican

majority right now. The election will not affect in any way the ability or inability to send $5,000

to every fucking American. What are we talking about? And then on top of that, like he promised

the dose checks they didn't come. But then the government was required by the courts to return

tariff money. Yeah. Do they give it to people? No. They gave it to some of those people standing

on that stage with him today, getting their trillionaire metals from the federal government.

Did you see in that same Trump rally? By the way, that Trump repeated his, we haven't talked

about this. His bizarre riff on Iran hitting Los Angeles where I happen to be, or San Diego with

a nuclear weapon. This time he specifically said, quote, we're not going to let that happen.

We protect our cities. I start this whole thing. What do you, what do you think about this?

I think, like there is obviously a very big debate about what he actually met. There are a lot

of reporters who are really showing off their both sides, Bonafide's by, quote, tweeting

Democrats and saying, this is an unfair representation. What Trump says. I don't care about any of that.

To me, this is more, this is just emblematic of what a disaster it is to have Trump out there.

Because every time he goes out in the open space, he does something that is unhelpful for Republicans.

Like, I don't think a lot of Americans think that Trump actually wants a run to bomb American cities.

Even you and I hate Donald Trump. I don't actually think he wants that either.

But it just is created discourse that all these candidates have to respond to.

It's gotten a ton of attention. People who don't pay attention to politics have heard about it.

These candidates are getting asked, what do you think about this statement? Do you agree with it?

Do you condemn it? And then what's happening now? Republicans up and down the belt are talking

about the costs of the Iran War, which is the absolute, the last thing that Trump, that there are

campaign saps and their pollsters we want them talking about. So more Trump at more rallies.

I think it's pretty clear what he was trying to say, even though he did not say it clearly at

all because he doesn't say anything clearly and he's impossible to follow. But it's his usual

thing where it's a whole nother made up story that's just as ridiculous, right? Which is like, if I

didn't, if I didn't bomb Iran, they would have developed a nuclear weapon even though none of

this, nothing he did in this war since February has done anything to degrade their ability to develop

nuclear weapon. And it's and gas higher gas is a small price to pay for ending Iran's nuclear

ambitions, which we haven't done yet, which we haven't done yet. That's the part that matters

politically, the small price to pay. Stop bitching American people. I am trying to accomplish a goal

that I am failing to accomplish that you do not care about and we're not worried about.

Right. And I just, to me, was like, the targets here for criticizing Trump are many.

And that's why we get up every day. And I don't, you know, I don't need to spend a lot of time on

on how he flubbed his line. And now if Los Angeles fell into the ocean tomorrow, do I think Trump

would care very much and shed a tear? No, I do not. Actually, but I kind of already knew that before

the rally. I didn't need, I need to hear him at the rally to know that.

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Trump is close. You got a secret plan for war. Secret plan for war. Just hold on a couple more

weeks. Get those ballots in. We'll start the bombing again. Gas will go even higher. You won't be

able to do anything about it because there's no more elections with Trump as president after this.

Well, I guess the one in 28, he'll still be president, but you know what I'm saying.

All right, so the bigger question here, did Trump's appearance in Texas actually give a boost

to the candidates? He was there to support because believe it or not, he was there to campaign,

even though you didn't hear that when he was talking about the checks or he was talking about

Iran and Los Angeles and San Diego and giving all the other shit. It's tough to know,

tough to know for Greg Abbott because he didn't show up. He had a very important hospital

dedication. Can't reschedule that. I can't reschedule the hospital dedication. I know the

president's in town and it's 25 days to the midterms, but you know what? I have to go show up

at this ribbon cutting. Ken Paxson was there. The president did try to go after James Telleriko

as he continues to workshop this bit. He's been doing a lot lately about Telleriko's eating habits

Let's listen. He's a vegan. He wants to eat a piece of lettuce, a little piece of lettuce, please.

But he's been seen. You know, you haven't seen him in a couple of weeks. I hear the guys

disappeared. Nobody knows. You know where he is? He's sick because he's been forced to eat meat

for political reasons and he's throwing up all over the place. He's sick. You know, my wife told

me, sir, do me a favor. You have to do me just a little bit of a favor. Is that vegan? It's vegan.

I don't know about that stuff. I'm not into it. But he said it's vegan. Please pronounce that word

properly. I called it vegan. I thought it was, I don't know what I know. I like steak.

Is that why James Telleriko is ill? Does he have the meat sweats and he's been vomiting

from eating too much meat? Profitably. Profitably eating meat to to rebut the charge that he's a vegan.

Vegan. Vegan. Sir. It's a vegan. Yeah, does he? Yeah, does the Mulani really call him, sir?

I wouldn't be totally surprised. I really want a nicer thing she calls him. I would be shocked if she

caught him, sir. Who does call him, sir? Who? Natalie. That'll be Harp. Yeah.

Just saying. I don't know. Just a little mix up there.

What are you? They're making a big deal about a poor James Telleriko who's been sick for a couple

days, like really sick, apparently. He has the flu. He's the flu. And he's also like a type one

diabetic and he's got the flu and he like had to go to urgent care. And they're all out there

like where is he? Where he's just disappeared. And it's like, yeah, he's fucking sick. People get sick.

Here's the thing. When James Telleriko is not on the campaign trail, he's at home in bed sick.

When Ken packs him on the campaign trail, he's in London with his mistress.

Also, it's such a like every, everything they do is so short-sighted, like they can't see around

any corners. Like Telleriko's campaign announced like he's back on the trail this weekend. Yeah.

So he's going to be there. So all of the, your whole week's message about like Telleriko has

disappeared. Like you got one more day of it. And then yeah, what is the, there's no even instant,

like it's, they keep saying like, where's he going? It's missing. It's mysterious and all these

like mega political types are like, there's something must be going on here. What do you think is

going on? Like if like it's obviously complete bullshit, but they want to, they want to, they want

to replace getting transition surgery. Yeah. It's to one of the genders. It's like, what it's like,

it's like, just have a, if you're going to have a conspiracy theory, have a conspiracy.

They, yeah, well, they have, they haven't landed on you. They're workshop in something. So they're

just, they're workshopping it in real time on Twitter, where you workshop conspiracy theories.

Yeah. We'll get, well, we'll get it by tomorrow. I'm sure. And then he'll be back on Saturday.

And then I hope you back on Saturday. Yeah. So after, and then it will, the body,

don't, we'll be back on Saturday. After the rally, Trump took it upon himself to challenge

Tallerico to a debate with Paxton, which is interesting because Tallerico has already, in fact,

agreed to debate Paxton and hasn't only because Paxton has refused to a single debate,

even the one Tallerico proposed on Fox News, a home game for Paxton still won't do it.

Meanwhile, the latest installment of Paxton saying stupid shit at that fundraiser dropped Thursday

morning, where this time he calls for cuts to social security and Medicare.

They changed some reasonable cuts and then towards better, you're going to have to do it.

Or we were going to be, there is no solution. That's just a railing. You have to suck it up.

And we, yeah. So yeah, that's what is meant by mandatory spending for those, for those who aren't

budget nerds who went through the budget battles of 2011. Social security and Medicare.

And if you don't like that, you're just going to have to suck it up. I am waiting for the next

the final installment of this, this is this series of leaked audio from the same fundraiser that

they just keep dribbling out for Kenbacks and just be like, honestly, you should just vote for

James Tallerico. I want to take a pause in this podcast and give a round of applause to the John

Cornens campaign staff. Oh, you think it's them. Well, they, they, someone in this fundraiser,

Republican, reported him and then gave it to someone presumably in Republican politics,

who's then been, they parceled it out. Like, it's so funny not to, I know not to drop it all at

once and just be like, an amateur, an amateur would have just been like, political, here you go.

Here's the whole thing, but just piece after piece after piece and they're leaking it out on

Twitter. And it is just, it's very well done. Kudos to them. If they could have done this good

a job with Ken Paxson's opposition research during their primary campaign, maybe we'd be a different

spot, but not a bad spot for us, but no, no, no. What do you talk to me about this debate thing?

What do you think happened here? I think that all I can, so my first thought was,

okay, they told Trump, oh, Tyler, he goes, been off the trail and he's missing. And so Trump

assumed that like, oh, he's trying to duck the campaign trail and maybe he's trying to duck

debates too. And didn't, and just no one told Trump, Trump didn't know that Paxson has been

refusing to debate. That's like, that's the Occam's razor. Like, they're all just idiots and

no one communicated to Trump that Paxson did this. But I don't know, maybe there's a more sinister

situation. So there's, I think there's, there is the Trumps, this is not my theory, just to be

clear, this is the Trumps, like, jujitsu, political genius, who's like, you know what? Not debating

as fucking stupid. You're behind, you should debate. You got to get that vague and telefreco in front

of the people of Texas. And so I'm just gonna give you a push. Yeah, I'm gonna bully Trump,

Paxson into it. So that's one theory. And he clearly, he hates, he hates, he hates,

can Paxson. So that is possible. The other theory is, it's a version of yours, but whether

they're actually stupider, which is somewhat brief Trump on the race and they told them about

the debate thing, but Trump wasn't paying attention. And he misheard and assumed it. Yeah, he assumed

that, Tyler Rico was the one refusing, which I can see in Trump's head him thinking,

this bait of vegan wouldn't want it to be a man and debate and just thinking that and then

doing it backwards. It just imagined being Ken Paxson's communications director. This came out at

like midnight Texas time, I think. You've just got back from this rally. You feel like you kind of

maybe survived the rally. Trump didn't call Paxson fat and stupid in this one. And you get home,

you open up your beer and then you get a notification that Trump has challenged your opponent

to a debate on behalf of your campaign without telling you. You know, I'm starting to buy your

theory that Trump did it, not because he's some jiu jitsu master, but because like the theme of

this and his entire involvement in the Paxson campaign has been bullying and emasculating Ken Paxson.

You're ugly, you're bad. This guy sucks for him anyway. So like I could see him being like,

fucking go debate. I'm just going to, I'm just going to make you debate by saying it publicly.

This is the race where Trump has the most skin in the game of all of them. He, you know,

there have been like in 2022, he hand picked a lot of the candidates, Ken had said,

I'm lost. It's like this cycle, Paxson's the only Paxson, I guess, Vivek are the two that he

thrust on the Republican party. And this is the one where he threw Paxson, he's thrust on the

Republican party against the wishes of basically everyone else in the party. And so if Republicans win

a tax ascendancy for the first time since whatever is 1988, that will be very embarrassing for

Trump. And so he Trump's doing what he naturally does, which is to already begin shifting blame to

Ken Paxson, as opposed to himself. Now maybe he can say Paxson should have debated.

Yeah, the things he's going to say about Paxson after Paxson loses are if he loses, not going to

would, are going to be so much fun, especially because the things he's saying about him now.

This is what he theoretically wants him to win.

Speaking of debates, they're happening everywhere this week. We're recording this on Thursday

afternoon. Just before debates in three big Senate races, Maine, Michigan, and Georgia.

Let's start with Michigan, where Mike Rogers will almost certainly be asked for his take on Trump's

latest post, giving Rogers his complete and total endorsement. And calling Abdul El Sayed

Mohammed over and over, saying, quote, he goes back to the days of the G-Hod.

The bigger issue for Rogers, though, is trying to pull off an epic flip flop on Trump's trade war

with Canada. Last year, Rogers said that the auto tariffs were, quote, restoring fairness.

And in August, he called the tariffs necessary. But now he's running this ad.

Drinking a libat and watching the Red Wings, Manit just doesn't get any more Michigan than that.

And here in Michigan, we know that Canada is not our enemy. We need to end this terra for now.

Man, Manit just doesn't get any more Michigan than that.

They're drinking this Canadian beer. Could you have not tried a few more takes on that one line

at the very least? Man, it doesn't get any more Michigan than that. It's just, it's the least

believable line I've heard in an ad in a long time. John, this is undoubtedly the best of many,

many takes. It is a shit political ad in every sense of the word. It looks fake. It's a ridiculous

thing to say. It was a film that filmed in Florida where Mike Rogers owns a house.

Yeah, you know what he does? He has been living for many years. He drinks Mojitos and watches

the Panthers. That's what that guy does. All right. And it's just he, like you can say this,

like, you know, people think maybe a little too Florida or rich because that duals would

be going after how wealthy is. And so I'm going to, like, our goal is to show regular guy.

So I'm going to wear a giant fucking sign that says regular guy.

And then let's even get into the terra part of this.

Remember this. Remember when Trump launched the whole trade war again or reignited the

trade war with Canada. I remember Roger statement because I was like, what the fuck are they doing?

It was like, he basically didn't say Trump's name at all. He didn't say the tariffs were bad.

All he said was like, I need to be Senator so I can have a meeting with Donald Trump.

Or I have a, I can get the meeting that I need to bring it into this. I don't know. It was like

some kind of a bullshitty statement that he didn't take a position on either side. And now he's

finally all the way against them. But he's not even that either. Right. Because like they

always say had a meeting and they're like, look, sir, you are losing in the polls.

And one of the problems you have is that Trump is very impop, and he's doing very

impopper things. So we need to find a high profile way for you to break with the president. That

will help people. But they walk up to the edge, but they don't do it. He doesn't say Donald Trump

shouldn't start as a terra for it. He doesn't say the Donald Trump should end the terra for.

He speaks only in passive tents about these things. The terra for should end. Well,

microadgers who the fuck should end it? Say I think with the Iran War. Remember he did that

a couple months ago or a week ago, but who knows what time is anymore? And it's like the Iran war

must end. Well, it's like, well, who started the war and who's the person responsible for ending it?

But he can't say that because he's too afraid that either Trump will turn up the money spiket,

Trump will call and yell at him, but he obviously does not want. Or Trump will come to Michigan,

which Trump has already said he's planning on doing in a barricade living shit out of him.

He's compacted it. But if you're going to be, if you got it, if you know you have to break with

Trump, you have to do what Mario Virus cells are did in that ad we looked at a few weeks. So

you have to actually do it. Look into camera and do it. But he cannot do it. Like I used to

really kind of cringe at all of Abdul's tweeting at microadgers about what a beta he is.

And I don't know that's the best political strategy, but it is not wrong either.

I know. I mean, it's hard to talk about this because we are

record. Like by the time you all listen to this, the debate will have happened.

None of you will have watched the debate. So it's not true. No, all I can think of is like,

what a great set of questions for my groggers. The debate, you know, it's like, oh, so what are you

going to do to end the trade war? Do you think that President Trump should have started it?

Do you think what do you think should happen now? What is what are his answers to all that?

But then let's say he has a different bolder answer in the debate. Then why the fuck you

spending all this money on this ad right now, which is going to be seen by more people because

you're showing it during Michigan and Detroit Lions football games, then your debate on a Thursday

night that's going up against Thursday night football. Yeah, that's true. That's true.

Um, on the Mohammed thing, Axiose had a story Thursday morning about how Trump is fuming at Fox

News for what he sees as overly favorable coverage of Abdul. He posted about it the other day

after the Martha McCallum interview with another G-Hotest reference. He said that her interview was

a softball interview, which it was not Abdul just did really well. Yeah, he ran circles around her.

Apparently his staff, Trump staff actually called Fox about it and did the same thing in August

after that Jesse Waters interview that Abdul later used it in ad. So what do you think?

You think going on Fox seems like it's working. Well, here's what I know. I know that no one,

not Donald Trump, not the White House communication staff, not the Lord himself can stand in the way

of Jesse Waters is crushed on Abdul. Like love finds a way and so he's going to keep doing what he's

doing. I mean, it is, I think there is a, like there's a larger question about whether the

Trumps over the top incredibly racist attacks on Abdul are helping anyway. I think the answer

that is clearly no, but I don't know what do you think? No, I don't think I think. Look,

now by saying no, does that mean I think that there's no like Islamophobia and that there aren't

some voters and Republican voters who are thinking like, well, I don't want to vote for the guy,

not because he's Muslim, but because I think he's G-Hotest. Like I'm sure there's that out there,

but do I think Trump hammering it by calling him Mohammed and G-Hotest like, do I think that's

helping? No, I don't know. There are ways. There's subtle ways to be racist. And even the Rodgers

campaign can't get out of the way with this. So a few weeks ago, they ran this ad with this

Iranian-American Michigan Der who had this moment with Abdul at a town hall. They sort of went viral

on the right. And as it was just this young Iranian-American man, two camera saying, attacking Abdul,

basically saying what's in all these other ads about his association with Hassan,

this completely false bullshit about relationships with the Muslim Brotherhood and terrorist

financing, all this other stuff that is in the ether in a lot of the right wing ads about him.

But then in that ad, they end by saying, I want someone who's going to stand up to the IRGC.

So it's like, I want someone, I need a senator who's going to be for this war and around that

everyone hates, which is just because there is something like if we debated this on text,

you may be telling me at some point, but like they're having this person deliver the message

is a way to sort of ally the accusations of racism in it. And because the audience here is not

necessarily Arab-American people in Michigan, it is white voters who may be susceptible to this,

but also a very sensitive towards racism and to try to do it that way. But they can't even do it

there because then they basically turn it into a pro-aron war at the end.

Yeah, my view on all this is that like there's so many ads now that it's all just wallpaper at this

point and that really for any race and this race too, for dual, it's about like, do voters just

get this overall sense that he's too extreme, you know? And the time spell says they do.

Right. And or at least some do. You know, the more voters think of duals extreme that

Rogers extremities, the only Democratic candidate in the key center races who has that challenge.

Right, right. And so the challenge is presenting a dual as close to a generic Democrat.

You can't do can. Now that cuts both ways because like he's not a generic Democrat in ways that

I think are helping him in that poll, right, which is like he is better on economic messaging and

healthcare than any other the Senate Democrats that they've texted, right? So you kind of, it goes both

ways on this. But like I do think that's why I don't think any one ad is going to do this sort of

like you know, be particularly effective or not. I think it's just like an overall environment of

like messaging about him. And at the end of the day is messaging more like, oh, you know, maybe he's

a little further to the left than me, but seems like he's a good Michigander and he's going to stand

up for us and going to like maybe try to put money in our pocket. So I'm with him or yeah, he seems

a little too extreme, right? Like that, that to me is the end. And I think all these ads contribute to it.

And whatever happens on the debate stage, if anyone sees it. We will because we're going to watch it.

But we're going to watch it. Yeah.

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Let's talk about Maine. Troy Jackson just got a Barack Obama endorsement this week, which

well, not a real shocker. It does help validate Jackson's accomplishments.

It lifts up his bio. It gives him a little moment in the news. I assume Barack Obama is still

pretty popular in Maine. State that he won a couple times. Jackson also had a pretty good

debate on Tuesday, which was fairly tame. But it also yielded just a priceless moment

from woman of the people, Susan Collins. Let's listen. Senator Collins has been

government employee or entire life. She's always had health care. She's always had

steady income coming in. That's not the way it is for most of us. I mean, health care is

a real challenge. And she's made it worse by advancing the big beautiful bills. First of all,

I have not been insured my health life. I spent a year when I was running for governor in 1994,

where I could not afford health insurance. 22 years ago, when I was first running for office,

32 years ago, John. Oh god, that's fine. Yes. 32 years, 32 years ago, when I was first running

for office, there was a brief moment when I did not have government health care. It's so

funny because there are two arguments that the Jackson campaign is making about Susan Collins.

One is she's going to, she's a Trump stew. She's going to help Trump,

the Republicans, or the Democratic states don't do that. The other one is that she's been in office

forever. She's been a public, she's been in government forever and not enough has changed.

And so she responds to this question of saying, look, and she does it with the tone of,

gotcha, you stepped in at Troy Jackson. I'm going to show you that 32 years ago, I briefly,

briefly took a break between my taxpayer funded salary to try to get another taxpayer

funded salary. And in that sabbatical, while I was trying to get another government job,

I did not have the hardship. True hardship. And all of you, former candidates can understand

how hard that would be if you were alive 32 years ago, when I did this.

Truly one of the more amazing moments. Yeah. Like I know that everyone, I heard you in time,

you talk about the Sun Pots of America only friends, which is our secret episode of Pots of

America that you can all get if you subscribe at Krika.com slash friends and become a subscriber

or two friends of the pod, get all kinds of other benefits. Any support, the work we're doing here

at Krika Media, which is trying to get people involved in politics. Anyway, that's just a

digression, much like Susan Collins's digression from government healthcare back in 1994 for a few

months. But when you guys did this, there was the whole road salt moment in that debate to where

at one point, she's like, she's bragging to that like, when I didn't, I didn't support this

trade war because I got road salt off the tariff list with Canada and then Trejaxon's like,

you can eat road salt and like that's everyone said that's a big moment, which was it was a fine

moment I thought. But like, I think this this moment, this is every, this is every argument about

super Susan Collins and every argument you would ever want to make against the Republican in this

environment. The road salt thing, which as you mentioned, I talked about, but it's like, you're

right, it's not, this is not like, where's the beef moment of, you know, in debate history,

it's a good moment. But then I saw a clip today at Trejaxon during a press avail and the question was

Troy, Susan Collins campaign says that you are not giving her enough credit with your road salt

attack. Like she's, it's does it get the full breadth of everything she's done for Maine.

And it's like, great, I'm glad you got road salt. Road salt is important. That's not enough. Do more.

Seriously, I mean, my vibe, the vibe I got from Susan Collins watching that debate and

it actually made me angrier is that like, she seemed so offended. Yes. To even be on that stage,

having to answer for her time in public office and have to actually work to run again for re-election,

for her fucking 10th term in office, it's not that much, but whatever it is, she's been there for

30 years now. So she wants another six, even though she promised she would only run for two terms,

broke that promise. And how dare you question how much I've done for this state, even though,

how dare you question my independence, even though I've actually voted with Donald Trump and the

Republicans 95% of the time, and all the times that I brag about my independence, it's when the

Republicans didn't need my vote so I could performatively be independent so I could win re-election.

Yeah. I mean, it's she, look, she's a fashion of beat. She does suck. She is giving off the vibes of

the kind of income once you go down years like this. I know she is. How are you feeling about that race?

Reed has a question here. I'm going to ask it like, I was going to ask it like it's mine, but it's not mine.

He said, he said, in Obama's endorsement video, he tells Democrats, do not sit this one out. Do you

think that reflects any real turnout concerns that the campaign is seeing, or is that just, quote, unquote,

my anxiety? I'm not saying that I'm sanguine about this race, but it's a

matter of less anxious than Reed. Fucking congratulations. Yeah. No, I have plenty of concerns

about everything. Turn out, maybe turn out will be a new one, but it was, it was not one of the

ones I was thinking about. I think I don't have any, you know, you and I both been around the writing

of these videos. I don't think that that was necessarily a specific line, like based on polling,

but it is true. And we have, this has been sort of mysterious to both of us that there are a

significant number of people in Maine who seem not to like trade Jackson. Yeah, that's

my guess. And so I think a little, whether they're people who were supporting Platonar,

who didn't like Platonar being gone or the process by which we got here, or people who were

supporting Mills who don't like any of this and Mills and Jackson do not like each other. And

as of like two weeks ago, Mills had not endorsed Jackson and Jackson not asked for the endorsement.

Everyone get over your shit and let's try to win this race. So I think there is some sense,

or fear maybe that some of the people who are not enthusiastic about Jackson for some reason,

because of how this process played out and they sit out. And so just like get in here, get in the

fight. I don't know if that's a real concern or not, but if I was trying to find a reason why

that line would be in there, that would be it. Yeah, I would say to all the main Democrats out there,

I know it's been a rough one, but look to Michigan, they had an extremely divisive primary.

You could have Gretchen Whitmer was out there with Abdul this week. Haley Stevens has been saying

great things like all the Michigan Dana Nestle, all the Michigan Democrats have been coming

together. It was a slot can appeared with Abdul, like everyone who was on either side of the

primary Mallory Vorow, they've all come together to really work hard to try to get Abdul elected.

And I really wish I do think that Trojax will probably benefit from more main Democrats and

national Democrats kind of, you know, because like main is the kind of state that again,

it wants to go Democratic. Those voters want a Democratic Senate. That's what they're telling.

Even the New York Times pulled the showed Collins ahead. You had people, most people wanting a

Democratic Senate. So like I feel like the Democrats, they're just have to be reminded that like,

this is our guy and this is our ticket to a Democratic Senate and not a Republican Senate.

I mean, having said all of that, I mean, Trojax and it has like, I think it's around a three-point

lead in the polling average right now. Although, Charlie Cook of the Cook Political Report said the other

day or said today that he hears there's a Washington Post poll coming out that's going to have

Collins ahead. He didn't say that though. He didn't say that? No, Dan. People are so fucking annoying.

He said, I hear there's, I think there's a Washington Post poll. It is. It's really that. It's likely

coming. And maybe it will show what I think it, what I think is what's going to happen in this race.

Which is Susan Collins pulling ahead. But like, but it's weird that like, why would the post-short

poll people like do a poll now it's Thursday that it's not out, but they would like give an early

poll to Charlie Cook like the couple several days before they could. No, it's not that they would do

that. It's the way the Cook process works. It's a bunch of, they do a lot of like, data analysis.

But one of the things is, and I've done this before back way, way back in the day, is you come in,

and you're like in an open dialogue with the people who do the Senate race ratings.

And so it's possible, like the way I interpreted this was, and this maybe this is just like

garble, is there are times when you know like a campaign knows that the, what the poll has a general

idea that the polls are going to show something one way or the other. And that they, you could,

like they are trying, you want to influence those ratings because it can lead to more donations

and more attention on your race. So I can maybe one of the campaigns told Charlie,

because we told, yeah, or told the people who like Charlie Cook sort of, I think he doesn't,

he just writes columns now, but like the, the woman who does, just to tell her, I think her name

is who does the Senate race ratings. I think they probably told her, but it is all spouses,

this is all bullshit. And there's a poll coming. And we're at just show this. It would be the second.

And if the poll after that, it would be the third. Yeah, so who knows again, who knows?

You're by the time you're listening to this week away up tomorrow. Yeah, the poll could be out.

We don't know. It's not like idiots. The night after you listen, this will be another debate,

because they do like it's basically the same four main debates in two and a week.

It's so bizarre. The same schedule is like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like,

the eight WMA playoffs. Yes. Play one night. You're on one night off one night.

Wild in Iowa. There's a debate Wednesday night in Iowa. Josh Turrick and Ashley Henson debated.

Like Mike Rogers, Henson is a Republican who wants credit for breaking with Trump without actually

being willing to make the break. In this case, it is voting to rein in the Iran war.

How do you define successful and immediate? And why did you vote against a resolution in Congress

to call for the war to end? We do need to bring it to an immediate and successful end. And to me,

that means not allowing them to have a nuclear weapon and making sure that we're working with and

protecting our allies in the region. I trust in our U.S. military, the greatest fighting force in

the world to bring this to a close as quickly as possible, because I know people are getting squeezed.

So why vote against the resolution? I don't think we need another resolution. And I certainly don't

want to see the president not be able to do an orderly end to this war. You think that's going to fly?

I don't, John. I don't. It's the same thing where it's like, she's trying to break with Trump,

but can't actually do it because she just want to anchor Trump. And this is sort of the prison

that he's put all of these Republicans in. Yeah. It's, that's it. That's probably the, I think for

all of these center races, that seems like the closest one to me, because that's the one that has,

that's had Turk down the most or at least tied. And it feels like and, and, Rob Sand in the

governor's races so far ahead and all these polls still have Turk and Henson either tied or,

or one of them like one or two points ahead. Turk is an awesome candidate in every way,

shape or form, but he performs a little bit more like a genie. He's just only performing a generic

Democrat, but in these other races where Democrats are, are just exceeding the generic ballot or

the political environment, they are candidates who are incredibly well-known, like Shera Brown,

like we're Cooper, like Mary Peltola, who have a brand independent. Turk doesn't have that,

because he's just a state legislator and does, and isn't known as well. So he is a little more

uphill battle. And Henson also performs a little bit more like a generic Republican, because she's

not particularly well-known. So you don't have, she isn't incumbent Republican, but it's not the same

as the, I think she, I think she has even better than that, because she's, like, yes, she's a member

of Congress, but before she was a member of Congress, she was local Iowa television. Yes. So like,

people knew her as not a politician, which is the best way to be known. Yes. And this is a little

bit like when people worry about Minnesota. It's one of the things that Michelle Taforia has is

she is a media savvy outsider, and that is, and you develop a relationship, like it's, it's why,

how Kerry Lake, even though she obviously lost by a lot, it's why she got to where she was,

because she had that relationship with voters, and that gives her a little bit of a leg up here.

But I think Rob Sand may have co-tails, which will, that would be, that would be, that would be the

key. Last thing before we get to love its conversation with Angie Nixon, the Wall Street Journal

has a wild news story about Kimberly Gilfoil, Trump's ambassador to Greece, former Fox news host

X fiancee of Don Jr., X wife of Gavin Newsom. According to signal messages reviewed by the journal,

Trump donor Eric Dieters offered Gilfoil a million dollars to use her influence with the Trump

administration to help with his various tax legal other issues. Gilfoil bragged Dieters that

everyone from cabinet secretaries to cash betel gets right back to her. Then just before her

confirmation hearing, she asked Dieters to secretly pay off her $100,000 MX bill. The message said,

quote, you could just send it here, it won't show up anywhere, followed by, quote, honey, please,

I need you to get this done for me today. Dieters did not pay, and yesterday, he went on MS now to

speak his mind. Kimberly Gilfoil is a grifter. Kimberly Gilfoil, I have no doubt has done this

some more than me. She's doing it right now in Greece. The only thing that bothers me about Don Jr.

and Eric Trump is how they, along with their father, are getting rich out in the open with crypto

and everything else. I'm a Midwest farm boy. I'm a good dude. I don't like their Yuck-Yuck world.

You could have paid me to go back to Marlago. Wow. The New York Times should have interviewed him as

part of that story. He's not going to the right diners in Western Michigan. Yeah. Gilfoil's lawyer

is obviously disputing the authenticity of the messages, sure. Meanwhile, the Daily Mail reports

that the State Department is now investigating separate complaints about Gilfoil's conduct as

ambassador in Athens. The Dieters story was before she was ambassador, but when she got there,

trouble, including an incident where she was, this is awesome, where she was allegedly drinking in

Mekanos at 4 a.m. called her head of security because she wanted more ice. She ran out of ice at 4 a.m.

so she called her head of security. He did not answer because he was sleeping because it was 4 a.m.

And because he didn't answer, she demoted him the next day.

Mark Arubio declined to comment on all of this before speech in Greece on Wednesday,

where he praised her leadership. And here's how JD Vance handled the question right after he

defined socialism. Do you have any reaction to a US government official, in this case a US

ambassador, asking someone to pay off debt in exchange to access to other government officials?

Well, with that hypothetical, Jen, obviously, I don't love that, but I don't know who exactly

you're talking about. I don't know the full details. I don't love that.

Who doesn't? It doesn't sound great. Now, if you told me it was a Democrat, I would condemn it

pretty quickly, but I don't know who it could be. Probably someone that I work with.

Yes. It probably falls under his preview as frauds are, I'd say.

Yeah, what the fuck frauds are? Dan, what do you think about this story?

There is so much in this story. So much. Every word is a joy. And we can talk about it.

Treat yourself. Treat yourself. Yes, treat yourself. It is funny that we listened to a reaction

the Mark Arubio had to this, where he was chast. I think we can only see the clip out of context,

but it seemed like they were asking him about it. He's like, look, I'm not going to let you guys,

you guys, the press, be the only arborist of truth here. So his argument is, I'm not going to

listen to the newspaper owned by Rupert Murdoch to tell me what's happening that has the signal messages.

Yes. Yeah. It's the thing that is that I love the most about it is that she might be the dumbest

fucking criminal in the world, where she keeps telling, like he keeps texting her like about the money

she wants. And she keeps saying, stop papering this. Eric, I really wish you would stop

papering all these things. And then another quote, it's unbelievable when we have a private arrangement

with you that you would now see see a producer talking about money. Do not say we have any arrangement.

The producer in question there was a Tucker Carlson producer because there was apparently an offer

of a million dollars to get an appearance on a Tucker Carlson podcast, which never came for fruition.

There was no reason, I think this might have been my favorite signal. Quote, what a nightmare.

You'll literally cost me my ambassador ship. Stop writing.

Which is also very privately she continued, if you write an email or a text about,

I'm going to kill you because I love you, but you're so out of control.

But she keeps telling him to stop texting, but she's telling him by texting.

It's like at that point, like I pick up the phone, pick up the phone. It's like, do not text about

this because if you were to text about it, that would allow the police and the authorities to

read the text and put us both in jail. It's sent.

Three sources say investigators are examining allegations involving potential substance abuse,

private planes and helicopters, improper gifts, and gillfoils relationship with an energy

construction company. This is all alleged in the Daily Mail piece that was the follow-on to the

incredible Wall Street Journal piece. But also in the Wall Street Journal piece, it talks about

how after Trump lost, she tried to monetize her, say her role as a mega icon into a business woman.

She started a hair care product, wine. She started a high-end, champagne, and vodka business,

I think. There was a pitch deck that she did for a dinner at Mar-a-Lago train to raise a bunch of

money for it, promising they would get to $75 million in revenue in three years. Then she shut

the business down like three weeks later. It's also like the whole like I need $100,000 to pay off

my MX bill right now. Sam Stein at the Bullwork interviewed this Dieter's guy as well today.

And so I was watching a little bit of that. And Sam's like, well, why didn't she need this money?

She's not, she's like a person of means. She has a lot like millions of dollars. She has no

debts on her public records. And Dieter's like, because it's her lifestyle. She's just like

been living high on the hog over as ambassador to Greece. And she's fucking partying mecanos and

doing all this shit. And so she's just like racking up these bills and just wants random donors

to pay them off by promising influence in the Trump administration.

You have to to be ambassador. She's got a settlement of her financial records to

the Senate and including your debts. So she's going to have to report this $100,000 MX debt,

which would have been quite embarrassing. And so she's trying to get that off the books before

that makes sense. But also in this story, it says that when she got divorced from

Don Jr., she tried to sell their mansion in Florida, I believe, for like seven, they bought

for $7 million. She tried to sell for $30 million. I think thinking that some like,

you know, someone tried to buy influence of Trump administration would overpay like four X

the price for the price for that. I mean, a Russian oligarch paid for Don Jr's next wedding.

So someone can step in there and pay a little higher price for the house.

But then she had, I guess Don Jr. ended up buying it out, buying her out from it for a much,

much cheaper price, which is why she needed the $100,000 to pay her MX bill.

I would say I can't imagine she'll be ambassador for long after this. But I don't know,

she might know too much. That's why she's ambassador now. I know. That's what I was thinking.

Because I'm like, maybe she's going to go down because like, who cares at this point about

Kim Gildfoyle and that family, right? But of course, she could, you know, she was around for a lot

of stuff. She's a lot of rooms. She's a lot of stuff. Yeah. Yeah. So good times, good times.

All right. When we come back, love it talks to Florida, Santa candidate Angie Nixon.

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your workload changes, Autodesk changes with you. As someone tuned into politics you've probably

seen the constant bickering about who belongs in the Pro Democracy movement. Well, we think it's best

to have these conversations in person and hopefully it will also be more productive. Cricket

Con is right after the midterms and it is going to be the first time we come together to hash it

out in person and kick off the 2028 debate. We just posted a ton more info about what to expect

from the big event from November 5th to 7th. So check it out at cricketcon.com and get your tickets now.

The NDC!

Joining me now, it's Angie Nixon, the Democratic nominee for Senate in Florida. Angie, welcome to

the pod. I am so excited to be with you today. Hey, pod, what up, Che? I don't know what the young

people say nowadays. I don't know either. I work in temporaries. I have no idea. There are a lot of

people who have written Florida off. It's shifted to the right. It's the beating heart of Maga.

It's hopeless. What do you say to those people? I would say they have not spent much time here in

the state of Florida because we have been winning things for years here. You know, we just need to

people to just invest in our state. And folks are fed up right now as well. There are Republicans

that are actually leaning into our campaign, our people power campaign. Folks are ready to work

to build a new vision for this country where everyone has the opportunity to be healthy,

prosperous and safe, and I'm excited about it. So, in a response to JD Vance, we had talked about

this on the show on Monday. You spoke movingly about growing up in a home with domestic violence,

how it drives you to take on bullies. But when you posted the clip, you said something that I thought

was really surprising. You said that you carried a lot of anger because of that violence and that

you didn't realize how much it impacted you until this campaign. And I'm just curious what you

recognized and what you feel like you learned about something so personal in your past in this

political arena. Yeah, for sure. So, I carried a lot of shame and embarrassment because, you know,

my mom didn't want anyone to know and so she passed that down to me and my brother. And I never

recognized how I'm always like when I see people hurting, when I see people are scared or

being picked on and bullied, I'm always like, booking up at them. And it wasn't until I had to

really share my story about my childhood with like my senior advisor because they want to dig deep

to see what drives you and things like that. And I put that story, you know, back in the back of my

mind. And I just, it came out and I'm like, you know what? It is me. A lot of people have to deal

with bullies growing up. And it has actually helped other women. They've come to start sharing their

story to me. And it's something that we need to work to stop out. Oftentimes people are afraid to

share things when they're the victims or the survivors of things. We see it right now with,

we've seen it with like the Epstein files. We've seen it with what happened at Cornell, right? We

saw it with what happened with a ton of other stories recently. And it's like, that happened to

was, right? Like we didn't, we didn't make that happen, right? And so we need to, we need to just

take it on and like turn it around and talk about how we're surviving from it and how we're pushing

forward to make things better. I sometimes think with the people that are at Trump rallies, the people

that have embraced MAGA, even if it, even when it's not delivering for them, even when they're

have experienced hardships, right? They're paying for the tariffs. They're paying higher gas prices,

higher diesel prices. That this idea of not demanding more for ourselves, not demand, not truly

accepting that we didn't deserve the pain and sacrifice and loss in our life. Like I do think

that's a, that's a little bit of the what undergirds, some of the kind of anger that you see on

the right as well. And I'm wondering what it's like when you're talking to Republicans, even

Republicans that might still see themselves as being on their team and pro Trump about what's

happening in Florida. Yeah. So thank you for that question. I actually had a similar question

today just a few minutes ago, but it was from young people in regards to them not voting and

just feeling like nothing would change. And I tend to tell people that we deserve better.

Like you deserve health care that you don't go bankrupt getting because medical debt is the

leading cause of bankruptcy. You deserve to have fully funded public schools. You deserve to have

groceries you can afford. Like you work hard and you should be able to afford to live in this

country. And that's not what's happening right now. And so how I talk to people on the other side.

So to speak is I let them know that they are profiting off of us fighting with each other.

They are profiting off of us being divided and distracted because that allows them to distract us

from the fact that they want to privatize social security because they want to make money off

of how like why are we allowing Republicans to move us to a place where they are privatizing social

security. There should be no profit to be had with our taxpayer dollars that she go towards

ensuring that our seniors can live their final days in peace and in good health. And I let them

know that we should not be operating with a scarcity mindset. This is America. This is the land

of abundance. The problem is the folks with the money and the abundance are hoarding it at the top.

Like they are trying to keep us down so that they can have more money on top of more money on

top of more money. And honestly I let folks know that they don't have to be scared. They don't have

to be scared of other other people that don't look like them. Like this is we are a multi-racial

working class. And honestly it's honestly like kind of a class war at this point right now. And we

have to all come together and let these billionaires and corrupt corporations know that we are the

workers. We are working harder than ever and we're struggling just to stay ahead just to get ahead.

And meanwhile they're working less and less and less and they're privatizing everything so that

they can make more money or so they can also trade stops that we don't even have enough money to

trade in the first place. And it's like this it doesn't have to be this way y'all like it doesn't.

We can start electing people who are exactly like us. We can start electing school bus drivers

and teachers and fast food workers and people that work at telemarketing farms like

imagine if regular everyday people you know farmers like imagine if those people were our elected

officials they would actually push for policies that would help benefit regular everyday people.

But what we're seeing right now is that the ultra wealthy are the ones that are

in charge and of course they're going to pass big BS bills that you know give them massive

amounts of tax breaks. Of course they are okay with working family taxes in the form of tariffs

right. Of course they're fine with those things but we can change this all around if we elect

regular hardworking everyday people. Anthos super tired because I've been called out on it

here in the state of Florida because you know we have a large retiree class of folks.

You know what's interesting is Florida has this reputation as being the home of senior citizens.

But I was I went and I was just like looking into it like where what states do have these big

populations of seniors and yes Florida is up there but it's also states that are rural in part

because they've lost their young people because the young people can't afford to live there and

get jobs there anymore. And part of that is obviously what we're seeing with you know Trump and

sort of tariffs and the hardships he's visited on some of his biggest supporters but

I to that point I saw that you pointed out that Donald Trump and Ashley Moody are in ways more

aligned with communism than you right they're attacking you all the time as a socialist but they're

ways in which they are kind of uh oh absolutely what do you mean by that?

Uh-huh okay um going after political opponents right calling for the assassination of sitting

congress members right um stealing taxpayer dollars to push propaganda and we saw that with

Ashley Moody who stole ten million dollars from sick kids that was supposed to go towards their

Medicaid funding and then we are seeing that now with this Trump TV network that Donald Trump

is using and also these the taxpayer money that they're using for paid ads um also the fact that

if if they talk so much trash about Cuba and Venezuela you know rightfully so but they're

deporting people back there like that is crazy to me and then on top of that to go onto

Venezuela and to be okay with taking over the taking control of their oil and helping decide

who sells what knowing good and well his son and his family and friends have vested interest in

selling this oil and and then causing up to the leader of North Korea and causing up to the leader

of Russia and it's like sir like is that what we're doing and then also they're saying that I want

to take over people's businesses when Donald Trump and this administration has taken stocks like they

have taken percentages of of several companies here in this like in this country I'm a small business

owner I don't want nobody coming to take my business absolutely not right and so it is it is so

mind-boggling that they are trying to paint me as the person that they are and I'm pushing back

against that and then they say you know I want to abolish prisons and I want to defund the police

like why would I want to do that when I want Donald Trump and Ashley Moody locked up in jail

like come on like they did some things that they deserve to be locked up for and so absolutely

I believe we need to abolish for profit prisons because why are we privatizing prisons and allowing folks

to capitalize and exploit people people's labor like that doesn't that is and and this is the

biggest shakedown ever of a president right like this is the largest grift ever every every which

way he can monetize something as he's president he is doing he is actively doing now that is not

stopped vans from attacking you as a socialist what set up this this controversy was his saying that

you don't belong in America and when and you responded by saying that you as you just said you own a

business you've called yourself a capitalist who believes we need some strong regulations but you

did join dsa in June of this year in a state where socialist as a label carries a lot of historical

baggage to say the least and I'm curious like put aside what Ashley Moody saying what JD Vance is saying

is this coming up for you on the ground with voters because whatever the you know the

the the sort of the political expedient attack there there are people who legitimately say like I

I come from a place where socialism is for me my family being persecuted my being in

poverty and having to flee I worry about voting for someone who's affiliated with socialism what do

you say to people that you know and and so what I will tell people is they should look at my

track record and what I have done and stood for and that all I want for them is to be able to decide

what they want their communities to look like and what they want their economies to look like the

people that keep pushing this division and and and this rhetoric that I'm trying to come do all

this horrible stuff are like you know my opponents and the media when I go out and talk to people

in little Haiti like who are voting for me and or in in little Havana who are voting for me

what they say and in in Venezuela communities what they say is they want someone who is

who's gonna give them quality health care they want someone who's gonna lure their cost they want

someone that is going to fight against bullies and dictators and that's what I tell for like I

literally was arrested by because of like a dictator style tight action against me right and I

let them know that I don't want anyone to have to worry about that type of stuff I don't believe in any

allowing any type of oppressive government to be in power right and so I let them know to you know

check my track record and I and then I have their back and that has been resonating we've been

able to cut through the noise and the disinformation because of it as part of your housing policy

called for a national rent freeze and an eviction moratorium is a big complicated country with

very different housing issues in different regions that just honestly like oh that doesn't

totally make sense to me right like it may encover I'm we're in an emergency but but places should

be able to decide how they're gonna build and expand housing yeah and so I want to be clear like

that is this is this is temporary it is temporary and I think I need to add to the website and put

like temporary okay because I am a I'm a landlord myself my first home that I was able to purchase

as a single mom um I'm actually renting it out to some friends and I don't overcharge them

a lot more it's actually like 200 more than what my mortgage is and that is in case something

breaks down and that type of stuff um but what I know is that I opened up Facebook today and a guy

said oh my god my rent went my rent went up $350 to like I have to sign and they want to charge me

$350 more property insurance then go up $350 more right um and so what we're seeing right now are

a lot of these private equity firms these for-profit companies that own these homes and these

these that are renting these apartments out they're just doing things simply because they can and

people don't have anywhere else to go and so what I am saying right now is while we have these

working family taxes on us in the form of tariffs while we are still in this thoughtless war that

is causing gas and diesel prices to go up and then causing everything else to go up there needs

to be a freeze on rent for like a year or two right so that people cannot be stressed out about not

having a place to stay and it's kind of similar to what happened during COVID right and so um we like

yeah people are hurting people are like dying on the streets people are having to crap themselves up

because they can no longer afford rent or people are taking food from their children's mouths because

they got to keep rent they got to keep a roof over their heads and so what I'm saying is like let's

let's let's stop raising the rents for a second right um so that people can get caught up I also

believe that we need to lower the interest rates on credit cards for a little bit as well um so

people like people have like I saw in three as the other day a woman was like y'all tell me how I can

pay for my rent on my credit card why do people have to pay for their rent on their credit cards

right now something is broken something is wrong but then you see people and these companies and

these billionaires making record profits number one because they're not paying people what they

what they owe them they're not paying people living wages and then on top of that the people

aren't getting paid living wages and everything else is going up and so I am ready to start like

looking out for just every day people here in this country and not just looking out for these

ultra wealthy folks like folks are hurt like they they're at their breaking point like they are

and I am concerned I know someone a guy lost his job a few months ago and then I read that he

like killed his kids and killed his wife and healed himself like people are taking their lives

because they they feel so hopeless and like nothing is going to change and I talked to my friend

a few weeks ago and she's like I she doesn't even want to get out of bed because the the

doom the the the cloud that is hanging over her about is she loses her job because she sees people

getting laid off if she loses her job this is her home she just bought this home five years ago she

doesn't know she's going to do the job market is not looking looking too good and so like those are

the things that folks are stressed out about and so that's why I say you know a temporary rent

and more torium on evictions so moody won't debate you no she says it's because she doesn't want to

give you a platform because you're such a you know you're just it's just the people can't handle it

I guess it's it's it's it's even if she thought you were such a dangerous it's so many dangerous

ideas she'd want to argue with you about them but no she doesn't how are you going to get in front

of enough people in the home stretch here if you don't get an opportunity to talk to her on that

stage I mean we're we're going out and talking to as many folks as we can this is a people's power

grassroots distributive program where there's there gets out spreading our message our social media

is popping we're interviewing wherever we go we're trying to hit all 67 counties before the

general election and we're just going to continue to get amplified thank you for having me on your

show it's good it's been great to talk to you it's also like but you know there's been a lot of like

oh how did how did Angie Nixon pull off this upset in the primary and then you see do you talk to

you or you watch your video just you're so charismatic it's really intoxicating it's really

very intense it's just a southern girl with the southern draw I talked to a lot of boring politicians

it's part you know gladly so you're from Jacksonville he spent most of your life there

what's it been like campaigning across the whole state what have you learned about Florida right

like Florida's a big strange place the more north you go the more south it is

the the further south you go the more international it is and I would say the more west you go the

more rural it is and I love my state man it's like it's like 20 states in one and also and a few

extra countries as well and we have beautiful beaches and parks we have beautiful people

uh we have such good culture and like good swag and some of it like that we still have southern

hospitality here and you know that sweet tea I still get you my signature diabetic I bet it

come on real quick but um you know like I just I love my state oh my god I love my state which is

why I'm fighting so hard to be able to represent it I just get so frustrated because it's folks

like Ashley Moody who are in power right now unelected Ashley Moody and my office my state because

I'm still a state lawmaker we have to field so many calls and emails from people who have reached

out to her or Rick Scott and they haven't received a phone call back and it's like that is not what we

need to represent us we need someone who's going to be accessible ethical and someone that they can

trust and I pride myself on acting as though I work for people like actually working for people I

don't I don't believe that the constituents work for me and that is how Ashley Moody operates

and I work for folks and whatever it is that they want me to do if it's within reason and

if it makes sense as far as like it helps improve the quality of life for people I am going to work

to do it. Well Angelicson thank you so much for being here good luck in this next month and I'll

just say my parents live in Boine Beach Florida. Hey and I would say the the outcomes there are either

canceling each other's votes or potentially potentially getting you two votes I will work on that

I will work on that. Oh please please do and I would I would say you know because I am from Florida

I do love those jaguars I'm looking forward to it's going to the Super Bowl but I still also love

the Tampa Bay books and the Miami dolphins and then also folks who follow me on social media Angie

for Florida go to my website AngieNixon.com but thank you so much for having me on hey to your

parents down there I want to be your US senator and so I would really love and appreciate it if

you voted for me. AngieNixon thank you so much thank you so much. That's our show for today thanks

to AngieNixon for coming on I'll be back in the feed on Sunday with our old friend David Axelrod

talked to everybody then bye everyone. Positive America is a crooked media production our show is

produced by Austin Fisher Saul Rubin McKenna Roberts and Michael Goldsmith with Reed Jirlin Elijah

Adrian Hill our team includes Matt DeGroat Ben Heffcoat Jordan Cantor Charlotte Landis Kenny

Moffat Adam Liper Joseph Dutra Desmond Taylor Dan Farrow David Tolls Mia Kelman Ryan Young and Naomi

single our staff is probably unionized with the writer's guild of America East.

As someone tuned into politics you've probably seen the constant bickering about who belongs in

the Pro Democracy movement well we think it's best to have these conversations in person and

hopefully it will also be more productive. CricketCon is right after the midterms and it is

going to be the first time we come together to hash it out in person and kick off the 2028 debate.

We just posted a ton more info about what to expect from the big event from November 5th to 7th so

check it out at cricketcon.com and get your tickets now the NDC

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