LIVE at Castfest! How popular is Donald Trump?

Summary

Americast LIVE at Castfest! – How Popular is Donald Trump?

Podcast: Americast (BBC News)
Date: April 30, 2026
Location: Live recording at Maida Vale Studios, London

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Episode Overview

This Americast episode was recorded live in front of an audience at the BBC's Castfest event. The main theme centers on Donald Trump’s waning popularity, what it means for both Republicans and Democrats heading into the midterms and beyond, and how shifting political allegiances—especially among key online influencers, swing voters, and the broader electorate—are reshaping the landscape. The episode also explores the impact of social media in modern US politics, controversies dividing Trump's base, the Democrats’ struggle to seize the political moment, and the dynamics that might define the coming elections.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Donald Trump’s Declining Popularity

• Polling and Frustrations (03:31 – 04:53)

  • Trump’s approval has fallen “precipitously” over the past year, especially due to his immigration policy, economic inflation from trade policy, and, most notably, the Iran war.
  • His approval ratings are down to the low 30% range, and even the 20% range for economic handling—indicative of “people in your own party who are fed up or frustrated and willing to tell pollsters that they don’t support him.” (Marianna, 03:36)

• Party Base and Influencer Criticism (04:05 – 05:09)

  • Significant discontent is now coming from influential figures within the MAGA and conservative sphere, particularly online.
  • Scandals and controversies, especially concerning the Epstein episode (though Trump denies wrongdoing), are fueling a new wave of skepticism even among former loyalists.

2. MAGA Influencers and Social Media Shifts

• Betrayal and Backlash (05:09 – 07:19)

  • Notable Trump supporters like Megyn Kelly, Tucker Carlson, and others have now publicly turned against him, often in dramatic fashion.
  • Tucker Carlson's on-air apology stood out as a moment of self-reckoning:

    "I want to say I'm sorry for misleading people. And it was not intentional. That’s all I'll say."
    (Tucker Carlson, 07:03)

  • Their break with Trump is most prominently over foreign policy, particularly the Iran war.

• Reasons Behind the Shift (07:19 – 10:25)

  • Trump’s anti-establishment appeal was central to his initial rise.
  • As President, he’s now the establishment, alienating the most anti-institutional influencers.
  • Younger conservatives and the under-30 cohort are especially critical of Trump’s foreign policy reversals.
  • “Anyone under the age of 30... you’d ask them about the Iran war and they would go, yeah, Trump’s wrong...That is a fundamental change...”
    (Marianna, 09:14)

• Speculation on Tucker Carlson’s Future (09:54 – 10:25)

  • Discussion of Carlson as a potential outsider GOP candidate due to his unique online influence and independent brand.

3. Social Media, Monetization, and Political Discourse

• Business of Conflict (12:24 – 13:39)

  • Key influencers now run massive businesses backed by conflict-driven content.
  • “These people run multi-million dollar businesses...they rely on conflict.”
    (Anthony, 12:24)
  • The performative nature of politics online means even established commentary figures will switch positions if it aligns with audience sentiment (and revenue).

• Trump Base vs. Swing Voters (13:39 – 15:44)

  • Trump retains a “high floor” with about a third of the electorate remaining loyal, but his coalition includes many who only tolerate him for policy reasons (economy, pro-life, anti-woke).
  • Many Trump voters “do not actually like Trump. They tolerate him because they're either pro-life or anti-woke or both.”
    (Sarah, citing a listener, 14:24)
  • Evangelicals exemplify those willing to “grin and bear it” for the policy victories, but even they are showing signs of distancing over recent controversies.

4. Democratic Party’s Parallel Struggles

• Approval Ratings and Discontent (16:49 – 19:04)

  • The Democrats boast approval ratings barely higher than Trump’s—“low to mid 30%”—with substantial disapproval even among their own base.
  • Disappointment comes from perceived inaction or lack of boldness to counter Trump’s controversial measures.

• Democrats’ Success in Elections (19:04 – 20:00)

  • Despite their unpopularity, Democrats are winning surprising victories—including in Republican-leaning districts—because they benefit from anti-Trump sentiment.
  • “Democrats are up by anywhere from 4 to 8%” in generic midterm ballots. (Marianna, 18:40)
  • The classic phrase: “Don’t compare me to the Almighty, compare me to the alternative.”

5. The Role of Personality and Social Media Presence in Politics

• Authenticity and Online Persona (20:00 – 21:54)

  • Modern voters, especially the so-called “double haters,” want a candidate they can relate to or “like”—often measured by podcast and streaming presence, not traditional speeches or media.
  • “All the social media strategy in the world can’t make up for a kind of lack of personality or ability to connect...”
    (Marianne, 20:53)

• No Unified Democratic Voice (21:54 – 22:10)

  • The US system lacks an official opposition leader, making it harder for Democrats to consolidate or project a unified alternative outside of presidential election cycles.

• Variability in Democratic Messaging (22:10 – 24:45)

  • Democrats succeed in local and state races by offering tailored candidates for their constituencies, but they’ll be hard-pressed to unite behind one figure for the presidency without fracturing.
  • The party must decide whether to enforce ideological “litmus tests” or embrace a broader, more centrist umbrella—a perennial source of tension.

6. What Culture War Issues Will Dominate the Next Races?

• Potential Fault Lines (24:45 – 26:19)

  • The podcast anticipates new issues—possibly not trans rights or abortion—will become central in 2028, with Israel/Palestine and economic anxieties looming as major factors.
  • Economic downturns remain the ultimate “issue” that can eclipse any cultural or policy debate.

• Campaign Negativity and Attack Ads (26:22 – 27:26)

  • The hosts warn of an impending wave of negative campaigning heading into the midterms, due in part to a lack of affirmative messages for both major parties.

7. The Search for Viable Alternatives

• Will the Democrats Find a Cohesive Strategy or Just Wait for Republicans to Implode? (27:26 – 28:22)
  • Discussion of moderates in both parties who are unrepresented and the challenge of both sides finding new, unifying candidates.
  • Potential future GOP figures are discussed but seen as unlikely to emerge until Trump’s influence decisively fades.

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Memorable Moments & Notable Quotes

• Tucker Carlson’s On-Air Apology (06:39 – 07:19)

  "I want to say I'm sorry for misleading people. And it was not intentional. That's all I'll say." (Tucker Carlson, 07:03)

• Discontent with Both Parties

  “It's a common misjudgment to think that anyone who voted for Trump is a MAGA diehard who will believe anything he says. That's definitely not the case...I’m surrounded by Trump voters and most of them do not actually like Trump.”
  (Sarah, quoting listener Sara, 14:24)

• Politics and Commercialization

  "These people run multi-million dollar businesses...they rely on conflict."
  (Anthony, 12:24) "If you are doing this because you have to, for financial reasons, appeal to the maximum number of people, then that's a fairly good indication for us to follow of where voters are thinking..."
  (Sarah, 13:39)

• Political Authenticity

  “All the social media strategy in the world can't make up for a kind of lack of personality or ability to connect with the audience.”
  (Marianne, 20:53)

• On Party Identity and Coalition

  “There are people on the left...being told by the party, your views are...unacceptable in the party. Can the party accept a broad range of views so you can run convincingly in all of America, or can it not?”
  (Anthony, 22:38)

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Important Timestamps

• 03:31 – Discussion of Trump’s Approval Ratings Decline
• 05:09 – MAGA Influencer U-turns: Kelly & Carlson break with Trump
• 06:39 – [Clip] Tucker Carlson Apologizes for Past Trump Support
• 09:14 – Younger Conservatives’ Rejection of Trump’s Overseas Wars
• 12:24 – Politics as Business, Online Influencer Economy
• 14:24 – Listener Sara’s Email on “Tolerating” Trump
• 16:55 – 18:40 – Democratic Party’s Dismal Approval and Recent Wins
• 20:00 – The Importance of Political Personality in the Social Media Age
• 21:54 – No Leadership Focal Point for Democratic Opposition
• 24:45 – “Purity Tests” and the Difficulty of Unifying Democrats
• 25:38 – Shifting Democratic Opinions on Israel/Palestine
• 26:54 – Anticipated Onslaught of Negative Campaigning
• 27:46 – Can Democrats Convince Independents or Do They Wait for GOP Failure?
• 28:08 – The Challenge of Finding Post-Trump GOP Leaders

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Tone & Flow

The panel is animated, sometimes irreverent, and candid in their take on US politics. They blend on-the-ground observations, polling analysis, listener questions, and media-ecology insights—while keeping a healthy skepticism about both parties and the larger system. The discussion feels like both a diagnosis and a speculation roundtable, with moments of humor (“That’s a microaggression!”) and sharp institutional critique.

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Conclusion

This live episode of Americast offers a frank, insightful, and at times speculative assessment of Trump’s plummeting popularity, why it’s happening now, and what it means for a Republican Party increasingly fractured between business-minded influencers and loyalist voters. Parallel scrutiny falls on an uninspired and divided Democratic Party that, despite internal disarray, is benefiting from anti-Trump sentiment at the polls. The episode closes with reflections on what new political identities or coalitions might emerge and the enduring centrality of the economy—and social media—in shaping US electoral outcomes.

Transcript

[Anthony]

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the uk.

[Sarah]

Want to be a star? No problem. Anyone can shine on TikTok. Post your first video today.

[Marianna]

Real life, real story, real you.

[Sarah]

Download TikTok and get started. We've got something a bit special for you today. Americast with a live audience from Maida Vale Studios in London at an event celebrating some of the BBC's best news podcasts, such as Newscast and the Global Story. We recorded the episode last weekend before the shooting at the press dinner in Washington, D.C. attended by Donald Trump. Hope you enjoy it.

[Anthony]

If you're ready, we're almost ready. We're just going to test our microphones, which means saying, hello, that's me, Anthony.

[Marianna]

Test, test, test. Pop, pop, pop.

[Sarah]

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.

[Marianna]

That's very good.

[Anthony]

Very good.

[Marianna]

She's good. She's a pro.

[Anthony]

Marianna, what shall I say?

[Tucker Carlson]

It's funny.

[Marianne]

Undercover voters. My undercover voters are five fictional characters.

[Anthony]

Okay, we're gonna launch straight into this. Donald Trump is not popular and not popular on a whole range of subjects and a worrying range of subjects if you are, for instance, a Republican congressman or congresswoman running in the midterms in November. In spite of that, the nation, it seems, is not turning to the Democrats with anything like the kind of enthusiasm that the Democrats might hope they would. So here's the question. Could the Democrats do perfectly well in November but still mess up the next presidential election? That is the fundamental question underlying what we're going to talk about now. So welcome to AmericaCast

[Marianna]

Ameracast from BBC News.

[Anthony]

Do you hear that? Oh, I think when I hear that

[Marianna]

sound, it reminds me of money.

[Anthony]

We didn't start this war, but under

[Marianna]

President Trump, we are finishing it.

[Marianne]

This is a big cover up, and this administration is engaged in it.

[Sarah]

This guy has Trump derangement syndrome. I have four words for you.

[Anthony]

Turn the volume up.

[Sarah]

Hello, it's Sarah here, and I'm in the BBC's Maida Vale studios in London, England.

[Marianna]

And it's Anthony across from Sarah here. The fabulous four have united a rare time when we're all in the same room together. It's great to see y'.

[Anthony]

All.

[Marianne]

And I'm sitting opposite Anthony. It's Marianne.

[Anthony]

Let's get onto the popularity of Donald Trump, or indeed Anthony at the moment, the lack of it.

[Marianna]

Yeah. If you look at the poll numbers for Donald Trump, they have declined precipitously across the board over the course of the past year and three or four months. And part of that is natural for a second term. President you're never more popular than the day you are inaugurated and it's typically a steady decline after that. But Donald Trump has done things that have been very controversial over the course of the past year. His immigration policy has angered a lot of people. Hispanic voters, as we have talked about, have turned on him. At least we've seen indications of that. His trade policy has inflated prices and Americans aren't crazy about that because they still feel like things are too expensive, things are unaffordable. And then the Iran war has been a real drag. And if you look at his poll numbers, there has been a real shift and an increase in his disapproval rating since the start of the war. And the American public is split mostly 50, 50 between Democrats and Republicans, conservatives and liberals. So to get down to where Donald Trump is Now in the 30% according to the recent polls, or even 20, 20%, 20 odd percent for his handling of the economy, you have to not just have the people who always hate you hate you. You don't have to just have the people who are independents, not like you. There have to be people in your own party who are fed up or frustrated and willing to tell pollsters that they don't support him for that to be the case.

[Anthony]

And they are. And a lot of them are influencers or former influencers within that broad kind of category of people.

[Marianne]

Yeah, exactly. Particularly when it comes to MAGA and the movement on social media. But I think particularly for everything around the Epstein, when those were released, obviously Donald Trump has many, many times denied sort of any wrongdoing or even being linked to Jeffrey Epstein in any way that could be construed as bad, essentially. But that has not stopped a lot of people on social media connecting him with Jeffrey Epstein, suggesting he was involved in wrongdoing everything else. And in some ways perhaps it's not very surprising because Donald Trump kind of built certainly this presidential campaign on the whole. I'm going to try and disrupt the traditional world of politics in the us I'm going to make it different. Once you are then the President, you are ultimately the estab. And a lot of these MAGA influences are very anti establishment and so very against what he's doing. I mean, maybe this was always sort of inevitable in terms of how that was gonna go.

[Anthony]

It's such an interesting point that, isn't it? Because actually so much of American politics is about manning the barricades, isn't it? Which side of the barricade you're then on. And what he's discovering is exactly, as Mariana said, He's on that side of the barricade that's in charge, and there's nothing you can do about that.

[Sarah]

And even among, I guess you could call them MAGA influencers, but people on television like Maggie Kelly, Tucker Carlson, these people who are pretty establishment in the commentariat, it's the Iran war that's caused them to break with him. And I guess I'm slightly surprised, I'm not surprised that they're against that and that they're very, very critical, but they have just gone wholesale. Everything about Donald Trump is bad from everything about Donald Trump being good. So all of a sudden he does one thing that you don't like, and then they've just leapt over the fence and they're barricading the other side now, saying that he's messed up on the economy, on the war, that he's not going to be able to win the midterms, that his polling's awful. It's as though they've done this complete U turn.

[Marianna]

Yeah. Megyn Kelly notes Trump's approval rating, has said it's cratered, said essentially, literally, he's effed and has gotten pushback from Donald Trump on that. But Tucker Carlson is an interesting case. He has supported Trump in the past. While there were some times when he was critical behind the scenes during the 2020 election dispute, and that kind of came out and leaked comments in the Fox News lawsuits after the the fact, publicly and in his comments on his show. He has wholeheartedly endorsed the president up until now. And that's why this clip we're gonna play of him apologizing for that support is so remarkable.

[Anthony]

Yeah. So he's talking to his brother, isn't he? He's on his own podcast. He's talking to his brother, who's also a Trump supporter and indeed a former speechwriter for him. Let's listen to the Tucker Carlson apology.

[Tucker Carlson]

I mean, you and I and everyone else who supported him, you wrote speeches for him. I campaigned for him. I mean, we're implicated in this for sure. Yes. It's not enough to say, well, I changed my mind, or like, oh, this is bad, I'm out. It's like in very small ways, but in real ways, you and me and millions of people like us are the reason this is happening right now.

[Marianna]

Yes.

[Tucker Carlson]

So I do think it's like a moment to wrestle with you, our own consciences, we'll be tormented by it for a long time. I will be. And I want to say I'm sorry for misleading people. And it was not intentional. That's all I'll say.

[Sarah]

I really am confused by this. I mean, as I said before, I understand where they are on the war. Donald Trump said that he wouldn't start any new foreign wars. These people have been against the neoconservative bit of the Republican Party for a long, long time. They didn't like George W. Bush, the people around him and their foreign policy, but they were really happy to backing Donald Trump through the tariffs, through his trying to prosecute all of his enemies, using the Department of Justice to do that. All the things that Donald Trump has done which have upset many people all around the world, they blindly followed him through all of that. And Tucker Carlson wasn't just commenting favorably on it. He's never out the White House. I mean, I see him there all the time, hanging out with the President and with the Cabinet. And now suddenly, he's got to wrestle with his own conscience because of one foreign adventure in Iran. Why this complete turnaround?

[Marianna]

I think the foreign wars and Mideast wars and foreign policy was central to Donald Trump's rise. The way he differentiated himself in 2015 and 2016, in part, besides being an outsider, was his criticism of the Iraq war and said Republicans were misguided. And he attacked Jeb Bush for what his brother, George W. Did and prompting the Iraq war in 2003. And I will say it's not just Tucker Carlson. I mean, as I think most of the audience knows, I'm from Texas. Cause I talk about it regularly. And I went back to Texas a couple times since the start of the war. And the first time I was back there was just a couple days after the war started. And the Republicans I spoke with there were willing to give Trump the benefit of the doubt. They said, well, he said he wasn't gonna get us involved in forever wars. He said he wasn't gonna get bogus down in the Middle East. They were, I think, hoping it was gonna be like Venezuela would be over in a day or two. Would go in there, would do it, would get out. That wasn't the case, obviously. And when I went back just a few weeks ago at cpac, which is a conservative conference in Dallas, I was struck by the number of conservatives there who were willing to openly criticize Donald Trump kind of the way Tucker Carlson did. Said, I feel like we've been misled. I feel like he's breaking his promise. Particularly younger conservatives. Anyone under the age of 30, I would go up to them, and I knew exactly what they'd say. You'd ask them about the Iran war and they would go, yeah, Trump's wrong. And I feel like he's making a mistake. This is not what he promised. This is hurting me personally by raising gas prices, making things cost more. I'm worried about my friends who are in the military. That is a fundamental change from what we saw and what I've seen covering Donald Trump now for the past 11 years.

[Anthony]

Do you think he might run in 28?

[Marianna]

Tucker Carlson? You might. I've got a 22 year old son who is engaged in politics. He follows it, doesn't watch broadcast news, doesn't read newspapers. He gets all of his information online and through Reddit and through YouTube videos. And he has told me the one person he thinks could be a real threat to win as a Republican is Tucker Carlson because he's an outsider and because he has a kind of a separate brand from the Republican Party. And you're nodding, Marianne. I'm curious if you're seeing that online.

[Marianne]

Yeah, I actually think to understand what's going on with Tucker, I think there's kind of two separate things happening, which is there's the broader shift around particular issues where people actually aren't that fussed about war and they don't like the impact of war, like stuff being more expensive and not being able to buy gas for their car in the same way and all that kind of thing. But then there's something different which if you look at Tucker Carlson, you also look at influences like Candace Owens, who people have probably heard of, who in lots of ways inhabit very extreme circles on social media and would be seen as quite extreme in that. Sen. But actually on the whole tend to be quite on the pulse in terms of the sort of direction of travel online. And what I would say is someone like Tucker Carlson, for example, has previously been criticized. So if you think of it like conspiracy land, which I talk about quite a lot, there's a kind of conspiracy line that exists on social media that people have dipped their toes in or been quite central to. Tucker Carlson has repeatedly been accused of spreading disinformation or conspiracy theories. He's always very much defended himself against that idea, but some of those conspiracy theories have been accused of being anti. Now, one of the things that he very strongly disagrees with Donald Trump on right now, and if you listen to that podcast episode, he kind of hints at it and talks about it, is to do with Donald Trump's relationship with Israel and this suggestion that there's something kind of untoward going on, that Donald Trump is Maybe being controlled in some way, and that's why he's making the decisions he's making. That again, has triggered more accusations of anti Semitism and that are different from, you know, political criticism of Israel and Netanyahu and everything else. And I think that if you understand how much of kind of Tucker Carlson's belief system online is built around this kind of evil cabals of people doing bad things thing, then you start to understand why when that no longer fits with what Donald Trump is doing, he sort of has no choice if he wants to keep that online audience, but to split and go another way. I think he's also quite good at reading the room online and working out what people are responding well to or not. It's interesting, Anthony, that you say it's younger people who you notice are like, oh, I'm not sure, I'm so fast. These are the main kinds of people they'll be seeing. They won't be kind of watching most of the traditional media.

[Anthony]

They run businesses, these people. This is where I think it's slightly difficult politically. These people run multi million dollar businesses

[Marianne]

which, which rely on, they rely on conflict.

[Anthony]

Exactly as you've taught us down the years when we've been talking to you about these things, or taught me anyway, that actually what they're doing is slightly different from old style political campaigning where they've got a set of things that they want to happen. They're businesses that thrive on conflict and need the conflict to keep going. The woman who does call her daddy, that incredibly successful Alice Cooper, the podcast that is, I think, number four or so in American podcasts I was reading the other day. She's having a get together very much like this one actually here in Maida Vale, except hers is in Las Vegas. They've got the Chippendales at halftime and Paris Hilton is the dj. And you know, these are really, these are big, big businesses. And I'm not talking us down in any way, shape or form. It's lovely and we've all had a nice cup of tea, or at least we have in the green room, but nothing more than that. And there is, you know, there is a side to all of this that is about commercial futures for individual people. And I don't know what you think, Sarah. I just wonder whether the politics of it, in a sense you ought to see separately.

[Sarah]

Yes. Because they'll go in the direction of, of clicks, as you say. And it's interesting though, isn't it, as you're saying, Marianna, that they're good at reading the room online. I mean, if you are doing this because you have to for financial reasons, appeal to the maximum number of people, then that's a fairly good indication for us to follow of where voters are thinking the kind of people that they want. If these people really do, you know, very, very good at sniffing what's in the wind. But of course there's different people on there. You've got a kind of die hard base of Donald Trump fans, which people reckons what just about under a third of the electorate will stick with. Donald Trump did through 2020, all of that kind of thing. He's got quite a high floor. He can only fall so far with support. But the people who put him in the White House are anything but die hard fans. Some of them are swing voters, some of them moderate Republicans who voted with their wallets largely and thought that he would run the economy better than the Democrats would and they remembered feeling better off during his first term. It's where they're gonna go with all of this. It's absolutely crucial not how many people in the base are turned off. And actually we've had an email about that from Sara who says, and she must be in the States cuz she says it's a common misjudgment to think that anyone who voted for Trump is a MAGA diehard who will believe anything he says. That's definitely not the case. I'm surrounded by Trump voters and most of them do not actually like Trump. They tolerate him because they're either pro life or anti woke or both. And I think that's a very interesting point. You've got the people Anthony's talking to at say for instance CPAC who are MAGA diehards. They've got their own views about it. But you've got ordinary folk who. I spoke to them all the time. You must have done as well through the 2020 election. They say, look, he's pretty awful. I wish he'd shut his mouth. Someone should deny him access to social media. If he could just get on with running the economy basically and making me feel better off. It's where they go that's important.

[Marianna]

Yeah, I think so. I think that especially evangelicals, they feel like the Lord works in mysterious ways. I've asked them that.

[Anthony]

Who knows, maybe they're right.

[Marianna]

They'll say, you know, yikes. But you can't argue with the fact that Roe v. Wade was overturned, that he has put forward right to life sorts of issues and that he has taken on their cultural conservative issues. And, and they're willing to kind of grin and bear it. Although it is also interesting to say that a lot of them pushed back with the Trump as Jesus meme that he shared and his criticism of the Pope. You know, he can. The people who were tolerating him because the ends justify the means or however you want to call it, they may want to start distancing more. And I think you'll see that first in Republican politicians in Congress, ones who are running for office in the midterm elections in November, if they start to distance themselves from Trump because Trump's done, he's not running for president again. His name's not gonna be on the ballot again, despite some of those rumors. But there are other Republicans who names will be on there in November. And if Trump goes down and keeps dragging them down, they are gonna have to find ways of distancing themselves kind of the way Tucker Carlson has.

[Anthony]

What then are the Democrats, Anthony? How popular slash unpopular are they generically at the moment?

[Marianna]

Yeah, there are a couple of ways to look at that. The first way is if you look at it, there's the appro rating for Democrats kind of writ large, the same way that we've been looking at approval rating of Trump. And if you do look at it that way, Democrats honestly aren't much better off than Donald Trump. The latest poll numbers have them languishing in the low to mid 30% as well, 60 something percent disapproving of them. And what I said about Donald Trump and the Republicans is true of the Democrats as well. You don't get to that kind of disapproval rating unless there are people in your own party who don't like what your party is doing. They don't approve of what the Democrats is doing. And if you look at one poll I was looking at, it started around October of 2024, right before the presidential election. Democrats had 47% approval, 51 disapproval. And since Donald Trump took office, that has grown into a chasm. And I think it's because there are people on the left who would normally approve of what the Democrats are doing, who are upset that the Democrats don't aren't doing enough. They see things that Trump is doing that they definitely don't like. And they feel like Democrats have not done anything to stop him or not used all the tools at their disposal to stop him. They say Trump breaking rules and pushing boundaries, and they think, why can't Democrats break rules and push boundaries back too? That's one way to look at it. Another way to look at it, however, is head to head generic ballot for the midterms. And that is, you're not just thinking generally, what, do I like the Democrats or not? But if I were gonna cast a ballot for a member of Congress in November, who would I pick? And in those Democrats are up by anywhere from 4 to 8%. And so what we've seen in these special elections and the off year elections last year, where when voters show up to the polls, they are pulling the poll ballot handle for Democrats, by and large, and that is much better news. I mean, there's a saying that Joe Biden would always have, don't compare me to the Almighty, compare me to the alternative. And I think that's the Democrats big hope that when it comes down to it, pick Democrats over Republicans, even if you're not crazy about the Democrats.

[Sarah]

And they're not just winning in narrow elections. I mean, they've been winning on state legislatures and things in really surprising districts in places that Trump carried by double figures, didn't they? I mean, there's like 12% Trump districts that Democrats are winning in. It's quite remarkable when you see that.

[Marianna]

Yeah, Mar a Lago in Florida, that district is now run in the state legislature by a Democrat. So there have been these big swings.

[Anthony]

Is it that they've got to find someone, though, Marianna, who's able to do what Trump has done or is it that they've got to say that's the end of that and we're going to be completely different and maybe more conventional and go back to the. Because that seems to me among the many decisions the Democrats have to make, one of them is how Trump, like, do we want to be how online and in your face and not necessarily always saying things that are necessarily true. Do we need to be in order to exist in this new political world?

[Marianne]

I think that if we're honest as we know social media is the world, like everything is on social media and everything that happens in the real world plays out online. And what Donald Trump did so effectively was reaching. And actually we have a. Yeah, these people who are called like the double haters. So the idea that they, they don't really like any political party or at least the two ones that they have the options between in the US they kind of need to like the person.

[Marianna]

Right.

[Marianne]

They need the person to be popping up on the podcast or on the streams that they listen to and watch and say, oh great, okay, I kind of like this person. And all the social media strategy in the world can't make up for A kind of lack of personality or ability to connect with the audience. And if you're gonna. We've. I've spoken about it on Top Comment, the other podcast I do that. If you're, like, cringe posting as a politician, like, it's never going to work. You need someone who seems authentic and genuine, kind of gets this world. They don't have to be young. They can be older. Like, you know, Bernie Sanders is.

[Anthony]

That's a microaggression.

[Marianne]

Call it out. Call out.

[Anthony]

Sarah, what do you reckon?

[Sarah]

Well, so I'm really interested in Mariana talking about having to have the right personality. Well, we need to have a personality and a person. And this is, of course, why the American system is so different. Because there isn't a leader of the opposition, there isn't a Democrat presidential candidate in waiting. We hear most often on the American that Anthony and I consume all day from the people in the Senate and the House of Representatives. And they're not necessarily the people who are going to be the flag bearers for the next presidential campaign. So we're asked all the time, where are the Democrats? Why aren't they doing more, saying more? Without someone for them to coalesce behind who speaks for the Democratic Party, it's very difficult for them to have any kind of unified message or people to know even where to look for what Democrats are saying. And that will change as soon as the primaries begin and we start to have people campaigning to be the next candidate. But there's always this vacuum in opposition, isn't there? Because you don't have somebody who plays the role of the leader of the opposition here.

[Marianna]

Yeah, there's no shadow cabinet. There's no shadow prime minister. Yeah. All of that doesn't happen. And the good news for Democrats is they don't need it to happen to win in the midterms. They can have everyone from Zohran Mamdani to some sort of a centrist, and they can run different candidates based in different districts at a.

[Anthony]

This is such an important thing.

[Marianna]

There you go. So Abigail Spamberger, who's the governor of Virginia, a centrist, what's called a Blue Dog Democrat, someone who. Who is definitely very moderate. She won the governorship in Virginia last year, and at the same time that Zohran Mamdani won mayor of New York, running very different campaigns. And so you're gonna see a bunch of different Democrats kind of appealing to wherever they are. And it's gonna be different for the presidential election, where they have to find someone and pick one person but also,

[Anthony]

not only do you have to find one person and pick one person and everyone gather round, but also, is there a litmus test that says you, Democrat A, are unacceptable to the party? For instance, perhaps you're a potential presidential candidate who isn't very keen on abortion rights, or you're a presidential candidate who thinks that in sport that females shouldn't have to compete against biological males. So, you know, there are these things where there are people on the left in American politics who, in the last few years, and certainly when Biden was in charge in the White House, were sort of being told by the party, your views are. It's not just that we don't agree with them. They are unacceptable in the party. And I think one of the questions that strikes me this time round, after the midterms, can the party accept a sort of broad range of views so that you can run convincingly in all of America, or can it not?

[Marianna]

I think you can do that in the midterms. I think it's going to be a challenge for picking a presidential candidate in the same way that it was a challenge in 2019 and 2020 when people were pressed to raise their hands if they favored abolishing ICE or if they favored universal healthcare, and all of these things that are not necessarily the type of policies that are gonna be able to be sold to the general public when it comes to a general election. And if you remember, Kamala Harris in 2024, ran a very centrist campaign. I mean, there was very little talk about Palestinian rights at the convention. There wasn't mentioned of transgender issues at all in that Democratic convention. What Trump and the Trump campaign did was hit her with stuff she said in 2019 when she ran that time around, because that campaign, all of the candidates got pushed really far to the left by Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and the folks. And is that gonna happen again this time? Is it going to be a party that becomes fractured? We're gonna have 20 candidates. I suspect it's gonna be a huge, huge field, and it's going to be the loudest voices, and the people who make the most waves are the ones who are going to break through.

[Sarah]

I think they've gotten over that idea that there's a purity test of where you are on trans and abortion and some of those things. Now, that doesn't mean that the Republicans won't be able to pick a new issue that people will have established positions on. But I think. I don't think yet know what the culture wars issue will be for 2028. Because I don't think it will be trans people and women's sports, for instance. I think they'll be smarter about that and pick something that works really well for them and is a problem for Democrats. And I think there may also be a problem around Palestine and Gaza and that they don't know how to talk to themselves about that or what kind of message sells.

[Anthony]

Yeah. If you are looking for issues that are going to come up on every stage, they're going to be asked, aren't they, about Israel.

[Marianna]

And Democratic opinion has shifted dramatically on Israel. So it may not be that controversial to say things about Israel, Netanyahu and, and genocide the way it would have been in 2020. I guess the question.

[Sarah]

But it's still potentially a drag in the general election.

[Marianna]

It could be an issue in the general election. The thing I will say is that if the economy is bad, the economy becomes the issue, full stop. Nothing else matters. So, I mean, we don't know what the economy's gonna look like in 2027, 2028, when these candidates are out there running. But if you remember in 2008 when Obama was running against John McCain and the financial markets were collapsing, that crowded out everything else, that is all they care about, the cultural issues, the social issues, all of that goes by the wayside. So that is another way of saying what you said, Sarah, which is that we don't know what it's going to look like in even just a year.

[Anthony]

We don't know. But don't just stop us talking about it.

[Marianna]

But we're going to talk about it anyway, because that's what we do.

[Sarah]

Yeah. What I think we do know is what November is going to look like, the midterm elections. And without a positive message to sell about the party or about the. The president, it will be really, really negative. There are, I mean, literally hundreds of millions of dollars waiting to be spent on adverts, on campaigns attacking the Democratic opponents. Because if you know anything good to say about yourself, then say bad things about the people you're running against. And so we will see an absolute onslaught of attacks on Democratic candidates and policies coming through November, which will leave a very bad taste in the mouth for a lot of voters.

[Marianna]

Yeah. Something people forget is that Republicans have a lot of money. They have fundraised considerably. The party itself has 10 times more money than the democr. Some Democratic candidates are actually doing okay and they have pretty big bankrolls. But by and large, there are going to be these independent committees and Republican Party sources that are going to pour money into this. I don't think it's going to change the dynamics. I mean, you can spend all the money you want in advertising. If the product you're selling is not popular, then it's not going to convince people. But we are going to see the airwaves flooded come September, October, November.

[Marianne]

You then wonder whether. And I know we've got a question from Greg which is kind of to this point, but I know we always talk about could there be someone else? Like, do people just not want to vote for the Democrats or the Republicans? This question is actually so Greg asked, can the Democrats form a cohesive strategy to win over independent voters or is it as likely they will be reliant on a Republican implosion?

[Sarah]

We don't know, of course, what direction the Republican Party will have gone in by then and whether there is a Trumpist successor to Trump as the candidate. Because there is a, I mean, there's a huge constituency of voters of moderate Republicans who are not maga, but who are not very well represented at all at the moment. And I think plenty of prominent Republican politicians who could go with them. If they had a candidate who would

[Anthony]

represent them, then who would that candidate be? Because you think of Rubio and you think of Vance, but we don't often talk about other potential candidates. 28 for the Republicans, if Trump has properly imploded or exploded or whatever.

[Marianne]

Yeah.

[Sarah]

And some of them are not very prominent because they do hold their fire. And I mean, there are very few in Congress, for instance, who've stood up and challenged Trump with a more moderate position. And it's people who are retiring. It's people like Thom Tillis. And each case where we've seen somebody do that, they've been somebody who's on their way out, not the way up.

[Anthony]

Okay, we're going to leave it there. It's been a real pleasure taking part not only in this discussion, but also with this wonderful audience as well. Thank you all so much for coming. Bye.

[Marianna]

Bye.

[Anthony]

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[Marianna]

Bye. Foreign.

[Anthony]

I'm Kai Wright.

[Marianna]

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[Sarah]

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[Sarah]

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