← Next Up with Mark Halperin
Next Up with Mark Halperin
The Senate Races That Will Decide Who Controls Congress
01:00:03
Mark Halperin's reported monologue takes you inside the latest state of play on the midterm landscape, explaining why the battle for control of Congress is becoming more competitive and the new emerging issues that could decide the outcome. Mark examines the growing backlash against Big AI, why so many Democratic candidates are running against the "establishment", and which party has the financial edge. Plus, David Bozell joins the show to discuss the persistent influence of parts of the legacy media and why news aggregators like Yahoo News and Apple News are far more influential than you may realize. Acre Gold: Turn your pocket change into physical 24-karat gold and enter to win a limited-edition Hot Wheels gold bar at https://GetAcreGold.com/Mark Chapter: For free and unbiased Medicare help, dial (262) 454-0503 to speak with my trusted partner, Chapter. *Paid Partnership*” Chapter and its affiliates are not connected with or endorsed by any government entity or the federal Medi...
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UnitedHealth Group Representative
Yeah.
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David Bozell
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Mark Halpern
Everybody. Welcome here. Mark Halpern with you. I'm the host of NextUp, editor in chief of the live interactive video platform Two Way and your guide to everything NextUp. Thank you all for being here. Thank you for being next year. So audience continues to grow, but not fast enough for my taste ever. So please, if you haven't already told your friends, families, associates, everybody in your life about next up, please do tell them it's a program you watch and listen to and that they should as well. Great program for you. Today we're going to talk about the media, a big fan, favorite topic here. David Bozell will be with us, president of the Media Research center, which is a granddaddy of them all. In looking at bias and media, David and I will kick around some of the main storylines in the question of media bias over the last few weeks and months. Before David is here, though, my reported monologue, you know, I spent so much time in the midterms. We were about 100 days away from Election Day and lately we've been talking a lot about some of the key races and you've heard a lot about Maine and about Michigan and South Carolina. Those micro looks and individual races are important. But today what I'm going to do is step back, give you the fruits of my reporting on the macro situation. Where do we stand on the midterms? And one strand that I pulled out, one theme that I think is super important that we're going to focus on, which is on the Democratic side, this question of being anti establishment and why I think that's so important in understanding where the country is right now. So quick break. When we come back, my reported monologue on the midterms as a prism to understand where we are as a country. My reported monologue is next up. Stop right now. Think about the last 30 bucks you spent maybe on a streaming subscription service that you don't even use or a lunch you've already forgotten. That's $30 and it's gone now forever. 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Okay, everybody, let's dig into the midterms. About 105 or so days away from election day. But that means early voting is going to start sooner. The stakes here are very high on both sides and we've got some primaries left. And a lot of the coverage of the midterms of late have been around these midterms, particularly in the main race with the replacement of Platner by Jackson and in South Carolina with the unexpected tragic passing of Lindsey Graham. But what I'm going to do today for you is broaden out and talk to you about where I think we are in these midterms. They're fascinating and they're hard to predict here. Nobody can really tell you exactly where this is headed. But what I did this week, I started at the end of last week. But what I've done in the run up to today is I've asked my best sources in both parties where, where are we? What's your projection for where the Senate's going to be and where the House is going to be? And I'll reveal that the answer is no one. Everyone I talked to said Democrats will almost certainly take the House, but there are a few who think it's not a sure thing. And that and people are less. There are very few people predicting the, the landslide by the Democrats that some were before and I'll tell you why. And in the Senate, even Democrats will concede now in the beginning of the cycle looked far fetched that they could take the majority. Then it looked like they were on track to now it's back to. I didn't talk to a single person, Democrat or Republican, who were, who was confident the Democrats would take the majority. Okay, Both sides have things going for them, which is why this is a difficult one to predict because they're cross currents. Republicans have a bunch of advantages. The Senate map continues to favor them. Of all the seats they're trying to win, to pick up net seats, there's only one, which is Maine. That is a state that Kamala Harris won. And these days, it's very hard to win states in a Senate race if the president's, if your presidential candidate didn't win it in the last cycle. So the Senate map, number two, redistricting, again, that went back and forth in the beginning when a Republican started the process, people didn't really know what to make of it. This mid unorthodox mid decade redistricting to try to even up what Democrats had done. A lot of blue states in the regular schedule looked, then it looked like Republicans were going to pick up a lot of seats. Then Gavin Newsom and others mobilized and it looked like, well, Democrats may fight this to a draw. Now it looks like Republicans with still a little bit of stuff to play out. And then we got to see the actual races. It looks like Republicans gave themselves like a 10 seat cushion. About 10 seats, maybe 8, maybe 9, maybe 10. That's a big deal. And in fact, if it Weren't for those 10 seats or so, many more people would be predicting a healthy Democratic pickup. So that was a big advantage then, no doubt, for all the stuff with the war and gas prices and everything else, and all of President Trump's troubles, there's no doubt that the Democratic brand is still problematic. They're thinking still of perhaps announcing some more policies to try to define themselves, but they're divided between the socialist wing and the more mainstream wing and they're unpopular. And for all of President Trump's poll problems, the Democratic brand is still a problem. Another big Republican advantage is cash. So it's a little nuanced, though. They're fundraising and their committees, the Republican National Committee, the main Senate Campaign Committee, the Senate Campaign pac, etc, all those committees are doing well. And if there's more billionaire money to come into super pacs or other organizations that don't necessarily require disclosure, right now, both parties believe more of that money will come at the last minute from the right. For Republican candidates, on the other hand, the edge in money is a little bit diluted by the fact that in the campaign level, Senate candidates And House candidates. Democrats are doing better. But the overall, if you stack all the money up into big two big piles, a red pile and a blue pile, Republicans are going to have more money and they typically haven't. And they can coordinate it because this recent Supreme Court decision and James Blair, the president's political aide, is going to be doing have more capacity to coordinate than any single Democratic thought leader or active, active strategist would. There's another big pot of money that dwarfs almost everything else out there, which is the $400 million or so that the President's super PAC has. Republicans are counting on Democrats, Republicans are counting the President's political team to spend that money and I suspect they will and that'll give them a big advantage. 400 million is a lot of money. On the Democratic strength side, the president as a messenger is still not what Republicans want him to be. Talking about the 2020 election, talking about the ballroom, talking about the Save America act, which is no prospect of passing. All of that is something that could be a Republican advantage. Donald Trump is a great political communicator, but they're not taking advantage of that. Where's the Democratic edge? And I should say, by the way, that this list I'm giving you of the Democrat and Republican edges, taken largely from Karl Rove, who wrote this in the Wall Street Journal last week. Very good, crisp analysis, even though Carl's a partisan. That tracks with all of my reporting. But Carl wrote it before I wrote mine down, so I'm largely taken from him. Democratic advantages mostly familiar to all of you. Historically, the president's party does not do well in the first midterm election or midterms in general. Second great number that people will look at always is the President's approval rating and disapproval rating. That's an advantage for Democrats because the president is still not very popular. Third is the president's weakness, particularly on the number one issue for voters, which is the economy. Democrats have an advantage on the so called generic ballot question. They ask voters, would you are you going to vote for a Democrat or Republican? Sometimes people like the question which party do you want to have control? Congress. Either way, there's a Democratic edge there, but it's not as great as historically it needs to be for Democrats to have a tsunami election. But it's still an advantage. And then most polling indicates greater voter enthusiasm on the Democratic side. That's something Republicans are trying to work on. Okay, we still have some primaries to play out and that will tell the tale to some extent to see what kind of candidate strength there is what kind of fit there is for each of these nominees in the districts or state in which they're running in the low approval rating should be helping of the president should be helping Democrats more than they are. But right now the polls have changed from where they were a few months ago where Democrats were doing really well in some red places, districts and states, not as much anymore. The Republicans still have a problem with independents and you're seeing in the private polling of both parties Democrats poised in the House to pick up again. I always ask people what's your floor and what's your ceiling of net Democratic House pickups. Consensus view is about at least 10 and as many as 20. It could be lower. It could be lower than 10. And once it's lower than 10, we get into the range where maybe Republicans could keep their majority and it could go higher than 20. It could. We'll have to see. Republicans are targeting enough seats to keep their majority in the House and they've got the messaging. They know what they're going to message on. They're going to say Democrats are crazy communists. Crazy communists. That's what they're going to say. The president's already started saying it. You've heard some of the House strategists say it. That's what they're going to say. We'll see if they have some positive message to run on besides tax cuts. But that's what they're, that's what they're, that's what they're currently thinking about. Senate is, is always a jam. It's always, it's always a less of a national wave and more about the individual states. We got to see what happens with the Jackson who's replacing Platner in Maine as a Democratic nominee. Let's, let's see him nominated formally this coming weekend and then let's see how he stands up as a candidate. Let's see what kind of opposition research comes. I've been telling folks on all my all my content there's going to be scrutiny of this guy. And even though he was a leader in the state legislator, even though he just ran for governor, Republicans are going to find stuff about him, trust me, and we'll see how he does. And then in Michigan, we have to see who the Democratic nominee is for Senate there between El Sayad and Stevens and Democrats and the establishment will feel much better if it's Stevens. So we'll see what happens there. Continue to keep your eye on possible Democratic pickups. Republican pickups rather new Hampshire and Michigan as the, as the ones that they're watching super closely, less so Georgia. And then, and then the question is Maine in play? If Maine's not in play, if Susan Collins is going to be able to win this race? And that's not a foregone conclusion, but it's a possibility. Once we see how Jackson does head to head against her, then they'll probably pick up North Carolina. They still need to pick up three more. They need, they need to hold Georgia, Michigan and New Hampshire and then they need to pick up three of, of some combination of, of Ohio, Iowa, Alaska and Texas. And none of those are foregone conclusions. None of them are. So that's, that's kind of where we stand. I would say chances are the conventional wisdom that's been true from the beginning of the cycle with the, with the twists and turns is still true. Conventional wisdom is Democrats are going to keep the Senate or take the House, Republicans will keep the Senate and both by narrow margins. So that's the macro playing field. Now what's the macro of the thematic. I've always told you before in the terms of when people say, do you cover presidential politics? I say, no, I cover America. And I cover it often through the prism of presidential politics. Okay, so what are we seeing through the prism now in these midterms? What are we seeing? A lot of strands that are kind of woven together. All these, all these structural things. Redistricting in the Senate battlefield and then the soap operas in various races and the personalities, the fundraising, all the intraparty conflicts. Those are all kind of braided together to lead us to the conclusions about where things stand and the Democratic side. And that's what I'm going to focus on today is the strands of left wing, all these left wing positions on the economy, on social issues, on ice, on Israel. That's a strand is the left wing positions. But the strand that I think needs to be separated from the left wing strand is the anti establishment strand. Okay, Republicans intentions for months was or weeks when the war ends, they'd always say, well in the war in Iran ends, then gas prices will come down, the president can move back to talking about tax cuts and contrast on the economy. Well, it doesn't look like the war is going to end. It could. But Republicans no longer say when the warrants. What they say is when we have our money to spend in the president's super pac, we're going to be able to both rev up our base and persuade independent voters back to our side by talking about how the Democrats are crazy communists, right? That's, that's the goal there and we'll see if they can do it. But the, the, the Democrats, the energy they have and the frame they're trying to put on the election for independence is about anti establishment, anti business as usual. We've talked before about how similar that is to what Donald Trump ran on in 2016. The Democrats anti establishment view is so directed or is directed as much as their own party as it is on Donald Trump. And, and, and you hear it from, from all, all their candidates. Now how does this go to winning a general election to be anti establishment of your own party? Well, it's to separate from an unpopular party because the Democrat brand is unpopular and it's to rev up the base, as I said, because the base of the Democratic Party is anti establishment. They don't like Chuck Schumer, they don't like aipac, they don't like the traditional parts of the Democratic Party. They don't like a lot of the interest groups that used to be considered the left wing of the Democratic Party but now by a lot of voters are considered establishment. What do they like? What revs them up is they want us. They want candidates who say we have to by force, political force, take the power away from the establishment and the protectors of the establishment. Big special interests, big AI, big, big tech, big crypto, big corporations. So Troy Jackson, Tony Troy Jackson running in Michigan, now in Maine rather. He won the nomination and this was his message here. I could show you 100 different campaign videos, but here's something from Troy Jackson running about this issue of the power of the people. As Bernie Sanders likes to say. It's the, it's the, it's the many instead of the money. Here's a Democrat about to be new nominee in Mission in Maine for the Democrats for senate. Troy Jackson S14 please.
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Sherrod Brown
Power does not give working people anything
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Mark Halpern
out of the goodness of a tired. Sometimes you have to make the people
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David Bozell
in charge so uncomfortable that they can't ignore you anymore.
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Mark Halpern
So again, it's a very brute force thing. And the fact that he's got a blue collar background I think contributes to the power of his message to win the nomination because that's what they want. They want, they want someone who, who seems tough and powerful because the people on the left and the anti establishment wing of the party, they know how tough and powerful the establishment is and the corporate interests are. James Talarico, the Democratic nominee in Texas, same idea, but he's using sometimes at least The Epstein class as his kind of shorthand for the powerful. Right. The powerful interests that win while the people lose. Here's a Texas Democratic Senate candidate, James Talarigo, talking about the Epstein class. S15, please.
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David Bozell
The Epstein class has no place in Texas.
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Mark Halpern
And if there's one thing that we can all still agree on, Democrats, independents and Republicans alike. Yeah. So he's saying even Democrats and Republicans and Independents, or even Republicans and independents like Democrats. They don't like the Epstein class. They don't like the powerful. Okay, now here's another insurgent candidate, I would say, Talarico And Jackson and Dr. Al said, who's running in the Michigan Senate primary. They're all outsiders. Two of them have been state legislators, Talarico and Jackson. But they're. They're running against Washington. They're running against the establishment wing of their party. They're not supported by the establishment wing. They are supported, in the case of El Said and Jackson, by Bernie Sanders and by AOC. Here's Dr. Elsaid talking to Politico about how he sees the Democratic Party as, too often, just like the Republican Party, catering to special interests. And he talks about how Marjorie Taylor Greene agrees with him. Here's Dr. El Said. S22, please.
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Dr. Elsaid
But too often the Democratic Party is more interested in continuing to take money from its corporate and special interest donors than it is in speaking conventional truth. It should be an obvious thing that everybody agrees with, that we should keep our money here. It should be an obvious thing that everybody agrees with, that people shouldn't go into medical debt in the richest, most powerful country in the world. The fact that MTG agrees with those points should not be all that uncommon because they're just like, obvious things to say.
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Sherrod Brown
And.
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Dr. Elsaid
And the fact that neither party is willing to say that is a reflection of the amount of money both parties take from the corporations and the special interests who, in effect, buy them off. To be able to say that. Look, when you have a public consensus that's here, right, Everybody kind of agrees on one thing. And then
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Mark Halpern
so again, as much against the Democratic Party as the Republican Party. He couldn't be more outside than that to. To say our party that we're running for the nomination of is. Is. Is as corrupt on these issues as the Republicans.
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Kai Newkirk
Right?
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Mark Halpern
But it's not just the insurgents. It's not just the outsiders. In Ohio, the Democratic candidate, Sherrod Brown, he was the United States senator for many years. Lost his seat. Now he's running again. Couldn't be more establishment, right. Than being a United States Senator. But Sherrod Brown, same thing. His advertising is all about how the system is rigged. Here he is with a message about how the system is rigged. This is S11, please.
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Sherrod Brown
Most people are working harder than ever before in the systems rigged against them. You work harder than ever before. Corporations are making more money. The average CEO is now making $17 million a year, 300 times what the average worker in those places are making. And he says the work ethic's broken. The system's rigged. That's why we fight back. That's why I'm in this race for the Senate.
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Mark Halpern
If there's four words that define the point I'm trying to make to you about how Democrats are running in this race, how their voters are seeing the nation in four words, the system is rigged. That's what they, that's what they see. And they see that again. It's a through line from the, from the, the financial crisis in 2008, Covid and now AI the reason AI is so unpopular. People talk about, you know, they don't like the energy use, they don't like the water use, but, but really it's about the system being rigged. They're saying, here comes a bunch of billionaires and trillionaires getting rich off putting some big data center in our neighborhood. And they don't like it. Here is again Sherrod Brown running it in Ohio, going after data centers. S10, please.
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Sherrod Brown
Ohio's electric grid. Big corporations treat it like a game, gobbling up energy to feed their data centers no matter how much it raises our prices. It's the latest way. They've rigged the system.
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Mark Halpern
Rigged the system. There's the word again. And, and calling it a game is also very resonant for folks because that's what they, that's what people think, that the, that the wealthy, the corporations, both political parties are playing a game that's a rigged game where, where the, the establishment wins and, and, and real people lose. I asked Republicans, what do you think of this theme? And they said, well, not only did Donald Trump run on this theme, but you got establishment candidates running on it as well. Because, because they know that a lot of people in, in the Republican Party feel the same way. The system is rigged, but they need to appeal to independence, too. So here's a, here's an ad for Dan Sullivan. He's the Republican incumbent senator in Alaska running for re election against Mary Patola. And honestly, he's, you know, Alaska, he's kind of an outsider just because he's from Alaska. But he's an establishment candidate. He's this incumbent senator. He gets money from all these corporate interests like most incumbents do. What's he running against the Democrat on? He's running against the Democrat. Same thing. The system is rigged for special interests in the wealthy. Here's Republican Dan Sullivan advertising against his Democratic opponent. S16, please. Mary cashed in a job at a D.C. lobbying firm making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year using her campaigns as a personal slush fund, paying herself a salary and spending thousands jet setting to luxury hotels. For Mary Peltola, it's always Mary first, Alaska last, Mary first to last, class lobbyist, cash, luxury. These are all, these are all the symbolism, the semiotics of the system is rigged. Okay, so everybody's running on it. And I think it tells you a lot about the times we're in now. What I want to do next after a quick break is I want to drill down on one particular candidate whose videos I think tell the story of using the midterms and the Democratic message and some Republican messages as a prism to understand where the country is, inflation and gas prices and people's concerns about their kids future. It's all tied up in these themes. The system is rigged. Take a quick break. When we come back, I'm going to introduce you to Kai Newkirk. Kai Newkirk is next up. There's one question that comes up over and over right here on the program. No matter what topic we're covering, the political parties, the media, Washington, there's always one question. It's the same one who's actually looking out for you and who's just looking out for themselves. I want to apply that exact same question to something a lot of you are dealing with right now and that is your Medicare coverage. If you're on Medicare, you've probably had people call you promising something better. And when you get those calls, you're right to be skeptical. The truth is most people in the Medicare space get paid more to put you in certain plans. That's just how the incentives work for most places. So the question isn't whether someone's selling you something, it's whether you can trust them. That's why I always tell my audience about chapter they're the only Medicare advisors that compare every plan nationwide and their honest folks, they're not paid to push one plan over another. They'll look at your doctors, your prescriptions, your priorities, and they'll show you what actually fits best for you. If you're already on the right plan, they'll tell you that. But if not, they'll help you make the switch. No cost, no pressure. They'll review your options in under 20 minutes. Call my friends at Chapter right now. Let them help you. 262-454-0503. Call Chapter at 262-454-0503.
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UnitedHealth Group Representative
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Mark Halpern
All right, next up, we drill down on a particular candidate, guy named Kai Newkirk, who's running as an outsider in Arizona primary primaries today, Tuesday, as I'm recording this, and this is a congressional district in Arizona. It's the 4th congressional district. It's Tempe, around Mesa and Chandler. And the race has gotten some national attention, but not enough. Guy Stanton, the former mayor of Phoenix, is the incumbent Democrat. He's been there for about eight years. Pragmatic establishment Republican, has support from a lot of the business interests, the Democratic establishment. He's outraised Kai Newkirk. I don't know what he's going to win or not. There's almost no polling in the race. Whether Newkirk wins this nomination or not, his messaging will I'm going to walk you through it. It tells you what you need to know about how the Democrats see being an outsider. Now, again, a lot of it's left wing. A lot of it is, you know, about Israel, about immigration. But, but at the heart of it is that Democrats have not been tough enough fighters against the Trump administration and are too controlled by their own special interests. And he just goes, and all this stuff, Newkirk goes just savagely after Greg Stanton on, on, on that frame and says Grant Stanton's a bomb because he's controlled by the, by the big money the way the, the, the establishment is. Newkirk has not been endorsed by AOC or Bernie Sanders, but he has been endorsed by San, the group Sanders has been associated with. He's a progressive, he's an organizer, been involved with issues like voting rights and democracy. He calls himself a Democratic socialist. And he, he thinks Democrats have been, again, too timid about going after the Trump administration and too controlled by corporate interests. So this is a. There's a pure ideological divide. And, and like I said, I'm interested in the issue divisions on Israel, on immigration, on the direction of the Democratic Party. But to me, the biggest thing is the last one, the, the notion that you run as a Democrat because the establishment Democrats have not lived up to what they need. Stan has all the, all the endorsements from things like Planned Parenthood, the Sierra Club, the Communication Workers of America, the Building and Construction Trades, all these groups, which, again, used to be considered the left. The Democratic Party, they're now with the establishment. Okay, so I don't know who's going to win, but like I said, I think, I think if you look at Newkirk's messaging, it's so interesting. First of all, data centers. The Democratic Party is divided on this. The governor of New York banned data center building new data centers. But a lot of Democrats take money from the AI industry, and a lot of them think AI is a big part of the future. Newkirk has been way out there, maybe his signature issue. And while there's an economic issue here, this is really about saying, don't let this system be rigged. Don't let the big money, AI, big AI, continue to rig our economy, make the rich richer. Here is Kai Newkirk's video about AI data centers. S24. Please.
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Kai Newkirk Campaign Supporter
I support Bernie and AOC in the moratorium on AI data centers. We need to make sure that that technology is regulated and that these data centers aren't jacking up our utility bills. Bills more aren't poisoning our water, aren't hurting folks in these neighborhoods. One of the citizens here told me that people are saying that we can't drink the data. And that's true. We need to put people first, put the essentials of life first, not corporate profits.
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Mark Halpern
Essentials of life over corporate power. As Bernie would say, the many over the money. So there's the focus right there on the AI piece. This is more general. And this is. This is just a brilliant video. Newkirk is not in the video. It's some young guy. For those of you who are listening to the podcast version, you won't see, he's like, he's not dressed the way you'd normally be in an ad. He's wearing, like, shorts and casual clothes. But the delivery is. Is fantastic. And just the. In a. In a minute video, the number of hot buttons that get pushed. Basically what he does is he holds up the mailers that Greg Stanton sending out. People still send direct mail. It's an incredible thing. So these are, you know, flyers that are showing up in people's mailboxes in the district. And Greg Stanton saying, I'm powerful, I'm trusted, I know how to do the job. And what the Newkirk campaign is saying, all the things that Greg Stanton's telling you make him good. All the things that Craig Stanton's saying, reelect me. Because this, they're saying, these are all bad things. Being powerful and well connected, these are all bad things. This is a video from the Newkirk campaign released this week. Here is. This is S25 please primer. Here's the deal.
- [31:30]
Kai Newkirk
The top MAGA Trump GOP Republican Party donors are pouring hundreds of thousands into crypto and AI super PACs to back Greg Stanton, a Democrat running against Kai Newkirk in our Democratic primary. Not only this, but the state of Israel is paying Trump's former campaign manager to Brad Parscale to send AI text persuasion chats about Israel in our district. This is ridiculous. Greg Stanton, proven and trusted to what, make ICE stronger? Proven leadership that never backs down except when it's time to impeach Trump and you vote against it twice in 2025. Taking on special interests, paid for by special interests. Delivering for Arizona families. Yeah, maybe the four who like own Google or Meta. If you want a politics that represents, represents your interests and not those of the wealthiest dudes in this country, vote for Kai Newkirk.
- [32:17]
Mark Halpern
And don't believe this, don't believe this malarkey. I love the fact that the guy's wearing shorts. It's just so. I've never seen an ad like that. Very modern. But all the things he talks about in that ad, all the issues he talks about, to me again, boiled down to what's the zeitgeist's anti. Big, anti wealthy, anti special interest. And when he says that the Republican Party's biggest donors are pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into crypto and AI super PACs to back Greg Stanton. That's true. Those super PACs, a lot of the money comes from Republicans, but they're looking for Democrats to support because they want Democrats may be in the majority in Congress and they want Democratic allies who support their agenda on crypto and AI and Newkirk's campaign's right. That's a difference. Newkirk doesn't want to be owned by corporate special interest, doesn't want to be funded by them. He's been outspent. He might lose because of that, but that's a big difference. And, and just the whole thing, he Says taking on special interests, paid for by special interest. That's what he's saying is, is what Stanton. Stanton claims to be against special interest, but takes the money. And that's the, that's the biggest complaint you hear from that wing of the party which has such resonance, including with independents, that all the Democratic leaders, Chuck Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries, all of them, they're no better than the Republicans. They just take the money. One more from Newkirk. This ad, this ad is brilliant. This on social media this week and it talks about. It starts with media clips and it chronicles all the recent elections in which these underdogs have won. And Newkirk's team is trying to basically say, here's another one. Here's another opportunity to send a message to the establishment as voters did in Colorado, as voters did in New York, to send a message on the issues they care about, on what they call genocide, on what they say, human rights. But really you'll hear it in here. Send a message to the billionaires. That's the key thing. The oligarchs. Send a message to them. Here's one last video from the nuclear campaign. They're all just so illustrative here. This is S26, please.
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David Bozell
And the roof is collapsing on the Democratic Party establishment tonight.
- [34:41]
Mark Halpern
All three candidates who Mayor Mamdani supported emerged victorious last night. Democrat socialist Malat Kiros beating longtime Democrat congresswoman Diana Dejet.
- [34:51]
Kai Newkirk Campaign Supporter
We can be the next big progressive victory. We can be the next big victory. That says no to apec, that says no to the genocide, that says yes to human rights. It is time to flip the tables of what is a corrupt and authoritarian status quo in our country. The threat that we pose to defeat Greg Stanton is so strong that the billionaires and the oligarchs are coming in now with hundreds of thousands of dollars funded by AI and crypto to try to prop up Stanton and defeat me in this campaign. Because they see how close that we are. I'm fighting for many different things to stand, stop the abuses that ICE has been carrying out. I believe that agency needs to be disbanded and abolished. Fighting to take on this cost of living crisis in which it's been so much harder for everyday people just to get by. We live in a time in which there's more and more wealth and power going to the billionaires and the corporations and it's harder and harder for working class people and everyday folks to get by to prosper in this country. And I'm fighting for things like Medicare for All that will guarantee health care to all of us as a right, not as a privilege. My name is Kai Newkirk. I would be honored to have your support.
- [35:57]
Mark Halpern
So here's the main point I want to make to you. We have good primaries to play at, including this one with Newkirk, and we don't know Michigan Senate races. Well, how will, how, how many of these Democratic socialist candidates will be nominated? And then we don't know. Of those who are nominated, how will they do in the general election? How will, how will Troy Jackson do in Maine? The Republicans tell you that these folks are crazy communists. And some of them have issue positions that are further out, like when we talk about abolishing ice, when we talk about abolishing the police. Those positions are going to hurt Democrats, not just the ones who take those positions, but they're going to hurt Democrats across the board because those positions are not popular. But here's where I think if the Democrats, whether they're nominating Democratic socialists or not, here's where I think Democrats have a chance to perform better than the Republicans think. The ones who are calling them crazy communists. Here's what that video said, said. It describes what it says, a corrupt and authoritarian status quo in our country. Quote, the threat that we pose to defeat Greg Stanton is so strong that the billionaires and the oligarchs are coming. And now with hundreds of thousands of dollars funded by AI and crypto to try to prop up Stanton. That's the message. And that, and that message is, is heartfelt on the part of these candidates. But again, use that as the prism to say, why are these candidates talking about this stuff? Why are they attacking their own party? Why are they attacking wealth in this country? That's the mood of a lot of the electorate. That's the mood of a lot of people in maga. It's the mood of a lot of independence because we've talked about income, income inequality here before. They think the game is rigged. They think that the status quo is unsustainable because of all the economics, they can't afford a house, etc. But even, even on, even on Israel, for instance, they think the reason there's been support for Israel and the American government by both parties is not because of, well, because of aipac. In other words, support for Israel has been driven, solidified, held in place by AIPAC giving big money to members of both parties in Congress. And honestly, ladies and gentlemen, there's some truth to it. You could be the most pro Israel person in the world. In fact, I'm sure if you went to AIPAC meetings and, and sat in on them, you'd hear over the years, you'd hear APAC people bragging to each other and saying, yeah, we're, we're, we're not, we're not giving these campaign contributions and sponsoring these trips to Israel for fun. We're doing it because this is how we keep the policy in place. So same with the corporations. If, if you, if you could go to a PAC meeting of the AI and crypto and traditional corporations, special interest corporations, you'd hear the same thing. You'd hear it at the labor unions too, by the way, but you'd hear the same thing. Big money is given to these candidates and these politicians to try to keep, keep them on, on, on the side of the establishment, to try to keep them from changing the status quo the way, the way the progressives would like to see it done. So I want to see the primaries play out. I'll be, I'll be fascinated to see if Kai Newkirk wins. But even if Kai Newkirk wins, Kai Newkirk loses in Arizona today. I bet you that Greg Stanton talks a lot about these same issues, just the way Sherrod Brown is talking about him. Because anyone running as a Democrat this year, whether it's attacking AI more or less, whether it's attacking Israel more or less, whether it's attacking corporate interests more or less, they're all going to be leaning that way. They're all going to be leaning towards saying the status quo has to change, the system is rigged. That's the mood. Not just the Democratic Party, not just the far left of the Democratic Party. That is the mood of the electorate in this country right now. You saw it with the Tea Party, you saw with maga, you're seeing it now. And, and I bet you if you did a poll question, is the American system rigged for special interests and the wealthy? I don't know. I don't know what that would test. I'm gonna see if I can get it on a poll. But a lot of independents would say yes, a lot of Democrats would say yes, A lot of Republicans would say yes. And that fights the American dream, right? The notion of the American dream is the system's not rigged. Anybody can succeed in our system. But the defining principle, which is why I'm using it as my prism today and to understand where we are in the midterms, the defining principle and why the Democrats have more enthusiasm to vote, is in Donald Trump's America. They believe the system is rigged against the working people of this country. And you're going to see not just Democrats, but as I showed you, a lot of Republicans making the same case because that's the message that's resonating right now. All right. There you have it. There's my reported monologue on where we stand. Let me know what you think about my theory that the prism of the midterms is leading inexorably towards those four words, the system is rigged. Email me your thoughts on my monologue at nextup at devil may caremedia.com Next up at devil may caremedia.com and let me know what you think about what I said. All right, next up, David Bozell will be here. He's the president of the Media Research Center. Talk about the latest examples of liberal media bias and what could be done about it. David Bozell is next up. Wherever you go, everybody's talking about the same thing, those weight loss injections. And they're talking about them because the results can be so dramatic. Those work by lowering blood sugar and reducing appetite. So if what you're looking for is to lose weight, maybe, though, you're not interested in those painful weekly injections, especially when you hear about some of those side effects. That's why doctors created a weight loss supplement called Lean. And the results there are remarkable. The studied ingredients in Lean have been shown to lower your blood sugar, burn fat by converting into energy, and curb your appetite and those cravings so you're not as hungry. But listen, Lean is not for just the casual diet or if you've only got a few pounds to lose. The doctors of Brickhash Nutrition created Lean for frustrated diarrhes with 10 or more pounds to shed. 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- [42:39]
UnitedHealth Group Representative
the country, UnitedHealth Group is working with local partners to build healthier communities every day. That includes helping partners like the good acre provide 45,000 meals and lower A1C in the twin Cities and helping hello Family doulas deliver 44% fewer underweight births in Spartanburg because building healthier communities starts by giving people access to the care and services they need to live healthier lives. Learn more@unitedhealthgroup.com commitment.
- [43:11]
Mark Halpern
All right, next up, one of the most important topics we talk about here all the time, media accountability. When I was first in the news business at ABC News, pre digital. There wasn't a lot of scrutiny of the media. And. And I, I quickly learned that the place I worked was liberally biased, and I learned that all the other major news organizations were. And it was not discussed in the hallways. And, and on a regular basis, we got mailed to the research department a newsletter from a place called the Media Research Center. And it was, it was read then by some, not by everybody. I read every issue. And I was amazed at how openly and aggressively they laid bare the media bias. I didn't always agree. I thought sometimes they went maybe a little too far. But most of the time, the Media Research center newsletter would say, well, Sam Donaldson said this and it was biased, and CBS said this. And it wasn't just anecdotal, it was also statistical. They had element. They'd say this negative story about The Republicans got 97 minutes, and this negative story about the Democrats got zero minutes. It was an incredible organization, and it remains so as media criticism, including a lot from the right, has proliferated, the Media Research center remains the granddaddy of them all. And it's a family business. Our guest, David Bozell. David, welcome. David, you said the kudos,
- [44:40]
David Bozell
Mark, is not uncommon. When an anchor would call us and say, I didn't say that. And we just played the tape.
- [44:46]
Mark Halpern
Yeah. David, it's funny because you've. Your career has been iconoclastic. It's been going against the established order. And yet you're a Nepo baby. You took over from, from your dad. Explain. Explain your family history. Not just your, your, your dad, but the fact you're. You're related to William F. Buckley, the godfather of conservatism. Just explain growing up what life was like for you and how you got into the family business.
- [45:12]
David Bozell
Oh, gosh. Well, I mean, our grandparents grew up in Northwest Washington, so it was not uncommon to kind of go over there for a Thanksgiving dinner and maybe Judge Bork would just stop by and have a glass of wine. Joe McCarthy. We had a Joe McCarthy couch in my grandmother's basement because Joe McCarthy used to sleep there overnight. Little known fact, Joe McCarthy is my father's godfather, so he shares that with Jacqueline Kennedy. I don't think Jacqueline Kennedy likes to brag about that, but, yeah, Joe McCarthy is both of their godfathers, so, yeah, it was just obviously different. Unique upbringing growing up. My dad was running National Conservative Political Action Committee, Nick PAC for short. His mentor passed away. They wanted him to take it over, but his mentor sister wanted to take over Nick Pack. They had started as all good things MRC. The idea of MRC started in a bar in the late 1986. And he said look, I'll leave NCPAC, but can I just bring this thing called Media Research center with me? And his mentor sister said sure, go for it. And all the staff went with my father. MRC was born. They made their bones. I believe it was the New Orleans Convention in 1988 in which they would slip these quotes underneath anchors doorsteps in their rooms or hotel rooms. And that's kind of how MRC kind of got on the map. And then obviously parallel to that, Rush Limbaugh goes syndicated with the lifting of the Fairness Doctrine. So MRC and Rush were simpatico. And all the clips, those early clips, pre email we had to quite literally mark we would play a clip, we would put a phone up to a VHS TV1 box and then blast it to Rush Limbaugh who had his phone to his microphone. And that's how those things, those clips were aired in the early days of Russia show Russia. So they were kind of. And then Fox comes along and the rest is history.
- [47:17]
Kai Newkirk
Yeah.
- [47:17]
Mark Halpern
David's father, Brent Bozo is larger than life figure and really a pioneer in what has become an important part of the media ecosystem of explaining a liberal media bias and pointing it out. I've, I've said it throughout my career, even when I worked in these places, that we have alienated half the country. And I've said to liberals, if you don't believe the press is liberally biased, you're ignoring the data. But recognize that half the country does and you're denying half the country these massive platforms because when your dad did it, basically it was covering the major networks. They had a monopoly. And those places alienated a generation or two or three of conservatives. Your career, you've taken over for your dad, but your career has, has seen the rise of two things. One is conservative media. Rush Limbaugh and the history you just gave is extraordinary. How difficult and technologically challenging it was to get Rush the raw material he needed. The rise of conservative media, first talk radio, then, then blogs, now social, but also the large social media institutions which up until Elon and recent developments and certainly in the 2020 presidential campaign, were just tools of the left. And the iron triangle between Democratic operatives, the traditional liberally biased media and these social media institutions was an extraordinary advantage for Joe Biden. And some have argued, including the President, he wouldn't have won without the suppression of the Hunter Biden Laptop story and others. Where are we now in 2026 as compared to 2020 of that iron triangle? Is it just as powerful or has it been diminished with Elon's takeover of X, et cetera?
- [48:59]
David Bozell
Well, Elon's takeover of X has certainly helped. I mean, our attitude has been you got to fish where the fish are. You got to go to where the audience is, for starters. And if the conservative ecosystem, if given an equal opportunity to thrive, it typically wins. Rush Limbaugh taking over talk radio, that whole ecosystem and all the many Rush Limbaughs that he spawned over the years. And liberal talk radio just doesn't have. And they've tried. I think you probably remember Air America, their big attempt in the 90s, Fox News coming along in 1992. Roger Ailes and company see the opportunity that Russia has created on talk radio. So they've taken over cable news. They own every single hour of every day. And they've done so for about 30 plus years. And so that balanced right ecosystem, that network has taken over that medium. So radio, check that box. Television, check that box. Where digital is concerned, Obama used Facebook with weapons grade precision, Mark. And conservatives were kind of asleep at the wheel until the likes of Ben Shapiro and Charlie Kirk. And I've run an organization called For America, a political operation that has an 8 million plus Facebook presence there. Until we started planting our flag. And our attitude was, Mark, if we don't plant our flag on the biggest communication vehicles that man has ever created, we might as well just take our ball and go home. So that's what a lot of these young upstarts started to do. And then that's when Silicon Valley responded, as you suggested, by censoring anything and everything that we were trying to say. It's better. You still gotta kind of color within the lines, the lines that they create and stay within their guardrails on certain topics and issues and how you say certain things. But it's certainly improved. Our focus at MRC are the digital news apps, the points of entry, Apple News, Google News, Yahoo and msn. And those things have been, I mean, Reuters. The origin story of that, Mark, was that Reuters had a poll in July of 25 that showed that 58% of the country gets their news from the points of entry. Apple News, Google News, Yahoo and msn. And that kind of makes sense, right? And there was an interesting, I remember back In April of 25, Mark Breitbart had a cool podcast driving down 81. And this was when Trump's numbers were going down. A little bit when tariffs were on again, off again. And they took the five worst polls that showed Trump's approval rating going down, and they overlaid it on top. And they looked at all the age intervals and from 18 to 30, 30 to 40, 40 to 50, 50 to 60, Trump was neutral or plus since the inauguration. Now, remember, this is April of 2025, but 65 plus, he was down 20 points. And so there are two prevailing theories on this podcast that I was listening to. One was that the tariffs were upsetting people's, their feelings about their Social Security. People want to keep what's theirs. And I get that. And that kind of amounted to about 8 to 10 points. But the other 10, you know, 12 to 10 to 12 points, they didn't really, couldn't really put their finger on it. And the kind of, the throwaway speculation was, well, they must be doom watching CNN and MSNBC all day long, but that those numbers don't bear that out. I mean, those numbers for those ratings have cratered in the last. I mean, if CNN's lost 50% of its audience in five years, MSNBC has lost 43% of its audience in five years. So the numbers kind of didn't bear that out. So then we started looking like, what is this demographic watching and listening to and consuming for news? And it turns out it's the points of entry. It makes total sense. It's Apple News, Google News, msn.
- [52:51]
Mark Halpern
And it's impossible for an outsider, no matter how aggressive you are, to understand. Is it algorithm? Is it human? How is it that these are deciding which stories people see? And I don't want to get into the specifics because it's, it's also complicated. But, but there's no doubt that if you're suspicious of those, of those institutions, you have to wonder, how is it, how is it that you can find example after example where it seems that the news that's being served up is, is sending people in the leftward direction? I want to ask you about something. I say this all the time, and people take issue with it. And I want you to tell me if you agree with me or not. And if you do agree with me, explain it to people better than I can. I call the major broadcast networks, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the news side of the Wall Street Journal. I call them the dominant media. Some people call them old media or legacy media, or some people call them the mainstream media. I've always understood why a lot of conservatives don't like calling them mainstream. I call Them the dominant media. Because my contention, and this is the thesis, I want you to agree or disagree. I still think they're dominant. As much as there's been a rise of conservative voices, people say, well, Fox does so well. Fox does so well for cable news, but it doesn't have the reach of the New York Times, of ABC News. So explain whether you agree or disagree that calling them the dominant media still makes sense and why.
- [54:09]
David Bozell
Well, dominance, your word of choice. That's fine. I'll take it. I'll agree with that. I just go by the numbers, Mark. And that's what we're looking at. This. We use the Press Gazette. I don't want to bore your very sophisticated audience, but the Press Gazette has an awesome monthly breakdown of the top news websites in America. And I was, as a conservative activist and someone who had just taken over the helm of the Media Research Center, I was annoyed to see the New York Times. This is November of 25,440 million hits that month and thinking, wow, and that's number one. And number one by a country mile.
- [54:44]
Mark Halpern
Yeah.
- [54:45]
David Bozell
Was more egregious was CNN.com@300. It's a monster. And it's all being helped by, you know, the, the aforementioned big four that we talked about.
- [54:54]
Mark Halpern
Yeah.
- [54:55]
David Bozell
But there are, you know, and Wall Street Journal's in the top, I think 14, 13, and still there. So if you just go by the numbers, you're right. This is like they command eyeballs, particularly in the long form format. But within that top 10 is where Apple sits and where Google News sits and where MSN sits and where. And where Yahoo sit. Yahoo is bigger than all of them.
- [55:21]
Sherrod Brown
Yeah.
- [55:22]
David Bozell
If you combine all Yahoo's properties, you could make an argument, Mark, that Yahoo is the most important news ecosystem in America.
- [55:30]
Mark Halpern
Yeah. So you'd be out of the family business if all this got fixed. So are you rooting for the press to be less, less biased or this is what keeps you, keeps you fed?
- [55:41]
David Bozell
Yeah. So I've got sort of four pillars. Number one, does anybody watch the liberal media? Number two, does anybody listen to them? Number three, does anybody read them? And number four, does anyone believe them? Number one, does anyone watch these guys? The ratings are less and less, less and less. They're sinking like a stone. Number two, does anyone listen to these guys? New York Times has a good podcast in the morning. It's very popular. You, you got Pod Save America. But beyond that, you don't have a really robust liberal media radio ecosystem. Number three, does anybody read these guys? Yes. By the tens of millions every single day. And the number four, does anyone believe them? I mean, pick whatever poll you want. I mean, Gallup's probably the most cited. Gallup has total believability of the press at 8%. This was a poll last year, somewhat. Believability of the press is 24%. That's less than Congress, Mark. I mean, this is less than some of the.
- [56:37]
Mark Halpern
As John McCain would say, they're down to paid staff and close relatives.
- [56:41]
David Bozell
That's exactly right. Exactly right. So in terms of where I see Media Research center, where I want to take the organization and kind of our quest is we've got three out of the four boxes checked. And I do think that if these apps were to allow. And right now I think there's a blockade and we could prove it. There's a blockade of the conservative ecosystem at the point of entry. If we can level that playing field, then there's going to be a more balanced ecosystem across all devices. The thing that you check 200 times a day and there's going to be all sorts of political. I'll give you a cherry, a rich example.
- [57:21]
Mark Halpern
Yeah.
- [57:22]
David Bozell
The Minnesota Star Tribune in the month of January shot up to the top 50 spot, number 48th in the top 50 out of nowhere, all because Apple linked to them 11 times and Google News linked to them six times in that particular month. Now, they've subsequently sync. They've subsequently sunk where they probably were. It was all anti ICE all the time. Okay.
- [57:47]
Mark Halpern
Not stories about welfare corruption, not stories about where.
- [57:52]
David Bozell
Yeah, nothing about what Nick Shirley has uncovered. None of that stuff. It was just all anti ICE all the time. Now, if you ask Breitbart, were you down, did you have boots on the ground in Minneapolis, in the Twin Cities? Of course they did. In fact, I did ask the editors of Breitbart that, and they said they were filing three stories a day. Now, if you're going to cover the ICE protests, wouldn't have behooved any of these outlets to just pick up a Breitbart story for the balanced equation. And so it has all sorts of political downstream effects. I mean, no surprise that. I mean, did ICE make mistakes? Probably. But to the extent that Trump needed to overhaul that entire program, if that was a more balanced presentation out there, probably not. So there was issue after issue where that, where that presents itself.
- [58:41]
Mark Halpern
All right, let's give out some awards real quick before we go. Just, you can, right off top of your head. And, and the answers can't be Trump or Vance. It can't be. What member of the administration is the most articulate and powerful on talking about liberal media bias besides the president?
- [58:57]
David Bozell
The vice president, probably Caroline. And, and she's terrific. And. Yeah, she's what?
- [59:05]
Mark Halpern
What Republican member of Congress.
- [59:08]
David Bozell
I was going to say Rubio, but he's in the Cabinet. Rubio's good at it, too. Member of Congress. The speaker does a good job. Yeah.
- [59:18]
Mark Halpern
I'll give you a nominee. Tom Cotton.
- [59:21]
David Bozell
Tom Cotton does it. And having been aggrieved.
- [59:23]
Mark Halpern
Exactly. He's the poster child. Haven't been aggrieved. I don't know why he wrote that piece for the New York Times, but that's a separate issue. How about podcaster, video podcaster? Who's the best?
- [59:35]
David Bozell
Oh, wow. Everyone's trying to be the next Rush Limbaugh and sadness. And Charlie was kind of well on his way when he could look at his audience size. And he had plans, obviously.
- [59:45]
Mark Halpern
But I mean, specifically on calling out liberal media bias,
- [59:51]
David Bozell
man, that's a great question. On the, in the conservative center right ecosystem, I am going probably Bongino.
- [60:00]
Mark Halpern
Yeah.
- [60:01]
David Bozell
And you know who has a creative job with it outside the mainstream news junkie world is, is our Clay and Buck.
- [60:10]
Mark Halpern
And they're hilarious on it because they're like me. They, they have to first get over the humor of it because it's so absurd before they can actually drill down and document it. But they're, they're great. They're great choices. David, we barely scratched the surface about all the, all that exists in your empire. So I hope you'll come back and we'll walk.
- [60:26]
David Bozell
Absolutely.
- [60:27]
Mark Halpern
Particularly in the context of the presidential. Because my aspiration for America is that this is the first presidential election where there's a level playing field in the media.
- [60:36]
David Bozell
I absolutely, I concur.
- [60:40]
Mark Halpern
Yeah. Let's see. Let's see if we can't team up and pull it off. David Bozell is the president of the Media Research Center. It's a family business. It's not a baker or butcher. It's just a good nonprofit that does extraordinary work. David, thank you for being here.
- [60:53]
David Bozell
Thanks, Mark. Appreciate it.
- [60:54]
Mark Halpern
All right, that's it for today's episode. Make sure you subscribe to Next up on your YouTube channel. Watch full episodes there, bonus content, everything we do. You can do that@YouTube.com NextUp Halperin. Listen to the program. If you like the podcast, you don't want to see what shirts I'm wearing, you can do that. To subscribe to Next up with Mark Halpern. Wherever you get podcasts. Make sure you turn your downloads on so you get every episode right when they drop Tuesdays and Thursdays. And the bonus content. Do all of that. Tell all your friends. Make sure everyone in your life knows we're here so they, like you, can always know what's coming. Next up.