Rage at Madison Square Garden

Summary

Pod Save America - Episode: Rage at Madison Square Garden

Hosted by Crooked Media's Jon Favreau, Jon Lovett, Dan Pfeiffer, and Tommy Vietor.

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1. Introduction: The Final Week Before the Election

With just one week remaining before the presidential election, the hosts of Pod Save America dissect the stark contrast between the two leading candidates’ campaign strategies. Kamala Harris is portrayed as unifying the country with themes of reproductive freedom and inclusion, while Donald Trump’s recent five-hour rally at Madison Square Garden is criticized for its overt racism and hate-filled rhetoric—an unprecedented spectacle in modern political events.

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2. Donald Trump's Madison Square Garden Rally

Key Points:

• Rally Content: Trump's event at Madison Square Garden (MSG) was marred by inflammatory remarks and racist undertones, drawing comparisons to historical pro-Nazi rallies, although the hosts argue this comparison was exaggerated.

• Impact on Voters: The hosts debate whether Trump's rally swayed undecided voters or alienated moderates and minority groups. They express concern that the hateful messaging could deter swing voters, particularly Latino Americans who are crucial in key battleground states.

Notable Quotes:

• Jon Lovett (04:02): "She is the devil."
• Tommy Vitor (06:31): "We're very much numb to it."
• Jon Favreau (05:45): "America is only for Americans."

Discussion: The hosts highlight Trump’s use of divisive language, including derogatory remarks about Latino communities and other marginalized groups. They emphasize the potential long-term damage such rhetoric can inflict on Trump's campaign, especially in diverse swing states like Pennsylvania and Florida. The inclusion of offensive jokes by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe during the rally sparked backlash, leading to criticisms of the Trump campaign’s poor judgment in vetting speakers.

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3. Kamala Harris’s Strategic Campaign Moves

Key Points:

• Celebrity Endorsements: Kamala Harris received endorsements from high-profile figures like Bad Bunny, Ricky Martin, and Jennifer Lopez, bolstering her appeal among Latino voters.

• Economic Plan for Puerto Rico: Harris unveiled a comprehensive economic plan aimed at revitalizing Puerto Rico, a significant swing region with a substantial Puerto Rican American population in Pennsylvania. This move aims to counteract Trump's anti-immigrant rhetoric and demonstrate Harris's commitment to addressing the needs of diverse communities.

• New Campaign Ad: Harris launched an ad contrasting her policies with Trump's, focusing on themes like reproductive rights and economic stability, reinforcing her image as a progressive leader.

Notable Quotes:

• Tommy Vitor (15:45): "The Harris campaign has a new ad out today."
• Jon Favreau (17:31): "Harris has gained seven or eight points in the polls."

Discussion: The hosts applaud Harris's focused approach on economic issues and her proactive measures to engage Latino voters. They note the strategic timing of her Puerto Rico plan and the accompanying celebrity endorsements as pivotal in shifting voter sentiment in her favor. The campaign's emphasis on positive messaging and contrast with Trump's divisive tactics is seen as a calculated effort to consolidate support among undecided voters.

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4. Donald Trump's Interview with Joe Rogan

Key Points:

• Interview Content: Trump's three-hour interview with Joe Rogan was critiqued for its lack of substantive challenge, allowing Trump to present a favorable image without facing rigorous questioning on his policies or controversies.

• Host Reactions: The hosts express disappointment with the interview, noting that Rogan's lenient approach provided Trump a platform to further his narrative without accountability.

Notable Quotes:

• Jon Favreau (19:30): "It was a love festival for Trump."
• Jon Lovett (22:54): "He was mean."

Discussion: The hosts argue that the interview did little to challenge Trump's false claims or hostile rhetoric, instead offering him a space to reinforce his base's beliefs. They express concern that such platforms can misinform or unduly influence undecided voters by presenting Trump’s distorted views unchallenged, potentially harming the democratic process.

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5. Final Week Campaign Strategies and Concerns

Key Points:

• Media Coverage and Messaging: Both campaigns are navigating how to effectively communicate their messages amidst intense media scrutiny. Harris aims to highlight her economic policies and contrast them with Trump's, while Trump's team faces backlash over the MSG rally's content.

• Poll Dynamics: Early indicators suggest a race still within reach, with Harris gaining ground in certain polls. The hosts discuss the uncertainty of the final week’s impact on voter decisions.

Notable Quotes:

• Jon Lovett (14:13): "They are projecting confidence."
• Tommy Vitor (54:18): "It's rigged against you."

Discussion: The hosts debate the effectiveness of each campaign's strategies in the closing days. They express concern that Trump's aggressive stance may alienate voters, while Harris's focus on substantive issues like the economy and reproductive rights could resonate more broadly. The uncertainty of voter turnout and the influence of last-minute events, such as Harris’s major speeches and Trump’s controversial statements, are highlighted as critical factors that could sway the election outcome.

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6. Interview with Speaker Nancy Pelosi

Key Points:

• Campaign Insights: Nancy Pelosi shares her views on the importance of mobilization, unity, and focusing on progressive agendas like reproductive rights and economic reforms.

• Response to Trump's Tactics: Pelosi discusses Trump's rhetoric, labeling him as an “enemy within” and emphasizing the need for the American people to reject his divisive and unethical behavior.

• Reproductive Rights: Pelosi underscores the critical role of reproductive rights in the election, highlighting Harris's commitment to protecting and expanding these rights against Trump's antagonistic stance.

Notable Quotes:

• Nancy Pelosi (70:19): "We have to get rid of that politics of personal destruction."
• Alyssa Mastromonaco (82:26): "What do you consider the biggest fight still ahead?"

Discussion: Pelosi advocates for a strong, progressive platform that champions women's rights, economic justice, and bipartisan cooperation. She stresses the necessity of defeating Trump to preserve the advancements made in these areas. Pelosi also reflects on the challenges of campaigning in a hostile media environment and the importance of strategic messaging to resonate with voters' core concerns.

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7. Conclusion: The Path Forward

As the election approaches, Pod Save America emphasizes the high stakes of the final week. The hosts advocate for active voter engagement, urging listeners to reach out to undecided voters and support campaigns that prioritize unity and substantive policy discussions over divisive rhetoric. They highlight the importance of rejecting hateful messages and focusing on policies that promote economic stability, reproductive freedom, and social justice.

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Notable Takeaways:

• Impact of Divisive Rhetoric: Trump's hate-filled messaging at MSG may have alienated key voter demographics, potentially harming his campaign in crucial swing states.

• Harris’s Strategic Positioning: Kamala Harris's focus on economic reforms and reproductive rights, bolstered by celebrity endorsements and targeted policies, positions her as a strong contender capable of appealing to a broad electorate.

• Media Influence on Voter Perception: The nature of media engagements, such as Trump's interview with Joe Rogan, can significantly influence voter perceptions by either challenging or reinforcing candidates' narratives.

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Final Thought: The episode underscores the critical importance of the final week’s strategies and messaging in determining the election's outcome. It advocates for informed voter engagement and strategic campaigning that prioritizes unity and substantive policy discussions over divisive and hateful rhetoric.

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Note: All timestamps correspond to the provided transcript and are included to reference notable quotes within the summary.

Transcript

[Tommy Vitor]

The kind of burgers you get today.

[Jon Lovett]

Tells you a lot about yourself. You're either someone who settles for sad, same old, same old burgers, or you're Edit Carl's Jr. Obsessed with a tangy OG Western bacon cheeseburger demanding a house made guacamole. Loaded guac bacon fired up for the.

[Jon Favreau]

Insanely hot El Diablo or craving a classic Charbold famous star.

[Jon Lovett]

Give in to your flavored cravings. Do your mouth to Carl's Jr Big Burger good Burger. Today's presenting sponsor is Simplisafe Home Security. With mischief night upon us.

[Tommy Vitor]

What's that? Halloween.

[Jon Lovett]

I guess it's crucial to be extra vigilant about home security. Simplisafe's Active Guard Outdoor Protection stands guard against potential pranks that could escalate into real threats. This advanced system not only monitors your property, but empowers live agents to intervene to prevent any mischief from becoming a crime, ensuring your home stays safe and secure. I guess that's a Halloween preview. John Lovett installed the Simplisafe all by himself.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah. No pumpkin smashed on that lawn?

[Jon Lovett]

Nope, not at all.

[Tommy Vitor]

As far as we know.

[Jon Lovett]

And he loves it. Old school home security systems only take action once someone's already inside your home. Simplisafe Home Security is changing that with its new Active Guard Outdoor Protection. It's the only home security designed to prevent crimes before they happen. Protect your home with 50% off a new Simplisafe system plus a free indoor security camera. When you sign up for fast protect monitoring, just visit simplisafe.com crooked that's simplisafe.com crooked there's no safe like Simplisafe. Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.

[Jon Favreau]

I'm Jon Lovitt.

[Tommy Vitor]

I'm Tommy Vitor.

[Jon Lovett]

On today's show, with one week to go. One week. Big, big, deep breath.

[Tommy Vitor]

Don't like that.

[Jon Lovett]

In, out. Our two candidates for president could not be closing more differently. Kamala Harris held rallies with Michelle Obama and Beyonce that hit on themes of reproductive freedom and bringing the country together. While Donald Trump just headlined a five hour rally at New York City's Madison Square Garden that was filled with more hate and open racism than we've heard at a political event. I think in decades. I cannot remember even a Trump event. I cannot remember anything quite like this. Uh, we'll get into all that. And then later, former speaker Nancy Pelosi talks with Alyssa Master Monaco about what it's like to be one of Trump's enemies within. What's keeping her up at night and what she's expecting on Election Day. But first, so I'll be honest, when people were comparing Trump's plans to hold a rally at Madison Square Garden to the pro Nazi rally that was held there in 1939, I thought it was a bit much. Plenty of other presidential candidates from both parties have held rallies at the Garden over the years that no one would confuse for being pro Nazi. But regardless of what words you might use to describe Trump's rally, you can decide for yourself whether JD Vance was right in later calling it a quote, celebration of America. Let's listen. And these Latinos, they love making babies, too. Just know that they do. They do. There's no pulling out. They don't do that. They come inside, just like they did to our country. There's a lot going on. Like, I don't know if you guys know this, but there's literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. Yeah, I think it's called Puerto Rico, all right. Heck, yeah. It's a cool black guy with a thing on his head. What the hell is that? A lampshade? Look at this guy. Oh, my goodness. Wow. I'm just kidding. That's one of my buddies. He had a Halloween party last night. We had fun. We carved watermelons together. It was awesome. As the first Samoan, Malaysian, low iq, former California prosecutor ever to be elected president, it was just a groundswell of popular support.

[Jon Favreau]

She is the devil.

[Jon Lovett]

Who ever screamed that out. She is the Antichrist.

[Tommy Vitor]

She is some sick bastard, that Hillary Clinton, huh? What a sick son of a bitch. The whole fucking party. A bunch of degenerates.

[Jon Lovett]

Low lives, jewel haters and low lives.

[Tommy Vitor]

Every one of them.

[Jon Lovett]

We need to slaughter this other people.

[Jon Favreau]

America is for Americans and Americans only.

[Nancy Pelosi]

When I say the enemy from within, the other side goes crazy.

[Jon Favreau]

Becomes a sound. Oh, how can he say no?

[Nancy Pelosi]

They've done very bad things to this country. They are indeed the enemy from within.

[Jon Favreau]

But this is who we're fighting.

[Jon Lovett]

A day of love. Another day of love. General impressions, guys. Do you think that got some undecided voters off the fence? What do you think?

[Tommy Vitor]

I mean, weirdly, Trump's actual speech was basically just a stump speech to a bigger than usual crowd. If it had just been him, I think it would have kind of been a nothing burger, but they decided to turn it into basically another day of the rnc. It's interminable.

[Jon Lovett]

RNC was much nicer.

[Tommy Vitor]

Well, just this, like, long, endless, you know, group of speakers and some of Them were effective and some of them were boring and some of them crossed the line in ways that I don't think we've ever heard at a Trump rally, at least not recently.

[Jon Favreau]

And by the way, just to your point that it was like an rnc, these were not people just going up there and speaking off the cup.

[Jon Lovett]

These were, it was an open mic night.

[Jon Favreau]

These were vetted speeches. In fact, there's reporting that these were.

[Jon Lovett]

That.

[Jon Favreau]

That the, that the Puerto Rico comment was in a speech that was put through a teleprompter and that they took out some of the other material for being offensive.

[Jon Lovett]

There was a, there was a line in his original speech that called Kamala Harris the C word. And the campaign took that line out, but then they sent the rest of that speech right to the prompters. Although the campaign is saying he ad libbed the Puerto Rico joke, the general.

[Jon Favreau]

Impression of the whole thing is a reminder that for a lot of like the core base, like Trump is a personality hire for bigots. You know, he's just like, he's their avatar. And when these people have a few hours to, I don't know, drink, be bored, this is what comes out. But pretty ugly and like, I have to imagine, fundamentally unhelpful.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, I will say too, you're right. It was just Trump's rally speech. It was Trump's typical stump speech, but like doubling down on the enemy from within, which is why I wanted to play that part of it. And you know, he did the we're an occupied country liberation. It's like, I guess we're numb to it because he's said it so many times now.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah, we're very much numb to it.

[Jon Lovett]

But on its own is incredibly dark to a way to close, close the campaign. Like when you really. I was listening to this because I listened to his whole speech because I was wondering if he would do anything different, you know, and he's really like, even in 2016, even in 2020, he was like going down a rabbit hole of talking about like the FBI and Peter Strzok and things. You had to like have a degree in MAGA, online MAGA to know what he's talking about 2016, he's still talking about the Washington establishment. We're going to fight them. He basically, when everyone's like, oh, what are Kamala Harris plans? Donald Trump is only offering in his speeches now, like deporting even legal immigrants, I guess, drilling tariffs and enemies list and I'm going to prosecute people. That's it. That's all he's doing now and then the rest is just like an hour.

[Jon Favreau]

Of grievance, some tax cuts for corporations.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah. I mean, you could tell what the campaign wanted was at the very beginning, which is, are you better off than you were four years ago? Kamala, you're fired. Get out. Right. You could tell that's what they wanted on the evening news. But then he ends up doing these crazy riffs about how there's a couple hundred thousand kids who are missing in the US or dead or they're sex slaves. And they came in because of Kamala's open border. They played like this, like, snuff footage news clip. You real, you know, a couple different times, they played all this, like, really disgusting, you know, sort of descriptions of crimes by undocumented people. I mean, it is. It's gotten so, so dark, and we are very much used to it. But, you know, that darkness in his speech is not what led the headlines. It was these people who came before him.

[Jon Lovett]

I also. There's been so much focus. We're going to talk about it more on Tony Hinchcliffe, that comedian that did the Puerto Rico joke. But the reason I wanted to play all those other voices is the Trump campaign. Their response now is like, it's a joke. It was one joke. No, no, no, no. America is only for Americans. That's Stephen. That was Stephen Miller, his top policy adviser, potentially the next White House chief of staff. The things they said about Hillary Clinton, about Kamala Harris. I mean, it. It was not just one joke about Puerto Rico.

[Jon Favreau]

There's Rudy Giuliani getting up there. Oh, gosh, saying hateful things are Palestinians.

[Jon Lovett]

Do you guys think that the Trump campaign was happy with how that went?

[Tommy Vitor]

They can't be. I mean, when your main headline is about whether the warmup act, literally first speaker at the rally, has hurt your standing with all Latino voters, like, that is not a good headline. And again, it wasn't just AOC weighing in. It wasn't Democrats. They can't just say this was cancel culture. The campaign had to walk back from this joke. A bunch of Florida elected officials put out statements. Trump's trade adviser Peter Navarro, who's like a real MAGA dead ender, called Tony Hinchcliffe the biggest, stupidest asshole that ever came down the comedy pike. That's a Trump advisor saying that. So this is a real mess. And you can't just blame the comedian. Like, his show Kill Tony is a roast comedy show. A lot of the jokes there are, like, them saying whatever is kind of the most Offensive, shocking thing. And often it's very, very racist. And you can love it, you can hate it, you can listen to that. But booking that guy to do that set at a political rally is unbelievably stupid. It is political malpractice. And of course this was gonna happen because you can get away with saying things at a comedy club you can't ever, ever say at a political rally they are morons for letting him get there.

[Jon Lovett]

Or the other guy who said Hillary Clinton's a son of a bitch, or the guy that said that we should slaughter the Democrats. Or, I mean, it's on and on and on. Past just comedians book all these people.

[Jon Favreau]

And also just that, like, in the same way that, like, I think they were caught off guard by the revulsion to JD Vance because they don't realize how offensive some of the things he has said are in the past. Like, they don't realize how strange and extreme and bigoted they've gotten. I think that's another case, right? They have this guy. A lot of the remarks are, are, are vetted, right? This is what they want people to get up there and say. And they, I think, of course, they're now backtracking because the backlash was so severe. But, like, they wanted this to be a bigoted, rabble rousing event. They are enjoying the comparison.

[Jon Lovett]

Tucker Carlson saying that Kamala Harris is Samoan or Malaysian or whatever when he fucking knows better.

[Tommy Vitor]

Interestingly, I mean, per usual, Tucker Carlson kind of played narrator at this thing where he talked about how he had been given from Trump the gift of freedom and liberation by being able to say what he really thinks now, right? And then you just saw it throughout all these speakers. And the biggest problem with the part of the Kill Tony jokes, the Tony Hinchliffe jokes were racist and awful. They also were not even funny. They weren't jokes. Just like shitty observations. And you can get away with a lot of things if you're funny. But also, buddy, this wasn't a comedy set. It was also an endorsement speech. He ended by saying, like, God voted three months ago. We voted in a week. I mean, he said, Trump survived the assassination.

[Jon Lovett]

It's not a, it's not a fucking comedy show. And a comedian just doing a bit and free speech and cancel culture. When the candidate's top policy advisor gets up there a week before the election and says, america is for Americans and Americans only. And then the speakers at the rally start saying, making jokes about Puerto Ricans, black Americans, a number of other people, and it just, it's it's what they want. Right? Like, it is their worldview. Right. And they wanted to get that across.

[Jon Favreau]

Yes. I also like and Tucker Carlson. We'll talk about more of this later. But like, Tucker Carlson basically saying, like, if they tell you Kamala Harris won, it's illegitimate. Is inconceivable that she could because of our racist views on her, which teach. Which tell us that anyone who says she's compelling or successful as a politician is lying to you. And I'm not going to lie anymore. I'm going to be honest about my racism. Look, it was a night of disgusting, racist, anti Democratic, anti American speeches. But this idea that, like, a guy makes a fucking terrible joke like this, which is not just racist, but as Tommy said, a bad joke. And then people are criticizing it. It's like, oh, you guys can't take a fucking joke? I fucking hate that. Like, this guy, this guy posted a video of Don Rickles at Ronald Reagan's second inaugural saying, nobody had a problem with Don Rickles speaking at Ronald Reagan's second inaugural. First of all, it wasn't a political event. It was a nonpartisan event. Also, Don Rickles turning over in his fucking grave. And the number of, like, hacky fucking terrible comedians who say Don Rickles was an equal opportunity offender is, like, it's very frustrating. It's also like, hey, man, like, you can joke about whatever you want to joke about. It has to be fucking funny. And like, Jeselnik has talked about this. A bunch of other comedians talked about Seinfeld, by the way, went out there and said, like, you can't make any jokes anymore. The PC culture is coming after it. And he actually thought about it. And he came back later, he said, you know what? I thought about it. That was a stupid thing to say. I don't believe that. Why? Because culture change and politics change, and you have to hit the goalposts. Like, the goalposts may move. What's funny may be harder, may be more difficult, and you have to fucking hit it. And, like, the idea that these terrible fucking comedians make the dumbest worst jokes and then everybody has to defend them because of their free speech is very frustrating. Like, if the joke was funny, we wouldn't be in this.

[Jon Lovett]

I know. I just.

[Jon Favreau]

I get, like, it's not the most important point.

[Jon Lovett]

No, I know, I know. I know you know that. But it's what they want this to be another debate about, of course, comedy and cancel culture and what's acceptable. And it's like, that is not what this is about you are.

[Jon Favreau]

Of course not.

[Tommy Vitor]

And you weren't canceled, man. You were speaking at Madison Square Garden in front of 28,000 people sucking up to the former and maybe future president in the United States. You were kissing his ass. You were kissing the ring. Your joke sucked. Everyone let you know. Get over it. You're not a fucking victim.

[Jon Lovett]

I think it's also bad for, like, however, whatever effect this may or may not have on actual voters, I do think there are now seven days left. At the time, there were, what, eight days left. So they lose Monday now because Monday was all about Madison Square Garden and the fact that they added, like, a hateful, racist rally. Tuesday now is going to be Kamala Harris's closing argument speech. So they lose. She gets the spotlight for Tuesday. So they're just losing days.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

And we keep talking because we're on the Kamala Harris side about, like, she needs to close the deal. She needs to do this. The race is pretty much tied. Like, Trump needs to close the deal, too, with voters, and he just lost. He's just lost a day doing that, at the very least, if not worse, if not, like, getting people off the fence to say, like, that's fucking crazy, you know?

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. I think we just don't know the full effect of this kind of a rally in the closing days and what it looks like for people to be hearing about it. And, like, because I do think that there's a bunch of people that are in this home stretch going to be reaching out to, like, friends and loved ones should be like, hey, I know you've seen a lot of things. I know you were saying like, this, like, here's why I think this is important. And, like, this is. This is a very good time for Trump to do some be part of something so awful.

[Tommy Vitor]

And it doesn't seem like a coincidence that yesterday, Bad Bunny, Ricky Martin and J. Lo all endorsed Kamala Harris.

[Jon Lovett]

Well, it was a coincidence that earlier in the day, before this even happened, she released her economic plan for Puerto Rico in Philadelphia. That was just like, what. What timing. Amazing timing. There are 470,000 Puerto Rican Americans in Pennsylvania. It's the biggest population of Puerto Rican Americans of any swing state, certainly larger than Biden's 80,000 vote margin. A victory in 2020. This is probably one reason, as Tommy mentioned, that a lot of Republican politicians sort of, like, fell all over themselves to condemn this. Rick Scott. Florida's got a. I think a million Puerto Rican Americans. And we wanted to find out whether this might actually have an electoral effect next week. So we checked in with our pal Carlos Odio, Democratic strategist who's an expert on the Latino vote. Here's what he said.

[Jon Favreau]

We're used to Trump and his allies saying wildly offensive things, but those things don't always make it to the kind of low information voters who are going to decide where this ends up at.

[Tommy Vitor]

The end of the day.

[Jon Favreau]

And so I want to do manage expectations that this is not providing new information. But if there is an exception, I would say it is the Puerto Rican piece, specifically because of the way that those comments, those incredibly unfunny comments were so incendiary, they were almost designed to be amplified at scale. I'm surprised WhatsApp didn't go down in Puerto Rico and in Central Florida and in Allentown and Reading, Pennsylvania. And they were instantly amplified by major players who had been on the sidelines of this election. So you had Bad Bunny and Ricky Martin weighing in for Harris. Normally you would say in the era of Trump, these things go down a rabbit hole. And yet this particular moment, and in the way it was timed, felt like it could be an exception.

[Jon Lovett]

So the Harris campaign also has a new ad out today. I can't tell if it's a video ad or how much money is behind it or whatever, but they made an ad about this. Nate Silver also did a little research, and he says there's some initial evidence that the rally is drawing broader attention. Today and yesterday are the top days of Google search traffic for Trump since the second assassination attempt against him in September. The chart was interesting. It's like this pretty straight lines. The first assassination attempt is like off the charts. Conviction is pretty small. That's a bump, though. Second assassination is like the conviction, little bump. And then now this is getting up towards that level, which I think is pretty telling.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, I talked to aoc, which you'll hear on Wednesday, and it was before the rally, but we talked about Puerto Rico and I do think there's something about that. The just the to Puerto Rico is garbage, reflecting the kind of the bigotry of that rally, like the sense that Puerto Rico was forgotten and disrespected after Maria and that this is a place that has been ignored by politicians, that Trump corruption contributed to the terrible response in Puerto Rico. I do think like all of this is like part of the ground on which this comment will grow. And so, yeah, it's also the period.

[Tommy Vitor]

Of time when people who don't ever think about politics are thinking about it for maybe the first time in four years because they're deciding whether to vote, and this can't be helpful.

[Jon Lovett]

No. And again, like, and that's with. We've been talking about the Puerto Rican American community, but if, you know, Google trends and Google searches of Trump are like, if anyone who gets any part of that rally. Yeah, there's not, there's, there's almost no good parts for that rally.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah, I mean, I mean, voters all across the country.

[Jon Lovett]

No, I know.

[Tommy Vitor]

Not thinking about politics at all. Like, that stuff.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah. And if you see the, and, like, look the, the headlines, you know, a lot of critique about headlines over the last several years. They all. New York Times, Politico, Washington Post, they all had, you know, racist, incendiary rally in the remarks. Like, I think this is one that broke through again, because it's the fucking final week of the campaign.

[Jon Favreau]

Not the most important point, but a group of people that I'm sure yell when they have to press one for English. Hillary Clinton would not be a son of a bitch. She would just be a bitch.

[Jon Lovett]

That bothered you.

[Jon Favreau]

I know it's like you're going to claim you're bothered by people speaking Spanish. You don't speak fucking English.

[Jon Lovett]

That is very true. Trump also. Point well taken. Trump also sat down with Joe Rogan on Friday. I know that's a few days ago now, but in fairness, that's how long it takes to listen to Joe Rogan's podcast, almost literally. The interview clocked in at about three hours, and as of Monday afternoon, though, has nearly 35 million views on YouTube alone.

[Jon Favreau]

Wow.

[Jon Lovett]

Did you guys have. How far did you two make it? I am an hour and a half in and I'm just like, I can't do it anymore.

[Jon Favreau]

Made it to the whole. Made it through the whole thing at two point.

[Tommy Vitor]

Same two.

[Jon Favreau]

At mostly two speed.

[Tommy Vitor]

I got up to 3.5.

[Jon Favreau]

It was about politics.

[Jon Lovett]

What do you get at 3.5?

[Tommy Vitor]

He talks slow enough that you get more than you think.

[Jon Favreau]

I'll tell you something. When you played the clip of the rally, I'm so used to. I don't. I try to avoid watching Trump live so that I can watch him faster so there's less time spent on Trump. And so I listened to him at like, wow, he's pretty energetic. And then when I, like, I think I moved from my car to back to my phone. And then he was back at 1X, I was like, jesus Christ. Yeah, this is terrible.

[Jon Lovett]

What did you guys think?

[Jon Favreau]

I'll tell you what I thought, which is first. So if you saw somebody on social media Telling you that it's the worst interview Trump ever did, that it was embarrassing, that Joe Rogan was horrified and thought Trump was embarrassing. You should just keep in mind that those are people you should not listen to, because fake news. It was fake fucking news. Do I think it's, like, a groundbreaking interview? Of course not. He rambles and he gives basically all of his same answers, but as a forum for Trump, it was also, like, I think the best kind of interview he could hope to get. Joe Rogan was incredibly solicitous, kind of keying him up with ways to take on some of the arguments from the left. It was a love festival for Trump. Do I think that necessarily matters? I have no fucking idea. But it was not. It was a good interview for him.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah, I'm not, like, a fan of Rogan's and a regular listener. I'm not a hater because I've, like, dipped into times and heard celebrity interviews and things that were interesting. And, you know, obviously he's very successful. So I. Going into it, I had, like, a little bit of hope that because he'd been critical of Trump and because he was an RFK guy, maybe he would push him on some things during the three hours. Maybe he'd do a little research to prep himself. But, like, I was. Couldn't have been more disappointed. He was entirely friendly. Rogan took everything at face value, from Trump saying he said some secret thing to Putin to prevent him from invading Ukraine, to Trump bragging about being able to run on a treadmill all day, even at the highest elevation. Like, everything was taken at face value. Rogan, he kicked off the questioning about the 2020 election denial by basically saying, you know, everyone does this Hillary question, 2016, yada, yada, yada, but never really, like, he came back to it, but he get past it.

[Jon Favreau]

There was one point where he said, are you ever going to show us the evidence? That was a good moment, I suppose. But, yeah, like, it was a. It was. I feel like it was an example to me of, like, I see a bunch of people are, like, canceling their Washington Post subscriptions because they're mad that Jeff Bezos, Washington Post, is not endorsing. And it just, I think, is that a. Is that a helpful thing to punish the journalists of the Washington Post? I do not think so. But where does that impulse come from? And I think part of where it comes from is this kind of, like, endless feeling of, like, dispiriting exhaustion that, like, there's a fundamentally fraudulent case. Donald Trump is offering just a fundamentally flawed and fraudulent case. And this was just a forum for him to lay out that case. But if it's not questioned, if it's not challenged, if it's entirely solicitous, you see why, if you're not paying that close of attention or if you're receptive. Receptive to in the first place, why Donald Trump is so appealing? Because in that forum, it's all, it's a ton of lies and bullshit and self aggrandizing made up stories, but it's compelling and he's charming in it.

[Jon Lovett]

I thought it was not compelling. He was not good.

[Tommy Vitor]

He's meandering.

[Jon Lovett]

He was mean. And not even because of the, like, all the frames about Trump. It's not the bigotry and lies from the rally. It wasn't that. It's not the he's addled and losing it kind of shit. He is just, he is a bad conversationalist because all he cares about.

[Tommy Vitor]

You don't get the weave dude, right?

[Jon Lovett]

All he cares about is himself and his fucking stories. And he's one of those people, like you could tell. And I was watching some of it too. You could tell Rogan too. Like, Rogan was extremely solicitous and very nice to him, but you could tell at times Rogan's looking at him like, okay, what next? Like, he just. The stories. And first of all, all of the stories, I mean, if we've listened to Trump for way too long, all the stories we heard before a thousand times again, we now we analyze Kamala Harris's speeches now and her interviews and be like, oh, did she talk about people, though? Is she talking about what she's gonna do for people? Donald Trump was like, at one point, at the beginning, he was bitching about how hard it is to build things in New York because of all the environmental regulations and the permits and the unions. And he's yelling and he's. And it's like he's like talking about something from 10, 15 years ago. Then he was talking about burying windmills and blades and it just, it is like, it is, it's self aggrandizing. I just, I cannot imagine that unless you were a Trump fan, if you could sit through that whole thing, you'd be like, yeah, this guy, I think this guy could be in charge. This guy, this guy was looking out for me.

[Tommy Vitor]

That's not where I landed.

[Jon Favreau]

That's not where I landed either. I just like the, I think that, like the way he was talking about, like he talks about again, it's all just bullshit.

[Jon Lovett]

What did you think was appealing?

[Jon Favreau]

First of all, they had very. They had, like, kind of. They had charming interactions about UFC and about fighters.

[Tommy Vitor]

I think knows his stuff when it comes to the UFC and boxing, and they connected on that, and the audience really likes that.

[Jon Favreau]

And, and then the. The stuff about building, like, it's. He. It's all pretend, right? But he's kind of trying to display for that audience a kind of like, I know about building. Like, there was a conversation about staffing up and how you have to use politicians because if you use business people that haven't been vetted before, he just. To me, it was like the. Of course, yes, he's rambling, and the stories go on forever. And occasionally Rogan didn't know exactly what he was talking about, but inside of that was like, a section where he talked about how moved he was to be at the White House when he became president. There was a section where he talked about the economy and taxes. Now, it's ultimately a bullshit case, but I felt like it conveyed the kind of, like, Donald Trump as businessman, this sort of affable outsider. That is what he's been trying to convey.

[Tommy Vitor]

I don't know if it gets him anything. I do think they connected on some level. I definitely think he. Randall rambled. That audience might be gone. I think Rogan is looking for conspiracies in every corner, and I think Trump served them up frequently. The thing that just, he was just so frustratingly uninformed. Again, I know Joe Rogan is in Meet the Press, but he referred to Kamala Harris being in her late 40s. He was talking about the bipartisan immigration bill that Trump killed, and he literally said to Trump, what was in that bill? It's like, buddy, you could have. You could have Googled that. He, like, there's. This is my hobby horse. But there's no, like, pushback or context about the Afghanistan withdrawal and the fact that Trump negotiated the withdrawal timeframe. Rogan's a big RFK guy. He's talking about healthy foods. There's no thinking or acknowledgment that Republicans are the ones who, like, want to get rid of the EPA to allow all these chemicals into our atmosphere and make our foods less healthy. So just. It made me insane. And remind me to tell you, I watched it after the show clip.

[Jon Favreau]

Oh, God.

[Tommy Vitor]

Rogan criticized one part about Trump. And I'll, I'll tell you what that was after we're done with this.

[Jon Favreau]

But, like, stepping back from it, what I was thinking when I was watching the interview is to that interview that his two advisors gave to Semaphore about what their strategy is. And I do think if you watched all three hours of that interview, you come away a little bit inoculated against the idea that Donald Trump is some like fascist menace. I just think you do, because the section about 20, about the vote in 2020 was so favorable to Trump. There was nothing about the insurrection. He just, I think comes across in this non threatening way in that forum. And I do think it's like worth keeping that in mind when we try, when we get to talking about the argument around fascism and all the rest that like this is a version of Trump that, you know, a lot of people are seeing. And it's, it's, I think it's, I just don't want to dismiss it.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, I wouldn't dismiss it at all. I'm just saying. And I think that on some of these podcasts that he's done, it is a good forum for him.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

And he sounded better, I think on this one. He has, he's just, he was very like, to me, it's, it's, you're right, if people are worried about the fascism thing, that's going to help that. But like at this stage, at week out, if you're undecided, first of all, if you're undecided, a week out, I don't know that you're listening to three hours of Joe Rogan because you're probably a low information voter, low propensity voter. So that, that's, you know, uncertain and at this point you want to be. Again, we're going to say this about Kamala Harris. We've been saying it for a month. You want to know, like, what, what is this person going to do for me? Right. And I don't think that he did that at all, you know.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah, I think just, I think that Rogan was a bit of a Trump skeptic and this interview all but stamped his approval on him by the end. And I don't know how many people that moves or if it matters, but on the margin it could, especially given the 35 million number you cited on YouTube.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, I had the same disappointment that you did. I was like, oh, I just, I like also bought into some of what I'd seen online before I went into it and I was like, oh, maybe Rogan's gonna push back here and there, but it just wasn't there.

[Jon Lovett]

So Harris campaign said that they were interested in going on, but it didn't work. Out. What do you guys think about that?

[Tommy Vitor]

I. It's a huge show. I think writing off any audience generally is a mistake in politics. I'd love to see Obama go on or like Colin Allred or somebody who might, you know, kind of jive with him, you know, in terms of love of sports. But I think in a normal length campaign, it would be a mistake to skip it. Doing it now. A few weeks left, got to go to Texas, got to spend three hours. Like, I don't know that Harris should, should have done it. I think it would probably have been a bad use of time.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, it would have been a bad interview. I just think, I think like he, for all the reasons that you guys cited and having listened to half of it, he clearly loves Trump. He didn't endorse Trump up to this, but he got his facts wrong on a whole bunch of things. He's not pushing back. He's got Trump's worldview. He's got RFK Jr's worldview probably more than Trump. Kamal Harris does not. And so she would have to spend I don't know how many hours going back and forth with him over basic facts that he would.

[Tommy Vitor]

He claims he wasn't gonna push her on that. He claims he just wanted to have a who are you, what's your deal? Conversation. But yeah, he's clearly got the aggrieved, you know, cancel culture, whiner worldview.

[Jon Lovett]

And I think with Bret Baer on Fox, you know that it is a set amount of time for the interview that you're going to push back, that you're going to do this. You can't do that for two hours and three hours.

[Jon Favreau]

I also, like, I take to heart what Binder told Dan, which is that, you know, there's all this sort of discourse around the unique set of issues that appeal to young men that we're trying to reach. But actually they care about the same set of issues as everybody else to a large extent. And so to me, it'd be less about like, should she do this one interview? I do think this larger constellation of kind of less political podcast and YouTube shows that are aimed at men, like, I would like to see us engaging with them more and like the Theo Vaughn's of the world and all the rest. But beyond that, it's like, well, she is going to a lot of places where you reach young men. She's on Charlemagne. She's doing all kinds of things. So like, they do have a strategy around this. Does Rogan necessarily fit into that? Maybe, maybe Not. But it's just one show.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, I am. Look, I've always been on this train, but, like, do not go on a show because you're platforming. Whatever. I'm just. I've been long done with.

[Jon Favreau]

Oh, yeah, I don't care.

[Jon Lovett]

It's a big show with a big audience. You go on. If you're in politics, right? Like, that's. You're, You're. You're trying to reach people, you go do it, you know, unless. Unless you think it's not going to serve you politically because the substance of the interview itself is not going to make up for the reach that you get.

[Tommy Vitor]

It's rigged against you.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah.

[Tommy Vitor]

So I caught this quick clip of Rogan talking with some of his buddies after he'd recorded it. And they were. And the guys were like, what'd you talk about? And one of them said, did you ask him why he was so pro vaccine? And Rogan's like, ah, kind of. I mean, the only time I was sort of frustrated in the interview was Trump started talking about the polio vaccine eradicating the disease. And I wanted to show him the chart of how that actually isn't true. And it's like. But he said, I decided not to get into it because I didn't want to go down a long path about vaccines. And it's like, okay, wait, so the one time you were disappointed in this interview, Joe Rogan, was when Donald Trump said the polio vaccine eradicated polio.

[Jon Lovett]

Now imagine interviewing Kamala Harris and him bringing up that point. What do you even do?

[Tommy Vitor]

I don't know.

[Jon Lovett]

So now we're gonna have Kamala Harris prep. I mean, I have changed my mind on this because at first I was like, well, I think it might be good for her to go on. But having listened to him, to Trump and even that, it's like, you're gonna have to prep Kamala Harris now for a day where you, instead of prepping her with just all the things you'd prep her for, for normal interviews, you'd be like, oh, by the way, on vaccines, you've got to know your shit on polio and this study and that. I mean, it's come on six months ago.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yes. Now, Right, Exactly.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah. Podcast America is brought to you by Tommy John. For a guy that says he wants the best of everything, your underwear leaves a lot to be desired. Talking to you, Tommy.

[Tommy Vitor]

Thank you.

[Jon Lovett]

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[Tommy Vitor]

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[Jon Lovett]

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[Tommy Vitor]

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[Jon Lovett]

Get 20% off your first order right now at tommyjohn.com crooked save 20% on second skin at tommyjohn.com crooked tommyjohn.com crooked C site for details Podcast America is brought to you by Policy Genius. Talk about one of your favorite family holiday traditions.

[Tommy Vitor]

I like to eat so many appetizers that you're not at all hungry for the enormous dinner that comes after.

[Jon Lovett]

Me too.

[Tommy Vitor]

That's a good tradition.

[Jon Lovett]

I also like getting life insurance.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

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[Tommy Vitor]

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[Jon Lovett]

Unbelievable.

[Tommy Vitor]

What are we doing? These are the hardest turns of any ad.

[Jon Lovett]

It's like we went from singing carols by the fire and eating appetizers anyway. They're right.

[Tommy Vitor]

More food for the rest of us.

[Jon Lovett]

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[Tommy Vitor]

Oh yeah, Mama's putting my insurance parents money in the S P. Happy holidays.

[Jon Lovett]

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[Tommy Vitor]

True.

[Jon Lovett]

And policygenius is the country's leading online insurance marketplace. Secure your families tomorrow so you have a peace of mind today. Head to policygenius.com or click the link in the description to get your free life insurance quotes and see how much you can save. That's policygenius.com FX presents say Nothing, based on the gripping true story and New York times bestseller. In 1970s Belfast, two young and idealistic sisters joined the IRA to fight for a united Ireland, graduating from rioting in the streets to robbing banks and planting bombs. Thirty years later, one of them agrees to a tell all interview about her ferocious and fascinating past under the condition it would only be released after her death. FX's say nothing. All episodes now streaming on Hulu. So everything we see shows the race is still a toss up. But the Trump campaign and magroworld are as confident and cocky as I think I've ever heard them. Even more so than in 16 or 20. After campaigning in places like New York, California, Colorado, Trump is also making stops in New Mexico and Virginia this week, two states Republicans haven't won in decades. Two decades. And here's a puzzling comment Trump made to Speaker Mike Johnson during the MSG rally on Sunday.

[Nancy Pelosi]

And I think with our little secret, we're going to do really well with the House, right? Our little secret is having a big impression, impact. He and I have a secret.

[Jon Favreau]

We'll tell you what it is when.

[Nancy Pelosi]

The race is over.

[Jon Lovett]

So Johnson got asked on Monday what the secret might be. And he said, by definition, a secret is not to be shared. And I don't intend to share this one.

[Jon Favreau]

Do you fucking. What the fuck? Kind of like, I'm sorry, Dictionary.com?

[Tommy Vitor]

Unbelievable.

[Jon Lovett]

Do you think that Trump made Johnson his accountability partner on that he uses to monitor his kids porn intake?

[Jon Favreau]

Trump is fucking like if he should be just an aging drag queen. Because that's, that's like the energy of these comments, just a kind of like it's a, it's a Sunset Boulevard. Like me and Mike Johnson, we have a little secret, don't we, Mikey? We have a secret.

[Jon Lovett]

Shh.

[Jon Favreau]

Don't tell anybody what we talked about. Anyway. Immigrants.

[Tommy Vitor]

Maybe they have a secret plan to actually hang Mike Pence.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

All right.

[Jon Favreau]

Finish the job.

[Jon Lovett]

So just to have a conversation about this, some people are wondering if this has to do with some plan between Johnson and Trump so that if, like, you know, if Harris wins and Johnson still Speaker of the House, that he will not certify the election or he'll engage in some shenanigans and then he'll try to throw the election to the House, in which case if the House votes, then Trump wins. I don't know. I don't. What do you guys Think I did not quite get that. It's possible, but just the verb tenses that Trump used, it makes me. It made me. I took it as they've got a secret about how to win the House. Not that, but I don't know.

[Jon Favreau]

I didn't know either, and I don't ever want to find out. So everybody do everything you can to win the fucking House. Like, if we win the house on January 3, Mike Johnson and Donald Trump could have whatever fucking bedroom secrets they want to have, and it won't matter. It could really matter if Mike Johnson is still the Speaker. So I really like the fact that, like, there was this. This. This was a line that came at the end of Hours of Menace of Tucker Carlson basically denying any kind of Kamala win could be legitimate. And it felt menacing. When you hear it, I re like, the feeling I had when I heard him say it was like, oh, that's a menacing fucking comment. Maybe it's innocuous. It's their secret fucking game plan to win the House. I don't know. I don't want to find out.

[Jon Lovett]

I want people to be clear about that too, because I saw some people saying, oh, well, even if Harris wins, even if Democrats win the House, Johnson will still be speaker during January. He won't be.

[Jon Favreau]

He won't be.

[Jon Lovett]

He won't be. The new Congress will be seated for January 6th. Will be wild.

[Jon Favreau]

Hopefully less wild.

[Jon Lovett]

Hopefully less wild. But it will be. So if Hakeem Jeffries is Speaker, and then also, even if. Whoever they have, if the Republicans win the Senate and whoever the leader is there, there's still not. We got it. If that happens, we got it. At least in the Congress part. There's no shenanigans in Congress at that point because we would control the House. But to the point you made about Tucker. Right. Because Tucker's doing this. How could she possibly win 86 million votes or whatever? And this is. If you look on social media right now, every fucking blue checked MAGA count, they are. We talk about, like, don't read too much into the early vote. They think the early vote is like, just. They are crushing Democrats right now. They're like, Trump is gonna win all seven states. And, like, they have. I don't know whether they actually believe this or whether they're just like, you know, spewing bullshit, but, like, if Trump loses, they are talk about stop the steal. Like, they are very primed to say that there's absolutely no way possible that Kamala Harris could have won this election.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. Whether they're being cynical or naive. I think one of the big lessons of a decade is it doesn't matter in either way. This is what they're going to pretend to have believed if Donald Trump loses. So I do think that that matters. I do. But I also, like, I think it's like, yes, it's about getting ready for post election shenanigans, but I do think part of it is like, look, any campaign puts up yard signs. Like, yard signs are about a bandwagon effect. We all do that. Everybody does that. But there's something specific about Trump because so much of the argument is about character and about him being sort of morally unacceptable and so creating a kind of permission structure that's like, they're all crazy. Look, the country's behind him. Like, you come on board, right? Everybody's doing it. And I think that matters more for him than it would for a normal candidate.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah. Meanwhile, Kamala Harris is keeping up her breakneck schedule in the battlegrounds. She's in Michigan as we're recording this. Three rallies today in Michigan, three events.

[Tommy Vitor]

Nice.

[Jon Lovett]

And earlier today, she responded on the tarmac to a reporter's question about Trump's Madison Square Garden hate festival. Here's that response, along with comments from aoc, who is of course Puerto Rican American herself. And she responded during the rally while live streaming a game of Madden NFL 25 with Tim Walls on Twitch. That's 2024. That's where. That's what we're doing right now. All right, let's listen. Donald Trump has. This is not new about him, by the way. What he did last night is not a discovery. It is just more of the same.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

And maybe more vivid than usual.

[Jon Lovett]

Donald Trump spends full time trying to.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Have Americans point their finger at each other. Fans, the fuel of hate and division.

[Jon Lovett]

And that's why people are exhausted with him.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

I need people to understand that when they, when you have some.

[Nancy Pelosi]

A hole calling Puerto Rico floating garbage.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Know that that's what they think about you, that that's just what they think about you.

[Jon Favreau]

It's what they think about anyone who.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Makes less money than them. It's what they think about the people who serve them food in a restaurant. It's what they think about the people.

[Nancy Pelosi]

Who, who fold their clothes in a store. Like, you're right.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Are you serious?

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah.

[Jon Favreau]

The privilege of being on this campaign is traveling across the entire country. There are hundreds of thousands of Puerto Ricans across in battleground states that need to send them a message.

[Jon Lovett]

What do you guys think about the way Harris responded AOC Walls, first of.

[Tommy Vitor]

All, I want Kamala to get away from the jet engines. I'm never going to let this go. I also was wondering why. Why is Tim Walls whispering like his. He doesn't want his mom to hear him playing Madden.

[Jon Lovett]

Right. It was like.

[Jon Favreau]

It's like, I'm like, everyone's very chill right now. Like, where, where is our defense? What's happening?

[Jon Lovett]

I don't know.

[Tommy Vitor]

I thought AOC was particularly good on this because she understands and is from the community and she's a really credible messenger. And it dovetails with the broader argument she's been making about Elon Musk, that he's laughing at you. They're mocking you. When they dangle the million dollar check, they're mocking you. They don't care about you. They don't understand you. I think that was effective. The Harris comments about divisiveness and division and fueling the flames, they're accurate. But it is giving me a little bit of 2016 PTSD, if I'm being totally honest.

[Jon Lovett]

Oh, really? I thought it was great. I thought she doesn't want to get offended by them. No. I think 2016 would be like, this is racist. This is offensive. Blah, blah, blah, blah. That was what 2016 was. She's saying like, it's the same old divisive shit.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah, she is saying the same old.

[Jon Lovett]

And we're gonna, we're gonna get into the whole future forward thing and the. And focusing economic stuff. But that's the pivot she's making. She's not taking the bait. She's not saying, like, I'm gonna go on, on the rally and say how offensive it is.

[Tommy Vitor]

Well, she commented on multiple times. So, I mean, they're certainly, I don't know if taking the bait or not, but they are certainly talking about it. They cut an ad about it that we mentioned earlier. They're doing a lot of things to highlight this part of the story.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah. But I think the way that the message is from her is that he should be focused. He's not focusing on you, and I'm going to be focusing on you. Which is the right message.

[Jon Favreau]

That's right.

[Jon Lovett]

So as we get close to the end, the A list surrogates are out on the trail for Harris. On Friday, of course, Harris and Beyonce rallied together in Houston. And then on Saturday, Michelle Obama appeared with the VP at a rally in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Let's listen.

[Jon Favreau]

We are at the precipice of an incredible shift.

[Nancy Pelosi]

The brink of history.

[Jon Lovett]

I'm not here as a celebrity. I'm not here as a politician.

[Nancy Pelosi]

I'm here as a mother. A mother who cares deeply about the world.

[Jon Lovett]

My children and all of our children.

[Nancy Pelosi]

Live in a world where we have.

[Jon Favreau]

The freedom to control our bodies.

[Jon Lovett]

Do not put our lives in the hands of politicians, mostly men, who have no clue or do not care about.

[Jon Favreau]

What we, as women are going through.

[Jon Lovett]

Please, please, do not hand our fates over to the likes of Trump, who knows nothing about us, who has shown deep contempt for us, because a vote.

[Jon Favreau]

For him is a vote against. Against us, against our health, against our worth. So, fellas, before you cast your votes.

[Jon Lovett]

Ask yourselves, what side of history do you want to be on? I would encourage everyone to watch the entire Michelle Obama speech. They call her the closer for a reason. What do you guys think of the speech?

[Jon Favreau]

I mean, I thought it was one of the best political speeches I've heard in a really long time. I was really moved by it, thinking about it. She was emotional delivering it. And I actually was thinking, like, you put that Joe Rogan interview up against Michelle Obama, and I just think Michelle Obama wins every time because, yes, that might have been the most effective version of Trump. You'll see, right? The affable businessman talking, shooting the shit with Joe Rogan. But this was about the stakes. And I found it, like, persuasive. It was persuasive. It was aimed at people who aren't paying a lot of attention, but it was also aimed at people who are paying a lot of attention and the best argument they can make to the people in their lives and spoke to, I think a lot of the cynicism and frustration people have who are paying close attention to. I just thought it was an amazing speech.

[Jon Lovett]

Tommy.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah, I mean, the speech is two parts. The first half was basically her, like, unloading the oppo clip on Trump and going at him very hard and laying into him. And I obviously enjoyed that, but that's something that a lot of people can do. The second half was riveting. I mean, you can hear it is silent in there. People are wrapped in paying attention. And it really was unlike any speech I've heard this entire election cycle. The way she talked about the stakes for everyone in terms of reproductive health. And she figured out a way to bring you emotionally into the room, into the hospital room, watching someone you love die. And it was unbelievably powerful. And I watched. I mean, a bunch of people told me it was great. When I finally watched it, I, too, was, like, blown away by just how powerful, how much she connected and how much you could tell she meant it. And my only thought afterwards was like, how do we get this in front of everybody? How do you make sure this is the thing on TikTok that's getting the most push? Because it's long, there's extended chunks, and that's the power. The sort of three minute detailed explanation of what life could be like for you and your partner if these laws pass.

[Jon Lovett]

I know. I was. We were trying to clip this for today, and it's hard because the whole section on reproductive freedom is eight minutes, I think. And so it's just. It's hard to. And it's. I mean, both of the Obamas are like this, right? Which is. There's not. They don't do sound bites in, like, one line here and there. And you really have to watch the whole thing in full to get it. I thought. I mean, we've been talking forever about, like, men and appeals to men and how this works. And she makes this direct appeal to men that I think is maybe one of the most effective appeals to men on almost any issues, certainly reproductive rights. Otherwise, like, you know, I tweeted this and then fucking Ben Shapiro, quote, tweets me. And he's like, michelle Obama is always just disappointed in you. Everything she says, she's just so disappointed in you. And it's like, it's a funny reaction because she went out of her way in that section to empathize with what young men or what men might be thinking. And at one point she says, like, I don't expect men to understand all that women go through with our reproductive health. She's like, frankly, women don't always understand what's going on in our own bodies, right? But she's like, just imagine if you do this. And then she's like, she's pleading with men, right? And she's trying to, like, put herself in their shoes. I mean, it's just. It was so empathetic. Well, it's also so empathetic, look.

[Jon Favreau]

Worth saying as well. Yes. There's some political value to saying Michelle Obama's talking down to men. She isn't.

[Nancy Pelosi]

Of course.

[Jon Favreau]

Of course she's not.

[Jon Lovett]

It's just lazy.

[Jon Favreau]

Of course it's lazy.

[Jon Lovett]

Which Ben has become.

[Jon Favreau]

Voting for Trump is a very disappointing thing for men to do. And I think part of what that speech was about was about how to reach people that you might feel upset with, that they're considering this, Right? She says at one point in the speech, like, your rage may be Justified. But if you use your rage to vote for Trump, you're voting against us. And like that. I think that idea, saying that, like, I understand why you're upset, I understand why this may be on the table for you, but it's morally wrong. And it's not just politics. It's not just, oh, we can disagree. A vote for Trump is a vote against the women you claim to love. And if you love them, you should listen to them.

[Tommy Vitor]

Ben Shapiro was so mad about the Barbie movie that he lit Barbie dolls on fire and then released a 43 minute review of it. So just for context, I just have.

[Jon Lovett]

A real special animus towards people like Ben Shapiro and JD Vance who fancy themselves the intellectual Zambonis. Right. Who try to make this, like, intellectual argument about shit. When it's like, you know what? You're full of shit. You're full of shit. Because if you actually listen to it, your criticism of the speech has nothing to do with what was actually in the speech.

[Tommy Vitor]

Your wife was dying. You would do anything it took, of course, to save her life. You lying little shit.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, of course. It's like, if you want to pick apart facts, then go try to pick apart facts, but you didn't do that because you can't.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

So, like the Trump campaign, the Harris campaign is also projecting confidence, though Democratic strategists and reporters are doing their thing by continuing to publicly air an internal debate about which message Harris should close on. Uh, the New York Times reports that Future Forward, the big pro Harris super pac, warned in their weekly email to Democratic operatives that attacking Trump as a fascist, which two four star generals who worked for him have now called him, isn't particularly persuasive. And that hammering a contrast with Trump on the economy and reproductive rights, featuring Harris's own stances, works better. We've talked about this a lot. Dan asked Kamala's lead pollster, our friend David Binder, about it on Sunday's bonus pod, which if you haven't listened to yet, you should absolutely listen to. Binder said you have to do both. And here's what Harris campaign manager, generally, Dillon, said about it to Jen Psaki on Sunday. I mean, look, I think we have seen from the beginning that when people who have worked closely, closest with Donald Trump speak out, it has real impact on voters and certainly on these voters that we're still trying to reach these small segment of undecided voters. We know anecdotally, we know from our research, when someone like John Kelly stands up and speaks about what it was like to serve under Donald Trump speaks about how he clearly wants unchecked power. The American people are not comfortable with that. And that is an important contrast that we have. And I think that it's fundamental to everything that the vice President is talking about, how we turn the page from this, how we have a leadership in this country that's focused on the issues that the American people care about. So we do think it's important, it's really important when people that are closest to Donald Trump speak out about it. And we've seen that across all of our data. What do you guys think about this debate and particularly the balance that the Harris campaign is striking right now?

[Jon Favreau]

So, first of all, like, I think the. We obviously have to do both is the answer we've always been landing on. It's just like, you have to do both. You have to make the positive case, you have to make the contrast case. You have to make sure people understand the threat. One thing that Binder said that I thought captures, I think another facet of this is he said around this question of whether to call Trump a fascist, it's that one word doesn't communicate what the threat is. Yeah. And to me, like, that was the most important point of this. Not, should we describe the menace and threat that Trump poses versus should we just make a positive argument? It's that when we talk about the threat Trump poses, how do we do that? And like, so I asked AOC about this, this question of, like, calling Trump a fascist, and she went right to Donald Trump will take away basic rights of women across this country. And so I think translating like fascism is a, is a, is a identity. It's a, it's a, it's a, it's a summary. And actually, you have to get into the details with people because people have heard for years all kinds of words that are true to describe Donald Trump. The last group of people we're trying to reach are, by Nate, by definition, undecided and unmoved by those broad brush characterizations where you have to get into the details.

[Tommy Vitor]

I'm a little worried about the balance of the moment and not because of, like, the message testing of ads. It's just because you have to ask yourself what is breaking through in the closing days. And I do think it is primarily this conversation about Trump and fascism. And I think it's valuable to say the top people that worked for him don't trust him to be president. Again, I think that's alarming. New information probably for a lot of people, but it's gotten mixed in with conversations about, like, praising Hitler's generals and things that I think just sound partisan and hyperbolic and a lot of people.

[Jon Lovett]

Do you think the Harris campaign has done that, though? I think because we're talking about, like, this is. I think it's unfair that this, it's like there's a lot of straw men running around here, which is like the Harris campaign is leaning in on fascism. No, they're not. Anderson Cooper asked her, do you think he's a fascist? She said, yes. Right. Everything else they've done, their ads, everything else has been about what you said, love it. Which is conveying what the threat means to people. And so, like, I don't know what else they would do at this point.

[Tommy Vitor]

I'm not blaming anyone. I'm talking about the closing conversation that people are hearing. And I think it's overly tilted away from an economic message right now in ways that worry me because every focus group and piece of polling we see shows you that voters primarily care about those issues. And they're also, there's a pretty easy, ready made answer for Trump, which is, we saw him for four years. People don't think it was that bad. And so some of the language used to describe him can seem ridiculous to people. So that's where my anxiety comes from. And I agree with you. I'm not criticizing their strategy necessarily, but you get to decide whether you do a press avail or not. You get to take questions or not. You get to decide how you answer things and what you highlight or not. And so it does feel like they are leaning into this. There's a big speech Tuesday at the Ellipse, where January 6th, you know, started. Right. That is going to lead to a conversation about the 2020 election and the insurrection and Trump's fascistic tendencies. And I just, I'm a little worried about that emphasis. When a lot of these undecided swing voters are like, I don't know, but gas was cheaper.

[Jon Lovett]

But this is, this is what drives me sort of crazy because I think that there is a gap between the people who spend their days looking at focus groups and looking at data. I am one of them. If Kamala Harris sat down with a bunch of voters in a focus group who are undecided and she had a choice of what to say. What she should say to them, of course, is a lot of this economic messaging right now, not all of them, as Binder said, their research shows. I know that Future Forward has their own research, but the Harris campaign research, pretty good, too. Their Research shows that there is some segment of people who, when you tell them that John Kelly said that this man was unfit to serve and he's a four star general, that gives them pause and that they may not vote for it. Right. But I would still say yes, Kamala Harris should deliver a message on economics. Absolutely. The problem is the filter and what gets through to voters. And when you're saying the conversation that, yeah, it gives me anxiety too. But there's also like, there's only so much you can control in a campaign. And I think if Tuesday, when she does her closing argument speech, she's going to get a lot of press attention because of where the speech is. Right. I think if she decided that for her closing argument speech she was going to go to like a grocery store or whatever, you could think something better and just do a big economic speech, it would be a fart in the wind. No one would cover it, Voters wouldn't hear it. And then we'd all be happy that you gave the right message, but no one would actually hear this.

[Tommy Vitor]

I mean, that's a look, straw man, like a fascism speech versus the most boring version of an economic event. Yes, of course. Like you would choose something that was interesting. I think at the end of a campaign, you are far more likely to get coverage and for those things to break through than at any other point. And I'm just worried that the focus right now is about a message that might not be as compelling to these swing voters. I think your job as a campaign is to figure out a way for the thing you want to talk about to break through and get covered.

[Jon Lovett]

Well, all their ads are doing that.

[Tommy Vitor]

I'm not criticizing them. I'm just saying, like when I look at kind of concerns I'm hearing from all these people about slippage and what people are saying they're hearing on the doors about. Well, I just want to know about her economic plans and, you know, the need for more information about her. I wonder if a closing focus that is again, about Trump is answering the mail with those people.

[Jon Lovett]

I also think that she's not going to spend like the setting is the setting. I think the setting gets attention, the setting gets press attention. I think that the entire speech will probably be the economic stuff, the contrast, the whole positive vision. Right.

[Tommy Vitor]

What breaks through.

[Jon Lovett]

Right.

[Tommy Vitor]

We're talking about Kill Tony and his event comments at Madison Square Garden and not what Donald Trump said.

[Jon Lovett]

But that's not under the control of the Harris campaign. You know what I'm saying?

[Tommy Vitor]

Like this, the setting where they I'm saying the setting is where they chose and that's going to frame up the speech.

[Jon Lovett]

But you said kill Tony. They're not, they don't have anything to do with kill Tony.

[Tommy Vitor]

I'm not making an example of. I'm just making the point that like something else can be the focus of the coverage versus the words.

[Jon Favreau]

Like in 2016, I feel like there were a bunch of big mistakes that we had to make because we were running against Trump for the first time. One of those mistakes that I think is absolutely a mistake, but one that's been, I think laid completely at the feet of the Clinton campaign. What was actually a larger media failing is I think what Tommy is talking about, which is she was traveling the country talking about the economy.

[Jon Lovett]

We always said about this. She did a bus tour towards the end through the Midwest, all about the economy. No one fucking heard it.

[Jon Favreau]

And so, you know, she does do this economic message. But what's breaking through during that time, it's the anti Trump message. And the anti Trump message was like, I think clearly not effective. Both because he hadn't been president, that people weren't. It was just, it was, we, we failed to make that case.

[Tommy Vitor]

It was stories about his character.

[Jon Favreau]

Yes.

[Tommy Vitor]

Like him being a shitty guy.

[Jon Favreau]

I think now we have landed on far more effective ways to beat Donald Trump. To make the argument against Donald Trump, like Kamala Harris is very good at making that argument. We still have this problem of how do you break through on the economy when the catnip is the more kind of political exciting. Trump is an extremist threat. Now the good news, right, is replacing Joe Biden with Kamala Harris and then like an incredibly well run campaign over months has like moved the needle on the economy. Right.

[Tommy Vitor]

That has absolutely happened.

[Jon Lovett]

That has broken through like they would. Their strategy has worked so far. Like she's like almost even with them on the economy in some polls and even in New York Times, Sienna, she like gained, I don't know, seven or eight points.

[Jon Favreau]

And so then I do think like in this last week, how do you do both of those things? I kind of like, I think doing a speech on the national Ellipse to just reaffirm that view that the Americans have that Donald Trump is chaotic and dangerous and unstable and like you can't trust him. Like I think is worth doing. I think that to me is the right thing to do because of the attention it gets. I think the question then is, okay, we've hit that point how? And then seven days that follows, do you Drive what Tommy's talking about because it's really fucking hard to drive. And you've used your closing speech on the ellipse. You've spent it. That's been spent. So it's hard. But like, I come down on thinking it's the right place to reach a ton of people with a closing.

[Tommy Vitor]

It's an all in opportunity costs. None of it is easy, right. But we're talking about the biggest, most important decisions in the closing week and what we want to get in front of voters. And it just does concern me a little bit, like the Michelle Obama speech, specifically about reproductive care and access to that care. And going in great detail about the horrors that could come from Trump getting four more years was unbelievably powerful. If that speech was sort of framed as, you know, Trump as dictator, and that was sort of like the prism through which that information got out, it just changes the tenor and the way it lands. And I think the likelihood that people get the information you want them to hear.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, well, I think in her, in her speech, she did a lot of Trump as the threat that Trump poses. She talks about shooting unarmed protesters, right? Like, look, I think stipulated. If you're out there, which no one has done, but if you're out there talking about Trump is a fascist, Trump is a dictator, blah, blah, blah. Like, that is bad. That is very, very bad. But there are things that Trump could do or that want. That he wants to do that we know from polling is very effective with the voters that we're talking about, right? People don't want him to shoot unarmed protesters. That's not popular. They don't want him to pardon the January 6th protesters. They fucking hate the 2020 steal the. This is why the Trump campaign has had an entire strategy to put him on these podcasts because they know that if people think that Trump is a threat that they lose. This is. The New York Times today just said that the Trump campaign is actually also worried that some of this Hitler stuff, the John Kelly stuff, is going to cost them the election. Right? So, like, I do. I just think that it is. I guess I'm not trying to like, defend the campaign or anything. I'm just trying to put myself in the campaign and events happen. And then it's like, what do you do to respond to an event that happens? Like Madison Square Garden happens. And if she gets off the tarmac and a reporter says, what'd you think about Madison Square Garden? I just, I think it makes me laugh to think of her saying, well, I'M just focused on costs.

[Tommy Vitor]

Well, yes, the dumbest possible answer is not what she's going to say, but there's like. J.D. vance pretended he didn't hear the joke. So he didn't comment on the joke. There's a million and one ways to avoid making news on the thing you don't want to avoid on. I'm not saying that's the right thing to do here. I'm just saying it is a strategic choice. And, like, do you think there would been a better.

[Jon Lovett]

A better answer off the plane? Like, what do you think that. What do you think?

[Tommy Vitor]

I don't remember what she said now.

[Jon Lovett]

Just the divisiveness thing that you were saying, possibly.

[Tommy Vitor]

I don't know. I have not thought about it until you just asked me. But like you said, running around saying fascism is not the way to go. I agree. I don't think they've been doing that, but very recently, she started using the word fascist.

[Jon Lovett]

She just. Just when Anderson Cooper.

[Tommy Vitor]

No, the first time.

[Jon Lovett]

And then Charlamagne said it.

[Jon Favreau]

Right.

[Tommy Vitor]

It's been a couple.

[Jon Lovett]

She agreed. She didn't. She didn't use it on her own. The point I'm making is this is what. You're responding to events. And I think when you. I think there's certain things where, like, he proposes a very serious threat, and if she could make the choice to say, no, he's not a fascist, but, like, I don't think that's a good choice either.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah, you'd be like, it's a word I haven't used, et cetera. I'm saying, like, all we're getting at here is, like, these are purposeful decisions that end up having an impact on what is covered and what the closing message is and what people here.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, I'm just. Yeah, I know. I know for sure. I'm just saying you're heated on this one. No, because I am. Because I'm. I'm. I'm heated on it. I'm not. I mean, I'm not mad. I'm just saying, like, I have. I have struggled with this so much because I have seen all the fucking data. Like, I don't. All of our friends in the Democratic super pacs and everyone else who's saying, like, this is bad, we got to do more in the economy. I get them. I've been there. I've seen the fucking data. But, like, when this happens on a campaign, a campaign's also about, like, the exigent events that you are responding to. And if you respond in a Way, that seems like J.D. vance seemed like bullshit when he said he hadn't heard the joke. If she had said she hadn't heard the joke, it would have been fucking bullshit. Right. And it's clearly something that worries the Trump campaign, which is why they walked it back. So of course she should go in on that.

[Tommy Vitor]

And I'm, I'm not saying she shouldn't have said that. I'm just saying, like, it's not hard to not make news on things you don't want to. Yeah, it just really is.

[Jon Lovett]

And all I'm saying is I think the critique from the super PACs that the somehow the Harris Walls campaign is not. Is this the strategy is leaving leaning too heavy on the Trump threat is just wrong. I think it's just wrong criticism. And then I think they need to close the deal on the economy for sure. But I guess I just, I'm with Binder, which is like, you really just have to figure out a way to do both.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. And also, just like the. Kamala Harris is running an incredibly impressive campaign in a media environment that sucks and makes Trump possible. And like, that is the, that is the thing. And like in the close, hard, it's.

[Jon Lovett]

So much harder than any other campaign to break through.

[Jon Favreau]

And so, and so in that context, like, how do you break through on the economy? What's the balance? Like, where I kind of land is. I have the same worry, Tommy. I, like, how do you reach these people? Like, how do you get to this, like, final group of people and make sure they understand the economic states at the same time, like, he's out there calling people the enemy of the people. He's out there saying these fascistic things. Tucker Carlson, his like fucking mind guru, is out there, like kind of like addled and claiming that they won't accept the election results. He's planning to not accept the election results. You can go to the ellipse, you can tell the truth and somewhere and try to use that to at least get to some coverage of the economic stakes too. I don't know what else to do.

[Jon Lovett]

I think 8 out of 10 voters on the doors that you ask if they're going to be like, well, I don't know what she's going to do for me. And then you tell that voter her plans and that might be your best shot at getting them vote. I totally agree.

[Tommy Vitor]

The doors might be the best shot. But like, again, it's just, you know, campaigns make a lot of choices. And Donald Trump did this goofy ass thing where he worked at McDonald's kind of for an hour. And it was like the thing that more people saw that week when it comes to political news than anything else. It was a creative, borderline bizarre choice, but it was really, really, really effective. And like, I'm not criticizing the Harris campaign. I'm saying, like, your job as a campaign is to find those things that do break through. And that was a really good example.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah. Okay, well, we'll leave it there. When we come back from the break, you're going to hear Alyssa's interview with Nancy Pelosi about pulling off a win next week. But before we do that, this is the part of the show where we beg you to do the most effective thing you can do to be Donald Trump and win this election. We need you to think of three people in swing states, Arizona, Nevada, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia, and call or text them now to confirm their voting plans. That would be nice. Or to just try to persuade them if they are thinking about not voting or thinking about voting for Donald Trump. And then you can have whatever conversation you want with them. You can say, can I offer you a fascist threat? And if they say, I don't care about that, you can say, can I offer you a healthcare? Or Nick Riddle, can I offer you a tariff? Can I offer you rights?

[Jon Favreau]

Have you heard about what John Kelly said? Have you heard what this hack comedian from Texas said?

[Jon Lovett]

You can go through a whole comedian, however long you got on the phone. It's not a 30 second ad. No, that's the beauty of a real conversation and it's with someone you know, so you can really have an interesting conversation. If you don't have swing state contacts, that's pretty sad. But then ask your contacts if they have swing state contacts. And once you've identified some swing state folks who may need some convincing, use VoteSave America's Last Call tool for easy [e-mail] vote. Also, if you've been scrolling Instagram and feeling some shame and envy about all those cool photos of your friends canvassing to save democracy, it's not too late to make a plan to join them. Just go to votesaveamerica.com and click on I want to volunteer. This message has been paid for by VoteSave America. This ad has not been authorized by any candidate or candidates committee. When we come back, Speaker Pelosi. Pod Save America is brought to you by A Real Pain from Searchlight Pictures. Searchlight Pictures new movie A Real Pain arrives in theaters this Friday. Written and directed by Jesse Eisenberg. Critics rave A Real Pain as one of the best films of the year. Starring Jesse Eisenberg, Kieran Culkin, Will Sharp and Jennifer Grey. Jesse Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin make for an all time comedic odd couple as two cousins who reunite for a tour of Poland to honor their beloved grandmother.

[Tommy Vitor]

That is a very funny pairing.

[Jon Lovett]

I'm in already. The adventure takes a turn when old tensions resurface against the backdrop of their family history. Official selection of Sundance Telluride in New York Film Festival winner of Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award US Dramatic at Sundance I think I saw a preview for this a long time ago and I was like, oh, this? Yeah, I'm definitely Kieran Culkin and Jesse Eisenberg. Yeah, I'm in.

[Tommy Vitor]

I would watch anything Kieran Culkin at this point. Thank you to Succession.

[Jon Lovett]

That's right. A Real Pain is playing in select theaters this Friday and everywhere. November 15th. Get tickets. Today. FX presents say Nothing, based on the gripping true story and New York times bestseller. In 1970s Belfast, two young and idealistic sisters joined the IRA to fight for a united Ireland, graduating from rioting in the streets to robbing banks and planting bombs. Thirty years later, one of them agrees to a tell all interview about her ferocious and fascinating past under the condition it would only be released after her death. FX's say nothing. All episodes now streaming on Hulu. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. This month is all about gratitude. And along with thanking family or friends, there's another person we don't get to thank enough ourselves.

[Jon Favreau]

Little pat yourself on the back.

[Jon Lovett]

You know, it's sometimes hard to remind ourselves that we're trying our best to make sense of everything. And in this crazy world, that isn't easy.

[Jon Favreau]

It isn't easy.

[Jon Lovett]

Here's a reminder to send some thanks to the people in your life, including yourself.

[Jon Favreau]

I think the term trying our best doesn't mean anything.

[Jon Lovett]

You've never done anything half assed.

[Jon Favreau]

I know. Well, there's no, we're not all trying our best. That's wrong.

[Jon Lovett]

Oh, we're not all.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, that's just sort of like, oh.

[Jon Lovett]

You'Re saying, oh, everyone's trying their best.

[Jon Favreau]

Like, oh, well, they're trying their best. Maybe. I mean, I don't know. Like, even when you are trying your best, it's not always clear. Like, are you?

[Jon Lovett]

Sounds like a conversation you should have with your therapist.

[Jon Favreau]

That's what I'm saying.

[Jon Lovett]

If you're thinking of starting therapy, give better help a try. It's entirely online, designed to be convenient, flexible, and suited to your schedule. Just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist and switch therapists anytime for no additional charge. Therapy is great. You can go on rants like Lovett just did and the person's paid to listen. Even if you think you're fine, you just go sit down with someone.

[Jon Favreau]

Trust me, I don't think I'm fine.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, well, even if you do, let the gratitude flow with BetterHelp, visit betterhelp.compsa today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp. Help. H E L p.compsa.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Today, I am honored to be able to sit down with Speaker Nancy Pelosi, representing California's 11th district for the last 37 years. Inductee to the National Women's hall of Fame in Seneca Falls. Recipient of the nation's highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Also New York Times bestselling author of the Art of Power, which I cannot recommend enough. Madam speaker, by my math, this is your eighth presidential election since coming to Congress. We are nearing election day. What is keeping you up at night?

[Nancy Pelosi]

Well, I'm just. How can I say this? I'm not up at night. I'm very happy about it.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Oh, good.

[Nancy Pelosi]

See, I'm a former chair of the California Democratic Party, and so my whole thrust in politics is own the ground.

[Tommy Vitor]

Right.

[Nancy Pelosi]

So it's wonderful to have the. We have to have the mobilization on the ground. We have to have the message which is unifying and not menacing, but is bold and progressive but not menacing. And we have to have the money to get the job done. The money's coming in. Yep. The message is in the hands of the candidate. The mobilization is what matters now. And I've traveling all over for some House races as well as presidential, and I feel very good that good about the fact that everybody knows it's in their hands. You know, people say I have my fingers crossed. They said uncross them and make calls.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Make calls or text, send a postcard.

[Nancy Pelosi]

Knock on doors or go walk precincts, but no fingers crossed.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Okay, good.

[Jon Lovett]

All right.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Well, then I'm feeling good. So, last week, Donald Trump referred to you again as the enemy within. He also said that January 6th was a beautiful thing and that it was all about love and peace. Your disdain and dislike for the former president is pretty well documented at this point. But did these comments scare you any more than things he's previously said?

[Nancy Pelosi]

Well, we've already borne the brunt of his hatred, as you probably are Aware there's something this person is not on the level you understand he is. Anytime he says something, he's projecting his own self. He is the enemy within. And that's why this election is so important. But when he says me and he talks about me or Adam Schiff or that, he's really talking about the American people. And I think that Vice President Harris has been very good about making that clear. When he's talking about the enemy within, he's talking about the American people. I myself think we're going to win this election because of the goodness of the American people, not because of the enemy within. I think the American people, when it comes right down to it, will understand that you cannot elect a person of such vulgarity, such misrepresentation, such insulting the intelligence of the American people. It was not a day of love. It was a tragedy for our nation. People ended up dying from it, many injured from it. And that just goes to shape. But I think that there's a judgment out there that may not be very loud, but it's very strong.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

So you were just in Florida for a women's get out the vote breakfast where you discussed the state's Amendment 4, which would codify abortion rights. How important has reproductive rights been as an issue for Democrats this cycle, both at the top of the ticket and down ballot?

[Nancy Pelosi]

Vitally important, reproductive rights, very important. I just recall to mind that two years ago, 22, the off year, people said we were going to lose 30 or 40 seats. And I said, they just don't know what they're talking about. They may collect high salaries, but they ain't on the ground. And they don't know what's happening, because we knew that that issue was very important. And they said, she meaning me, I owed an apology to the Democrats for putting that in the forefront. Didn't I know it was in the rearview mirror? And people didn't care that much. But we know how those members voted and we know how our candidates were opposing that. They opposed putting Roe v. Wade into law, and they even opposed women having a right to contraception, and they opposed anything to do with climate crisis, gun violence prevention, all of that. But the women's. The women's issue, the reproductive health issue is primary. And as you know, we lost five seats in New York.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

I know.

[Nancy Pelosi]

And that's for a lot of different reasons, but hopefully we win them back this time. But I have no doubt that we will win the House of Representatives. Hakeem Jeffries will be the speaker. He must be the speaker. He Must be the speaker for all the issues we care about. But also on January 6th, to protect our democracy.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

So it's October. October surprises throughout the years are of great lore. And in 2008, I was on the Obama campaign. Many consider the financial crisis and the record rise in unemployment as the October surprise of that election. But in 2008, weeks before the presidential election, Congress came together to keep the economy from over a cliff. Do you think Congress could come together today to solve a problem that catastrophic?

[Nancy Pelosi]

We would have to. You remember that President Bush was president at the time when this happened. And it was the generosity and the really responsible attitude of the Democrats that saved the day. Let's be sure to point that out, because Republicans never lived up to their commitment to have 100 votes to pass this. I do believe it was the reason we lost the house in 2010, because we had to save the day. And people thought we were bailing out Wall street, we were bailing out the economy. And we always agreed that whatever we did would be bipartisan. But they didn't do their share, so we had to weigh in more heavily. But nonetheless, as you indicate, it was bipartisan. We got the job done. I don't know that anything like that could happen under Trump because he doesn't have it. The only thing he did when he was President of the United States with a Republican majority was to give a tax break, to have a tax bill. A tax bill that gave 83% of the benefits to the top 1%, added $2 trillion to the national debt to give tax breaks to the richest and biggest corporate America and individuals as well. And he says that's what his agenda is, to renew that tax cut. But at this point, it will be more like $5 trillion to the national debt. So it's hard to imagine anything. We tried to do infrastructure with him, he wouldn't do it. Let me just say this. Why am I even talking about him being president? Kamal Harris will be President of the United States.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Yes, ma'am.

[Nancy Pelosi]

And because of the rules of the Senate, with the 60 votes and the rest, we would have to have bipartisanship to get something big done. Let us always think that that sense of responsibility will enable the Republicans to come on board. If we make our compromise, they have to make theirs. But that's our responsibility. We have a responsibility to strive for bipartisanship, to be accountable to the public about that and have transparency so the public knows.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Right. In 2007, you were elected first woman speaker of the House. You have been the most powerful woman in politics since. And you made the decision to step down from leadership. It takes women so long to break the glass ceiling. Why did you make the choice? What did you hope for and were you right?

[Nancy Pelosi]

Well, yes, I was right, of course. But let me just say that it's not a glass ceiling in the Congress.

[Jon Lovett]

Okay.

[Nancy Pelosi]

It's a marble ceiling.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Oh, yes.

[Nancy Pelosi]

It's a much tougher thing. Obstacle to break. No, I thought it was right. I was excited about it. I don't know. People ask me, was it right? Yes, I was full of excitement about it. The only thing I regretted was that it wasn't going to be in the majority.

[Jon Lovett]

Sure.

[Nancy Pelosi]

See, I thought we could win it, even though they said 30, 40 seats was five seats. But I stayed in order to make sure that what's his name doesn't set foot in the White House again and to make sure that Hakeem Jeffries has that gavel. But I've been there 20 years. 20 years either. Eight as speaker, 12 as leader.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Right.

[Nancy Pelosi]

And it's a major responsibility and you know, legislatively, politically fundraising wise. Yes, I was proud of what we had done, but I was glad others were willing to carry the load.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

So you were just telling me you've been in Boston today already campaigning, you're here in New York City campaigning, you are then heading out and crossing the country campaigning for Democrats. So one of my favorite memories was hearing Barbara Mikulski, who served as U.S. senator for 30 years before retiring. I saw her speak once about her first run in Congress, 1976, and she talked about how she raised money through bake sales for Barb. So how has campaigning changed over the years? With the advent of social media, do you think it's become more inclusive?

[Nancy Pelosi]

Oh, absolutely. Well, separate in part from the advent of social media. There was a decision made when I went to Congress in 37. It was 37 years ago, a few years after Barbara went to the Senate. And we're all so proud of her. There were 435 members of Congress, as that is the number. There were 23 women, 12 Democrats, 11 Republicans. That was absolutely unacceptable. So we made a decision to recruit, to train, to fund, to accept self recruitment and that. And then this Congress, I'm very proud that we have 94 women and we're going to get more in this next election because it was a decision. And social media is a double edged sword. Some of it's positive, some of it is not, but all of it is about women. And of course we want minority, even with more diversity, our Caucus. Our House Democratic Caucus, I'm proud to say, is 70% women, people of color, LGBTQ. It's a fabulous statement about a political party in a Congress, a parliament or whatever. And we still want more. But the. But it was a decision. It wasn't. This happened because of social media. Right now, social media can be a danger to. Because when I'm trying to encourage women to run or talk to those who have decided they're going to run, they're always concerned about the negative aspects of it. I could never subject my family to what you've been through. I'm not even talking about the physical violence, of course, of. Of Donald Trump's friends. I'm talking about the just you become a target. That's just the way it is. And they know that women. Here's the way I see it. They know that women have a reputation for being more ethical. It's just the way it is. That's the way. So what do they do to our women candidates? They attack their ethical standing by saying things. Make them up. They're not even true. And if your child hears that their classmate heard that on TV and comes home crying, is this worth it?

[Jon Lovett]

Right.

[Nancy Pelosi]

Right. So we have to get rid of that politics of personal destruction, which really became a factor during the 90s when Newt Gingrich became speaker. He really did that. Went after the Clintons, as you know, Hillary Clinton so much. And we just have to take it down to, we're a democracy. We have differences of opinion. Let's express those differences, let people judge what it means to them without trying to say things that really, I have no doubt that the things they said about me when I was speaker and the rest and became speaker and all that on the Republican side contributed to the assault on my husband.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

So I remember at Senator Harry Reid's funeral, President Obama talked about how Reid was the epitome of progress over perfection. And I wanted to know if you had any words for folks who are sitting on the sidelines right now who are still undecided about whether to vote for Kamala Harris on November 5, specifically for folks who think she's not progressive enough.

[Nancy Pelosi]

Oh, come on. Excuse me. Well, that was a beautiful word that the president said about Harry was wonderful and he was masterful, and I miss him every day. I have two words to say to people who say she's not progressive enough. Donald Trump, a tragedy for our country. If he were ever to be elected, everything that we care about or have done would be obliterated by him. Somebody said to Me the other day, what's the difference between the Democrats and Republicans and how you treat poor children? I said, we do and they don't.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Right.

[Nancy Pelosi]

That's just the way it is. So, you know, with all due respect to that, and I'm a progressive from San Francisco, and what the thing is, is that we have to win in the whole country. And when I was invited by the governor of Michigan to be there for events, I said, then what works in Michigan, works in San Francisco. Working class message. What works in San Francisco may not work in Michigan. Let's win, baby. Okay, so if they have ideas that they want to develop at the local level and, and have them become something that have national acceptance, that's what this is about. That's what I did. I mean, I came at it very from the left in San Francisco, but I know you have to govern from the center. So I would just say to them, everything that we did. Joe Biden was a fabulous president. Consequential. Our agenda was beautiful from all the bills, the, the rescue package with the child tax credit, the infrastructure bill with all the jobs, the PACT act for our veterans, the CHIPS act for our economy and involving women and ownership as well as jobs and our. To save the planet. The biggest commitment of any country ever, $370 billion to save the planet. That's very progressive and it would be all negated. Lowering the cost of prescription drugs, lowering the cost of insulin. That's not what they're there for. They're taking us to court on some of those things. And Trump has sat down with, oh, I said his name.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

I know you don't like to do that.

[Nancy Pelosi]

I don't like to do it. Slipped down, sat down with the fossil fuel industry and said, give me a billion dollars and I'll get rid of all this other stuff. So I just have two words for them. Donald Trump. Bless your hearts for your sincerity and the rest. As I say that as a San Francisco liberal, very close to my constituents, and I had a lot of those signs in my basement for 40 years. But right now, we want to win the White House. And if they think that giving a vote to a third party or something like that, that is courageous. No, it's dangerous.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

It is dangerous. So I did want to ask. You mentioned your husband, Paul. And shortly after he was brutally attacked, Trump took to Twitter and made a joke about it. And minutes after Trump was grazed by a bullet in Butler, Pennsylvania, you released a statement on Twitter that read in part, as one whose family has been the victim of political Violence. I know firsthand that political violence of any kind has no place in our society. Thank God that former President Trump is safe. Having walked in his shoes, how depraved does it seem that he couldn't wish you and your husband well?

[Nancy Pelosi]

I think it's indicative of who he is. That's why I come back to the goodness of the American people. This is a person who has no respect for other people. He's all about himself and his rich friends at the expense of other people. He exploits fears and concerns that people have about how they will survive economically in a time of globalization, a time of innovation. He sells them a bill of goods. And again, there are social, cultural issues like guns and gays, as they call it. Three GS. Guns, gays and God. Can you believe it? As a mother of five and six years and seven days, I have something to say about that. But this is not a person that you would even let in your house, much less into the White House of the United States. He is vulgar, grotesque. He is unpatriotic. We know that he is demonstrating characteristics that can be considered fascist and how people respond to him because he, again, he sells a good bill of goods, but if his lips are moving, he ain't telling the truth.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

You came to Congress in 1987. You came to Congress to fight for children and HIV, AIDS. What do you consider the biggest fight still ahead?

[Nancy Pelosi]

You mentioned the social media earlier. It's not about what the fight is, it's about how the fight is conducted. President Lincoln let the record show I'm quoting a Republican president. President Lincoln said, public sentiment is everything. With it, you can accomplish almost anything. Without it, practically nothing. But for public sentiment to prevail, people have to know. And that is what I think the challenge has been. In this administration, we did great things, but the bully pulpit of the White House did not showcase them so that the President's numbers were like a 37%. So the challenge is not the issue. The challenge is the presentation. Now, on the issue, we build consensus, we reach across the aisle to try to have bipartisan support for so many things. But the public really has to be aware of that because some of it takes a great deal of courage for our members. Not me, because I represent beautiful San Francisco, but deal of courage for them to vote for in their districts, especially since the other side will try to misrepresent what it is. So the point is, as I always say, I can bake the pie or I can sell the pie, but I can't do them both. At once. So there has to be a recognition, as we did, the Affordable Care Act. We just went out there and mobilized and mobilized and mobilized, and that's the way we passed it and that's how we saved it, because of the engagement of the public. So I would say as we go forward, there's a care agenda that has to happen in our country. We are, I think, the only developed nation that does not have affordable childcare. The child tax credit, so important. Home health care for our seniors, family and medical leave. So if you want to talk about how we can make a big difference in our economy, it's the fullest empowerment of women and caregivers. They may be men too, in the workplace, and we have to make sure that the public is aware of it so it is not misrepresented to them by the other side that does not believe in governance, they don't believe in science. So don't do anything about climate because you've invented the climate crisis right at the weather service. That's why they want to privatize it. The education abolish the Department of Education and the epa. Epa, what is this? Okay, so let's go right to your kitchen table. Let's go right to your kitchen table. You have to make ends meet. The cost of childcare is huge. Cost of housing is huge. The cost of care for your older parent or sibling in addition to children is hard. It's expensive. But it's also hard to get the kind of safe care that you need. We really have to change that. We had it in the build back, better bill.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Right.

[Nancy Pelosi]

We couldn't get it completely. We got most of it, but we didn't get what I just named paid family and medical leave, affordable child care, child tax Credit. We had $400 billion in the bill for home healthcare for senior siblings in addition to children. So I think the empowerment of women, when women succeed, America succeeds. And we want women when they're in the workplace to be fully present. They always worry about families, we all do. But if you have the assurance that the care is safe and good and it is affordable to you, I think that women will make bigger strides even in the workplace, in our economy, in our national security, in our politics, in our government, in academia, in every way.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

So speaking of women, you ran for Congress in your late 40s. Toni Morrison wrote the Bluest Eye in her late 40s. Julia Child was 49 when she published Mastering the Art of French Cooking. What should women know about the second half of life? What changes as we age?

[Nancy Pelosi]

Well, for me, my children grew up. It was about them. Once they were in school all day and five children in six years and seven days. That was quite an occupying force. I had never intended to run for office. I wasn't even interested in it. In fact, I avoided it. I mean, I didn't even avoid it. I didn't even think of it. And then when the opportunity came along and then I ran and they said, you'll love it because you love the issues. That's why you're involved in politics. They were right. I loved it. And then when I was there, then they said, now you have to run for leadership after a few years. And I said, no, I like the issue, I love what I'm doing, one thing and another. But again, we were losing. We lost. 94, 96, 98. And then I said, okay, I'll take some responsibility in the 2000s. And then we won. I became speaker. So when I go housewife, House member, House speaker, my motivation was for the children. I always tell people, know your why, know why you are doing this because you're going to get the slings and arrows and everything else and you have. It's all worth it if you know why you're there. And mine was the children writ large. But specifically when I went there, it was about the AIDS crisis as well.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

So I have to ask you, what's your secret to being able to spend all day in sky high heels that would take down the average 35 year old?

[Nancy Pelosi]

The dark, I think dark chocolate, very dark chocolate.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

What is your favorite dark chocolate?

[Nancy Pelosi]

Oh, well, it just depends if it's ice cream or if it's candy or whatever it is. I said, when I left the hotel in Boston this morning, I had chocolate ice cream in the refrigerator. And I said to Ian, I said, I just drank the ice cream, the chocolate ice cream, because it didn't freeze in the refrigerator. No, I think some of it is being Italian American and I just have this, not enough hours in the day to get all the things done that I want. I think part of it is raising five children. You're always working, you don't even have time to wash your face. You know, it's constant and then you multitask, you get it done. So it is, I don't know, I largely attribute it to chocolate. Dark is very dark.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Is a dessert. A dessert if it's not chocolate?

[Nancy Pelosi]

No, I mean if people give you like fruit or something, I think that's a nice vegetable or fruit, but it's not dessert. That's not Mislead ourselves. It's. And then so sometimes that happens. People put like, oh, I just made this thing. I say, that's nice. I was like, I'll consider it like a piece of bread, or I'll consider it a. If it's a pastry, or I'll consider it a vegetable if it's fruit, you know, fresh something. No, it's chocolate. And people know it. I mean, it saves me a lot.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Because do you know how I know it?

[Nancy Pelosi]

No.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Because when we first came to the White House, when Rahm Emanuel was chief of staff, he would call me and he'd say, honey, which is not sexist. Everyone listening, because he called David Axelrod honey, too. He'd say, honey, Nancy's coming down. And I'm only calling you Nancy because that's what he said. He said, where are the best chocolate croissants? And so even though I was an assistant to the president, I was in charge of the chocolate croissants that we got for you because he said, she will be happy if we have chocolate.

[Nancy Pelosi]

I remember going to my first lunch with President Obama in that little lunch place, and he said, first we're going to start. And he had chocolate, dark chocolate candy with sea salt sprinkled on top. That's the first time I had that. It was delicious. But I'm a connoisseur, and I'm not, you know, I'm not indiscriminate.

[Jon Lovett]

Right.

[Nancy Pelosi]

It's not just any chocolate, and I don't like it adulterated. Somebody will say, oh, this is great. It's got hazelnut in it. I say, that's good. You have. Enjoy it.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

You enjoy your chocolate.

[Jon Favreau]

So.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

But if I want a chocolate bar, what should I put in my bag?

[Nancy Pelosi]

Oh, no, let me just say this. I like very dark chocolate. Okay. But a good Hershey's with almonds never offended anybody.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Okay. Well, Madam speaker, thank you so much for talking to me today. And listeners, don't forget to head over to votesaveamerica.com 2024 and make sure you're all set for election day.

[Nancy Pelosi]

And make sure they do their calls.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Do your calls, your postcards. Drive people to the polls, be a poll worker. Do all of it.

[Nancy Pelosi]

All is in their hands, Madam Speaker. Thank you, Fate of the nation. Thank you so much.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Thank you.

[Jon Lovett]

All right, before we go, one of the best memes of the Kamala Harris era.

[Tommy Vitor]

This is going now after Pelosi.

[Jon Lovett]

She's going to be really happy. Do you think she'll be as happy or happier than Brian Schatz. Better than the lead in the meme. Got an important update on Sunday, courtesy of Rudy Giuliani, whose stirring speech we did not play a clip from yet. And we felt a journalistic responsibility to share the whole new meme with you that we've updated. Do not come. Do not come. I'm gonna come.

[Nancy Pelosi]

There's no place in America the president.

[Jon Lovett]

Shouldn'T be able to come. I mean, I mean, does Rudy have a point? No, it doesn't.

[Jon Favreau]

No.

[Tommy Vitor]

We learned that clearly in the Clinton impeachment.

[Jon Favreau]

No, there are places where the president shouldn't go. Absolutely. Or come what is.

[Jon Lovett]

His speech was fucking lost.

[Jon Favreau]

He's lost it, man. I mean, he had to give up his apartment to the, to the election workers from Georgia, which is fucking awesome. He had to give them. He had to give the election workers a Mercedes that once belonged to Lauren Bacall. Yes, yes.

[Jon Lovett]

If this was tested, that clip, do you think that would move some voters off the fence?

[Tommy Vitor]

I think we could get people going with that thing.

[Jon Favreau]

I don't think it'll help Rudy's mayor campaign.

[Jon Lovett]

Think he's going to make take one more run out after Adam.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. By the way, just going to just once again throw out my terrible prediction that if Donald Trump wins. Eric Adams, Department of Homeland Security.

[Tommy Vitor]

Oh, no.

[Jon Lovett]

Oh, yeah. I thought you were going to say pardon. I'm like, obviously the pardon.

[Tommy Vitor]

Yeah, pardon.

[Jon Favreau]

Mark.

[Tommy Vitor]

My Rudy hasn't been sober since the Bush administration.

[Jon Lovett]

All right, that's our show for today. Thanks to Speaker Pelosi and to Alyssa for that great conversation.

[Jon Favreau]

Speaker Pelosi, so great to have you.

[Jon Lovett]

We love our guests.

[Tommy Vitor]

We love our guest on Wednesday.

[Jon Lovett]

Love it. And our buddy Tim Miller of the Bulwark will be back on Wednesday with a new show box. Hi, everybody. If you want to get ad free episodes, exclusive content and more, consider joining our friends of the pod subscription [e-mail] friends and if you're already doom scrolling, don't forget to follow us at podsave America on Instagram, Twitter and YouTube for access to full episodes, bonus content and more. Plus, if you're as opinionated as we are, consider dropping us a review to help boost this episode or spice up the group chat by sharing it with friends, family or randos. You want in on this conversation? Pod Save America is a crooked media production. Our producers are David Toledo and Saul Rubin. Our associate producer is Farah Safaree. Reed Churlin is our executive editor and Adrian Hill is our executive producer. The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan Cantor is our sound engineer, with audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Writing support by Hallie Kiefer Madeline Herringer is our head of news and programming. Matt DeGroat is our head of production. Andy Taft is our executive assistant. Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Haley Jones, Phoebe Bradford, Joseph Dutra, Ben Hethcote, Mia Kelman, Molly Lobel, Kirill Pelaviev and David Toles.