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- [00:07]
A
Welcome to Talking Feds, a roundtable that brings together prominent former federal officials and special guests for a dynamic discussion of the most important political and legal topics of the day. I'm Harry Littman. The week saw Trump induced turmoil from sea to shining sea, starting in Iran, where the president insisted a deal was close even as new fighting broke out. A set of closely watched primaries in Indiana gave Trump a chance to demonstrate his influence and produce the defeat of several candidates who had bucked his redistricting plan. And Virginia's highest court shot a lightning bolt into the nationwide redistricting arms race by invalidating voters recent decision to draw maps to favor Democrats. Between that decision made on a narrow procedural point and the rush by several Republican states to capitalize on the Supreme Court's opinion in Calais, previously confident Democrats had cause for serious consternation with new outbursts of violence in the Persian Gulf, fresh legal setbacks for Dem's attempt to retake the House and midterms looming. I'm grateful to be joined by three of the keenest political observers in the country. And they are David French, a columnist for the New York Times. He is also a former JAG officer who earned a bronze star in Iraq. Since leaving full time law practice back in 2015, David's become a prominent voice in American politics and American conservatism. Of a certain stripe. Anyway, David French, thanks for your service and thank you as always for joining Talking Feds.
- [02:00]
B
Well, thanks so much for having me. And a lot of the modern conservatives say I'm not of their stripe at all.
- [02:05]
A
Harry, I said a certain stripe that was meant for that asterisk. And another show which I hope will have. Yeah, that'd be fun. I think the Republican Party is deserted. Maybe more than one guest on this show. Not. However, Mara Liasson, a national political correspondent for npr. Mara reported on seven, count them, seven presidential elections. Her reports, of course, can be heard regularly on NPR's Politics podcast as well as NPR great programs, Morning Edition and All Things Considered. Mara, thank you as always for being here.
- [02:43]
C
Thank you. Thanks for having me. And now that I know David is David French, I am a huge fan.
- [02:48]
A
There you go.
- [02:49]
C
Huge.
- [02:50]
A
And Mike Murphy, it's been a minute since he's been on. So good to see you, Mike. He's the co director of the center for the Political Future at usc. And before his vocal criticism of Trump pushed him to his party's outskirts or he stayed steady while his party pushed away, Mike earned a reputation as one of the most successful Republican strategists. And in the country. He's also, of course, a co host with David Axelrod of the great podcast Hacks on Tap. Thanks very much for being with us, Mike, from your undisclosed location in Southern California.
- [03:29]
D
Yeah, I'm hiding out here from the Trump malaise, but it's great to be here with you, Harry, and my friends Mar and David. So look forward to chewing over the. The status quo.
- [03:40]
A
Whoa.
- [03:41]
D
Craziness.
- [03:42]
A
Okay, let's start with a pretty big bite. Seismic news from this morning. The Virginia Supreme Court has struck down the new map that voters passed as a constitutional amendment a couple months ago. It had set the state up to elect 10 Democrats and one Republican instead of the current six and five. Very quickly, because I have replaced, rolled up my sleeves and gone through it, it's very much on procedural grounds for not according to the four to three opinion of the court, going through the labyrinthine process that the Virginia Constitution prescribes and basically on the reasoning that the election encompasses the whole time during which you vote, not just election Day. That's just to give a flavor of how particular the case was. But let me cut to the chase because the news, maybe in part because it was a surprise hit very hard, and the headlines now are huge loss for the Dems, et cetera. So let's just start. Is that. Is it being overplayed or is it as big as that?
- [04:52]
D
Well, I just say the plan was awful. Mayor Daly would have been embarrassed. But we're in this arms race between the parties. I think there's a little too much. I approve of the decision. I get the idea. You don't campaign for a day, you campaign for a year. Boundaries count. But some Democrats thinking, oh, my God, we failed in our attempt to rig the elections in Virginia. Now Trump's, the Republicans are gonna win the midterms. Not true. None of these things where the Democrats are impersonating the Republicans who started all this with Texas, with the cheat, there are big enough to stop the tide of anti Republican voting, particularly in the House.
- [05:29]
C
Maybe I would say this goes under the category no good deed goes unpunished. Because the problem for Democrats has been that they passed these referendums, they set up nonpartisan redistricting, and they had to go through a heck of a lot more hoops than Republicans did to do mid cycle partisan redistricting. And Virginia, you know, had to take it to the voters, which they did. And now I guess they could appeal to the Supreme Court, which would be kind of shocking if the Supreme Court sided with them. Although, I mean, if they believe in that everybody gets a chance to rig things mid cycle. Why shouldn't they let Democrats in Virginia do what all the Republican states are doing, too?
- [06:12]
A
David, I want to hear your thoughts, but I'll jump in quickly as Supreme Court nerd and say, you know, it's completely based on state law and the Virginia constitution. And so the Supreme Court won't speak to that. I see no chance of their taking on the case. Sorry. And especially if I've stolen your.
- [06:28]
C
So no recourse at all. This is the end of the line.
- [06:31]
A
Yeah, I think that's right.
- [06:32]
B
Yeah, that's right. This is a state law issue. So the Supreme Court's. The Virginia Supreme Court's the final word on Virginia state law. I don't really see a constitutional claim here, a US Constitutional claim. So this is the end of the line. But I'll say this. I'm going to agree with Mike. If this is the midterm that appears to be shaping up, this is going to be a rounding error. What we have seen for months is Democratic over performance. I think one of the lowest over performances was in, actually in Tennessee, where I think it was about an 11% over performance by the Democratic candidate. And this was a Democratic candidate who was known as the AOC of Tennessee. So that's not somebody calculated to appeal to a Republican district. And she overperformed Kamala Harris by 11 points. And that's one of the lowest over performances of this cycle so far. And so let's just say if you had an 11 point over performance, take sort of the minimum and say that's going to be like the median, then Democrats are winning the House. And not only are Democrats winning the House, a lot of these gerrymanders are going to backfire because a lot of these gerrymanders are based on 2024 maps that Republicans have sort of wrongly believed have baked in the shift that happened in 2024. And I think you're going to see perhaps some really rude awakenings, particularly in Texas, where there was some redistricting done sort of based on the idea that Hispanic shifts in 2024 were more permanent than they really are and have been. So look, if this race narrows very significantly, then Virginia could be important. But if present trends continue, in other words, if we continue on the arc that we've been on for, you know, the last 18 months or so, then we won't remember Virginia. It won't even be in our minds on election night. But I think there's a deeper thing here. The deeper thing is this gerrymandering race is horrible for this country. It is horrible for this country. And I don't see a clear path out of it, because, as Mara said, this path of sort of unilateral disarmament where one side says we'll do independent commissions and the other side says we're going to redistrict to the max, that's just absolutely not sustainable. There's got to be sort of a national solution to this, I think, or no solution at all. And if we have no solution at all, it's going to be very, very bad for this country.
- [09:06]
C
Wait, and you still think it's a rounding era, even with the Voting Rights act redistrictings?
- [09:10]
B
If, again, if you have the same kind of Democratic performance that you've seen up until now, I think the math is just overwhelming. And what you would actually see is some interesting Democratic pickups in freshly gerrymandered districts. So, in other words, one of the. It's not as if these states were gerrymandered previously in a charitable way.
- [09:32]
D
Exactly.
- [09:33]
B
They were not. They were gerrymandered. They were pushing the limits already, and now they've blown through some of the red lines to make a lot more districts closer with this hubris idea that says that everything we won in 2024 is just baked in. We're keeping all that. And I just think that's completely wrong.
- [09:52]
D
Yeah. The Voting Rights act decision is less about changing partisan outcomes than changing racial ones. You know, in the old days, both parties would cheat. I used to live in a district in California the Democrats drew that was only contiguous at low tide. I mean, I used to work for a lot of governors, and we'd break out the whiskey and get out the map and try to figure out. Remember in Michigan, we always wanted to try to move Sandy Levin, the effective Democratic congressman, into Ontario, could never quite figure out how to do it, so. But what happened over time was the incentives in the Voting Rights act for minority districts and meant that Democrats and the Republicans would kind of try to work the law in different ways. The Republicans would try to make a secret deal with the Black Caucus to take a white Democratic district to a black representative in exchange for picking up their edge in a few of the marginal districts. You know, so there was all this golduggery. What the Supremes really have done is told states that it's okay to be more partisan about this, which is kind of an equal opportunity offense. Bottom line, in a wave election, these marginal things do lasting damage to the system, but changing the outcome will be Pretty hard. We've already done the big sin in a normal midterm from 25 years ago. The Repubs will be looking at a more than 30 seat loss in the current polling. But we've narrowed down the number of swing districts before all this tremendously. So now a landslide is winning 16 or 18 districts, which is I think, the approximate realm. They could even do a little better. We've just taken away most Americans do not live in a swing district where their vote means anything. You know, it's predetermined. Who I vote for for Congress in this part of LA matters nothing all. What matters is who wins the Democratic primary. And what matters there is where the public employee unions go and there are Republican districts where interest groups have similar powers. So I'm with David. This is horrible. And if the Democrats want to hang on to some moral high ground, which is not normally for 40 years what I've argued for, but in a democracy where most voters want to punish a party, they don't have to undo democracy to let democracy work. And imitating the Republicans I think is not good for them. So net net I think this is going to be plus one or two districts either way. Right now I'm thinking it might be plus one or two Democrat simply because Virginia was the boldest move they made, followed by California and that overcomes Texas.
- [12:26]
A
But there's some pretty bold moves on the other side. To David's native Tennessee, it was already. It's about a. What would you say, David? 65, 35. It was already 8 to 1 and now they want to go to 9. 0. I just want to stay with this for one minute because we had two emphatic answers from David and Mike and Mara was gave the. Maybe Mara state the other side, if you don't mind, of your, you know, I'm not so sure, guys.
- [12:51]
C
Well, I'm not so sure because the Democratic advantage in the congressional ballot, I think it's at 5 now. Well, we. I thought that it had to be at 8 or more to really have a wave election. And also the financial disparity, which usually doesn't really matter so long as you have enough money, is so extreme. I mean, it's like seven to one now. Does that matter this year or not? I don't know. One thing I wanted to ask David and Mike and you too, Harry, is do you think in the long run if this is taken to its logical extreme and we have these kind of perverted redistrictings, that there will be a push to elect Members of Congress and state legislators, based on the percentage of the popular vote. In other words, they run slates of candidates, one from each district. But the percentage of the statewide popular vote that your party gets is the percentage of the congressional delegation that you would be awarded. I mean, it would take the kind of real estate advantage, the redistricting out of the picture. I mean, do we think that's completely nuts?
- [14:00]
B
Here's my pessimistic take, not just on that reform, but reform in general at the moment. And that is the problem is, you know, constitutionally, these elections are matters of state law unless the Congress intervenes. So Congress, if they're, if we're going to do this sort of national change, it has to be through Congress.
- [14:19]
C
Maybe it'd be a state by state change. I don't know.
- [14:21]
B
Well, again, you'd get your problem of unilateral disarmament. Is a blue state going to go 60, 40, right. When the red states go 100? Zero? Absolutely not. No way. And so then the problem becomes these guys who are charged with passing a law that would reform the system are products of the system that they would be passing the law to reform. And this is why I feel like of all of our political problems, and we have many, gerrymandering is one of the ones I feel the most bleak about. And I honestly think one of the only things that's going to arrest this is, is if there is such a wave in 2026 this year that it exposes that they flew too close to the sun on the gerrymanders and that the gerrymanders actually went back and bit them. And I think if they feel burned by the gerrymander, we'll have a chance to do something. But if they feel that the gerrymander secured their power, we're toast. On this is. It's, it's like chiseling. It's just like putting a granite block into our legal system because they're going to want to preserve their own path to power. And these gerrymandered districts are designed to be super, super comfortable for these incumbents. And so this is why I am pessimistic about, at least in the short term, about the prospects for reform again, unless there is some sort of wave election that just sort of blows through a lot of the recent gerrymanders and exposes them as just too clever by half.
- [15:54]
D
Yeah, I think the reforms I like are ranked choice voting and open primaries
- [15:58]
C
because, well, top two primaries for more than ranked choice voting.
- [16:02]
D
Well, I can make a pretty good case for Ranked choice voting. And so can Lisa Murkowski.
- [16:06]
C
Well, it's confusing to people. It's like, really, you're going to take my second choice and a computer is going to read. Why not just have top two primaries? It gets you the same thing.
- [16:16]
D
Well, I'm for top two primaries, ranked choice that incentivizes second and third choices to count, which makes candidates run wider. Mayor Lurie in San Francisco is a good example. He would not be mayor if it wasn't for ranked choice voting. Even with top two.
- [16:31]
C
Even with top two. Okay.
- [16:32]
D
Yeah. The thing you were getting at is interesting because it also gets to the electoral college. Yeah, you know, exactly. But Dave is right. You gotta do it everywhere. Because it's been a Republican dream forever to do proportional congressional in California in the big blue states. I mean, part of the sub with our polarized politics. When you look at the U.S. you have about 3,400 counties. All the Democrat vote comes out of 500 of them. So that's why the Democrats have a disadvantage now in the electoral college because they're more concentrated into a few huge states. So you got to be. You got to do it everywhere. And it federalizes some things. So I think it would be very hard to ever get there.
- [17:13]
C
So we need massive population redistribution.
- [17:16]
D
Well, you know, in the old days we used to mint states to create senators, you know, and there are people who still like, why is there north and South Dakota? That was literally a political deal.
- [17:27]
A
Yeah. I mean, so much of this does come down to the electoral college. And I tend to share the view that constitutional amendments are bloody difficult. But I will say I'll give my two cents cuz I'm a little more sanguine, Mara, than maybe David and Mike, though there's a legal question at the end. So in brief, it's the ugliest thing going. I agree. And it's got this combination of the biggest motivation for officeholders to act unscrupulously, not care about the public, and it being sufficiently arcane that I think it generally escapes public perception. I don't think people have a real idea of how anti Democratic it is. But look what's happening now. So Florida is a perfect example. You have the people of Florida clearly against this and nevertheless Desantis was able to just force it through through. So I can foresee a situation where, oddly enough, and it would be a landmark in the country, this procedural nicety would actually become the focus of popular pushback. And if it did, yes, the answer would be, you've talked about ranked choice 1, 2, proportional. There are many ways to get around this problem, but the big question will be whatever's chosen. Will the U.S. supreme Court say, this is up to the states to decide and you can't impose a one size fits all solution. But it seems to me there's a real possibility that people are now focused on it, depending in part on what happens here. Okay, let's go a little bit more to the midterms outlook generally, Mike, I wanted to go to Indiana, where there were a number of state legislative primaries that were seen as a test of Trump's continuing power. This odd situation where he is cratering and yet maybe still can flex his muscles and punish individual candidates who don't please him. Talk to us a little about the results in Indiana and what you make of them.
- [19:32]
D
Well, Trump has a lot of power in the rank and file, grassroots marching army of the Republican Party. He doesn't have a complete lock, but he has a majority lock. One of the coolest polling questions a guy named Whit Ayers invented on the Republican side is we ask people on polls, do you consider yourself a party Republican or a Trump Republican? And depending on how Trump's doing, he can score anywhere from 45 on that question to 65. But generally it's over 50, which means he's very formidable in a primary because he, you know, when we poll Republicans, we don't poll primary voters are a subset. They're the most active. And that's where Trump is strongest. And by the way, generally true of an incumbent president, it wasn't a great idea when Clinton was a popular president, when Obama was to go in the Democratic primary, say, I'm here to fight Obama. But Trump has hardened it like everything in our politics now. So they went thundering into these Indiana legislative seats with a ton of money they didn't run on. Oh, my God. He wouldn't let us gerrymander the state. It was, you're a traitor to the Trump movement. And, you know, we're very tribal now. Politics is, I'm right, you're evil, to quote Bill Gray. So it worked with most of them, not all. I think he won, what, five out of seven was it? I don't know if we have the final, final numbers yet, but there was a time when he would have won seven out of seven. But, but yeah, there's a litmus test now in Republican politics of your view on Trump. It doesn't always happens. Some people like Brian Kemp, the governor of Georgia, have tangled with him and won. But generally he has the law of gravity, particularly with smaller political figures who aren't that well known. If you're Barney Bag of donuts in a rural district in Indiana and the RNC comes in with a million bucks calling you a Trump hater in a Republican primary, yeah, you're in trouble. So it was kind of cat bites dog to me. The question for Trump and the Republican Party is the future, not the grip he has today. What is the Trump who built his brand on winning going to be like after the Democrats put a Democratic boot print on his rear end in the congressional elections? You know, The Trump of 2027 is what politically interests me inside the party. And there are no shortage of conspiracies from the right and the center of the Republican Party to do something about that. But it'll come down to where the primary voters go. And we're gonna know about that at the end of 27 and into Q1 in 28, we're gonna have a big, fascinating, open seat Republican contest for president. And that'll be the X ray of where Trump is and where the party is.
- [22:08]
A
David, let me ask you to stick with 26 for another minute or so, cuz even here, as Mike says, he showed a certain amount of muscle, but also, you know, his approval ratings are in the 30s. There's another kind of gravity at play here, it seems. I want to ask you what it means. Do Republicans kowtow but then distance themselves from Trump once they survive their primaries? Or now with Indiana, are they pushed back in, sorry about that, Mr. Trump, I'll never do it again kind of mode?
- [22:43]
B
Well, I've put it this way. They're in a pickle right now because here's the problem. The Republican primary voter is going to be the last person to abandon Trump. Of all of the people in America, the Republican primary voter is going to be that cohort, are going to be the last people to abandon Trump. Number two, you have Republicans all over America and these heavily gerrymandered districts, as we've just been talking, to the point where the approval of Trump is actually their key to their whole career. Their whole career. At the same time, of course, Democrats oppose Trump, but independents have been sprinting from Trump at extremely high speed. And also overlaying all of this is the fact that Trump is really the only president in my lifetime who governs only for his base. In other words, his communication is for his base, his initiatives are for his base. Everything is for his base. And so his base, which is a third of the country, roughly, which is about his approval rating right now, his base isn't going anywhere. There's, you know, there's some chipping and decaying, but it's, it's not going anywhere. But everyone else is. Everyone else is. And here's the other thing. You know, I. To say I lived in the heart of MAGA country would be an understatement. In 2024, my neighborhood voted 85% for Trump. So I am, I have lived all the years of the Trump era in the heart of Trump country. And one thing that is very clear to me is if you are in Trump's base, you don't get the same news, you don't get the same information, you don't live in the same environment at all, at all from your independents or your Democrats. And so it's a kind of a self contained cocoon that is getting a little bit smaller, a little bit, but is still remarkably zealous. And one of the reasons why a Republican can't necessarily pivot to the center after surviving their primary is they know the base will go after them and maybe even stay home if they sense even a molecule of what they would call being a rhino.
- [24:52]
A
Right.
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B
And so they're in a bind right now. They're in a real bind. That's why there has to be a, I would say a very big fundamental shift between right now, May 8th and November for the Republicans to salvage themselves right now under the present dynamic and the present trends, it would not shock me to see a 30 to 40 seat swing in the House.
- [25:19]
C
Wow.
- [25:19]
B
And then it gets very interesting in 2027. Then it gets very interesting. But, but unless and until that occurs, unless and until that occurs, then it is, we are going to see continued deep and intense loyalty to Trump. No news cycle is going to shake that. No polling result is going to shake that. Nothing is going to shake that. The only thing that can shake that is an election and the outcome of an election. That is it.
- [25:48]
D
I had a Republican member joke to me, I have to choose between death by primary or death by general election.
- [25:55]
C
Well, that's, that's the question I have. So Donald Trump weighs in on these primaries. His guys almost always win. How many of those people are weaker general election candidates than the Trump apostates that they defeated by weighing in on these primaries? Is he electing a whole bunch of general election candidates that aren't as good as often?
- [26:19]
D
One thing that's happening right now is a lot of Republicans in these tough districts, you know, the ones that haven't called up aheadhunters call up this Green Door Association. I'm. Look, I gotta get outta here. There's been record numbers. That's the poll to watch. How many of them are jumping ship. But they're watching their filing deadlines, the date by which you can no longer file in a primary. And the minute some of these folks, their filing deadline is over. And some have happened, but a lot are in the next 60 days, they're going to start running for the tall grass. That doesn't mean they attack Trump, but it means they go try to get invisible and try to create their own identity in ways that might irk the White House. But that, that primary risk goes away. The problem is for most of them, it's awful late and the die's kind of been, been cast presidentially. I, I'm a contrarian on the, you know, six months ago. Oh, J.D. vance will be everything. I think J.D. vance has two problems. One is he's going to have all Trump's enemies and only half his friends. At best.
- [27:18]
C
Yeah.
- [27:19]
B
Truth.
- [27:19]
D
Second, he's working for Stalin. There's an old joke, I'm an old Russian area studies guy. There was an old joke they told us about during the Second World War. Two generals are going to the Kremlin to see Stalin. Igor and Boris. And Igor says, boris, you look so upset. What's wrong? And Boris says, igor, I got a battle tomorrow with the Germans. If I lose, Stalin's going to shoot me. And his friend says, well, you got a bigger problem than that. If you win, he's going to shoot you and your family. There's only one hero in the Soviet Union. So the minute the MAGA press and the MAGA for profit machine starts loving up Vance or now loving up Rubio.
- [27:55]
C
Oh, Rubio. We're in a Rubio moment right now.
- [27:58]
D
Defeated Trump in the bunker is going to see that and kill them. Also, every Republican politician with ambition for president, so we're call it a hundred right now, all agree on one thing, screw Vance. And they're about to agree on screw Rubio. So it's going to be interesting on that point.
- [28:19]
B
I would love to hear what you all think of this. My view is the most important person to both Rubio and Vance's prospects is Trump. That this sort of idea that if this present trend continues and you've got a president who's bumping along in the mid-30s or low-30s in approval by the time 27 rolls around in early 28, I'm not certain that there's going to be anybody with a golden halo glow coming out of the Trump administration. And that you might have something much more like the change that Republicans did from 2008, where they went with McCain, who McCain ran against Bush in 2000. He was a Republican alternative to Bush. He was not an extension of Bush. And so my question is, are we even looking in the wrong place to look at the constellation of people in the administration and administration, which might be as early as 27, being seen to be circling the drain? And so that's where you might get somebody like Brian Kemp. He's accomplished the impossible so far. He's the unicorn. He's like the Harry Potter, the boy who lived. And that is the person who took on Donald Trump and still held on to the Republican base.
- [29:35]
D
Yeah. And beat him.
- [29:36]
B
He's a popular governor. He's a popular governor and so is a Brian Kemp, a natural next person. Somebody who says, hey, look, I've, I'm in tune with the Republican base. But moderates and independents, you can't say I was a Trump toady. I defied him in 2020 and lived to tell the tale. So, so that's my question. Are we looking, if we're looking in the Trump administration for the next Republican, are we looking in the wrong place?
- [30:03]
D
I think you're right. We could be. The problem is MAGA's gonna fade, I think, but DAP is not gonna fade. Dumbass populism, which is what terrifies me as a starchy old school conservative. So the most powerful word in advertising is new. And so I think Kemp is new. I think that's gonna have power, but they're gonna have to check the populist box, which I think is a sad thing for the party. But that energy that Trump brought is pretty indelible. It may be populism light, but the other thing, and I'll be quick curious about, is will one of the great bread and butter Republican primary issues return, which is fiscal conservatism? Cause that has been thrown out the window. I'm hoping for a Democratic Congress to curb spending. I mean, that's how insane things have become. And that used to be very powerful of some of the same voters who are for Trump. Now, does that have a reformation? Because that would be an interesting factor. Nobody in the Trump world has a case to make on that.
- [31:03]
C
Yeah. And the debt is at crisis levels.
- [31:05]
B
Yeah.
- [31:06]
C
Look, it's very hard to make predictions, especially about the future. We don't know what happens to the war in Iran, what happens to the economy. Do we have tremendous job loss because of AI. I mean, we're in a whole new world. I mean, two years from now, I don't know what the Democratic Party is going to look like, let alone the Republican Party.
- [31:26]
A
Well, that's really fair too, and I'd like to get back to them. I mean, you know, what world are we in? And another way you could put it is what does Trumpism look like after Trump? Not a question that we oracles, I think will solve today. I did want to touch specifically though on the the Senate, which is not subject in the same way to these different redistricting wars. The conventional wisdom had been very long shot Hail Mary for the Dems. Then it had been maybe it's a coin toss. And I think that seems to continue. I just wanted to invite any of you to give your thoughts specifically on what the US Senate is likely to look like come a year from now.
- [32:12]
C
Look, the thing that's so ironic is it's a minoritarian institution that is elected by a majority popular vote, you know, which is kind of amazing. But I still think it's really hard for Democrats, although Democrats I talk to are a lot more hopeful than they were six months ago. Like, they really believe Graham Platner could beat Susan Collins, which I've always been pretty skeptical about. And they think there are other places for pickups, but the math is very hard for them. They need net four pickups and they can't lose, you know, that means they can't lose anybody. So I don't know, what do Republicans think?
- [32:44]
D
Well, they think with a big money advantage and the law of gravity at the end, like, you know, Alaska, Dan Sullivan has bad numbers there. He's behind, but it's Alaska in the end. They're gonna stay with the right in a wave election. It could happen. It really could happen. But it needs kind of a time and space warp. I think what people are missing when they look at the Senate is in the House, the minority has no power. You know, you're there for the haircuts and you get to make a fiery speech in the Senate. If they go from four to two or four to one, they will almost have effective gridlock majority. You know, it's very hard place to run. You're herding cats. And the minority has a lot of power in the Senate. So once you get close to 50, 50, that is not a small change. That is seismic right there. And let alone do you get to 50, 50 and then poor, you know, vans for president will have to cast ties on tough votes. He'll Be jammed on every single day. So any change, any Democratic gain to the Senate is bigger than one seat.
- [33:45]
C
Wow. So that's a good consolation prize.
- [33:47]
D
Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's no loss here. The question is how big the win is. And even though the math is tough and the headwinds are tough, they put a gun to my head. I'd say no, but I'd say they pick up three. And it's not impossible. They get all the way. You gotta watch the second tier.
- [34:02]
A
Things like Ohio and Texas or what.
- [34:05]
D
Yeah, Ohio, Texas, Alaska. I just saw Poland, Kansas, five points.
- [34:09]
C
Oh, my God.
- [34:10]
D
Yeah. So, you know, Nebraska, there. There are these outliers that could pop.
- [34:14]
B
The question is, you know, there's been this Lucy with the football, with Texas for a while, right? Texas is going to go blue. It's going to go blue. Well, if there was ever a time, it would be if Ken Paxton wins the primary, right?
- [34:29]
D
Yeah.
- [34:29]
B
If Cornyn wins the primary. I just think the laws of gravity are going to take over. I don't think Talarico, no matter what the polls say right now in this moment, I just. I don't see it. But if Paxton wins, that is a classic example of maga, drunk on its own power, putting forward perhaps the least electable statewide Republican, which is still very electable in Texas. Right. This is Texas, but sort of essentially, it's giving Texas general election voters the middle finger. It's saying, we know this is not your ideal. We know this is not the person that you would really ideally want, but by golly, we run the place. This is our guy, and you're going to vote for him, or we're going to call you a heretic, or whatever we call Democrats in Texas. And I'm not sure that's going to work for them. I'm not sure that's going to work. And so I think a Paxton Talarico race, I would be watching like a hawk. I would still give Paxton the edge in that narrowly. I actually think if Graham Platner is the nominee, that makes Susan Collins much safer. She is a very good politician.
- [35:35]
A
In Maine.
- [35:36]
B
Yeah, in Maine. And I'm sorry, I'm just. I'm really hopeful voters in Maine will not turn to the man with the Totenkopf tattoo as the alternative. I'm sorry, I don't believe his story. I do not believe his story. And look, let's even say we believe it. And he says, I went through a very bad time in a dark time that extended all the way to 2021. That's when you kind of had the last of the really bad Reddit posts and everything. I'm sorry. Before you get to be a United States Senator, I need more than like, five months without a Nazi tattoo. Like, I'm sorry. And it's not just any Nazi tattoo. It's the Totenkopf. It's the. It's the tattoo of the freaking concentration camp guards. That's the tattoo. If you saw that on any Republican in America, you would say that dude needs to be nowhere near public office. And I get the argument, lesser of two evils, all this, but Susan Collins voted to convict Donald Trump. If she had her way. Donald Trump is not in office and barred forever from seeking federal office. If she had her way. So are we really going to turn to a dude with an SS tattoo? SS tattoo that he just recently realized was. Come on, come on. I've been in the military. I've been around countless guys who have. Who are covered in tattoos. And you know what they can do? They can explain every one of them. This is the Chinese symbol for strength and fortitude. This is the picture of my mother. This is the unit insignia from my first deployment.
- [37:14]
C
This.
- [37:14]
B
I mean, come on. And so look, Democrats who are walking down the Grand Platner road or walking down the Trumpist road, rationalizing the lesser of two evils for the alleged greater cause, and it's going to make them come to grief.
- [37:27]
D
I'm going to put you down as undecided, David. And I'm feeling the Platner sticker off my truck. I think if the election are held today, he would win. But. And I agree with you on why he shouldn't. The question for Platinum will be how he does under the second look, because with, with the Governor Mills getting out, it's now all him. And candidates like that, they start, interesting. And then how do they wear. When we have a longer discussion of why does he have the worst possible Nazi tattoo, et cetera, et cetera, Generically, he's heading toward a win. They've got to move it on a referendum on Collins and the Republicans to a referendum on him, which in a way, viewer, is hard to do. You can elect a Democratic cinder block in the right wave year because it's all about punishing one party. But he's wearing some Velcro there. And if he gets the scrutiny, I think that thing will be a toss up. The other thing about him, like Fetterman, he's one of these un politician politicians, and they can be very attractive, at least on the Surface because they just, they look like they don't fit the herd. So something must be good about them. They get that for free. So they, they've really got to do a second look there. Larry McCarthy, who is the media consultant on the Republican side, is very skilled. So Blattner's going to get a rough treatment and Collins will have money. But New England in particular has kind of become an anti Trump hotbed.
- [38:51]
A
I just want to point out that, David, last time you were on the show, you said much the same about Talarico. You were saying, I plead with my Democratic friends, don't think getting Paxton will make for a weaker race. And there's skeletons and Talaricos closet.
- [39:06]
B
Talarico actually has, yes, he has a lot of progressive beliefs, but he's also operating in the public square in a way that is very, very different from say, a Ken Paxton. You know, Talarico reaches out to political opponents. He's said, he's gone on podcasts and said there is a place for pro life people in the Democratic Party. He has called for an end to this kind of war of each against all that we're constantly fighting about. He's. There's a lot about Talarico's message, not his progressive politics, but a lot about his message about character and decency and integrity and treating your opponents with decency, trying to make politics less of a blood sport that I agree with completely and I think would offer a really powerful contrast to a Ken Paxton.
- [39:52]
D
The cruel irony for us cynics is that Trump is really screwing Cornyn. The kind of the play that was set up was, look, we're in trouble with Paxton, so we gotta get Cornyn to put Texas away in this high stakes year. So Mr. President endorsed Cornyn and they built expectations for that. And then Trump kind of froze and didn't endorse Cornyn. So now the vibe is the President's found something wrong with Cornyn. Paxton's right, and Paxton has moved ahead in the primary because those expectations weren't met, which normally would be processed, but in this case, it's a message to the primary voters. The President's hesitating, he's found a flaw. So pork horn. And the great irony would be Trump's egotistical need to be in the spotlight and dangle power fumbling leads to Paxton, which leads to a Republican Senate loss, which leads to a Democrat controlled Senate. And that is a plausible scenario.
- [40:49]
C
Now that would be wild.
- [40:51]
A
Mara, if you have any final thoughts, last word to you on just, you know, where the midterm calculus stands.
- [40:58]
C
Overall, I pretty much agree. I mean, Democrats have a shot, but not a slam dunk. I'm really, really interested in Mike's talk about any pickup for them as a consolation prize. Any way you become less of a minority in the Senate, I think that's a really good way to think about.
- [41:25]
A
All right, it is now time for a spirited debate brought to you by our sponsor, Total Wine and more. Each episode, you'll be hearing an expert talk about the pros and cons of a particular issue in the world of wine, spirit and beverages.
- [41:43]
E
Thank you, Harry. In today's spirited debate, we pop into the beer aisle for a closer look at the two main types of beers, ales versus lagers. And to help separate lagers from ales, it first comes down to one fermentation. That's the process where the yeast does its magic to give the beer its alcohol content and carbonation. Now, ales are fermented with top fermenting yeast at warm temperatures somewhere between 60 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit, whereas lagers are fermented with bottom fermenting yeast at colder temperatures between 35 and 50 degrees Fahrenheit. Because of their warm fermentations, ales can generally ferment and age in a relatively short period of time, three to five weeks. Lagers can take longer, up to six to eight weeks. The difference in temperatures and time means the quicker fermentation in ales, including stouts, Hefeweizens, pale ales, and IPAs, creates a fruitier, spicier flavor that's crisp and refreshing. At Total Wine and More, we have over 1100 ales, so you can explore all you want. Lagers, including Hellas Pilsners, have a smoother, richer, more mellow and robust flavor than ales thanks to their longer fermentation time. We can thank the Bavarian brewers from the Middle Ages for discovering the benefits of longer fermentation after storing their brews in ice caves during the winter. In fact, lager in German means to store, which adds up since lager beer was brewed, covered and stored with ice harvested from nearby lakes. At Total Wine and More, we have an ice cave of our own filled with a huge selection of ales and lagers from around the world. Just remember, the next time you enjoy one, give a little cheers to fermentation.
- [43:32]
A
Thanks to our friends at Total Wine and More for today's a spirited debate. Hey, let's spend a few minutes on Iran, which forced its way back into the news this week as the US Made an abortive attempt to escort ships through the strait. Iran launched a number of small scale attacks. In the meantime, both sides say the ceasefire is still in place, talks are ongoing. Mara, I want to stick with you because you've had a really close eye on the diplomacy here. Where do these talks stand and is there any tangible hope of progress?
- [44:09]
C
I think they're very preliminary. The problem is it's like Groundhog Day. Every day, Trump comes out to say, we won, everything's going great, they wanna make a deal. They really, really wanna make a deal really badly. And then nothing happens. The war is over. Technically, he's told Congress the war is over.
- [44:26]
A
What about that?
- [44:27]
C
Yeah, the war is over. Well, he wants to reset the clock on the War Powers act because it's. The deadline is up, I think already we've passed it. Yeah, 60 days. And also you've got the rest of the world saying out loud that he's making it up as he goes along. I mean, that's why he was so infuriated at Frederick Mertz where he said the US has no strategy. Well, it's hard to see one.
- [44:48]
D
Yeah, there is no strategy.
- [44:50]
A
Yeah. Actually, let me ask you guys, I mean, what the hell is he even trying to say? Is it just like a Humpty Dumpty formulation to get around the War Powers Resolution or make the American people stop paying attention? What the hell? The war is over. How can you say that? And also in the other side of his mouth say if they don't come to the table soon, it's going to be really bad for them. Typical Trump saber rattling.
- [45:16]
D
And they've got the leaked intelligence report too, that the bulk of their arsenal is somewhat intact and they can last a few months.
- [45:23]
A
And ours has been beat up pretty bad.
- [45:25]
D
Yeah, yeah. I mean, three people count in this fight. This is the one, I think, hopeful part. Trump, the Ayatollah and President Xi, and they all want the Straits open because they all have incentives for that. You know, all Xi's got to do is do some maneuvers near Taiwan and the Pentagon will fling into a complete panic because we're in this ridiculous stalemate there. So Trump tries to create his own reality field. It's part of his crazy. It's over. I mean, tell the eight French soldiers who just got burned because an Iranian missile hit their tanker that it's a ceasefire and the. The war is over. So a friend asked me, what's the best advice to Trump. I said, tell him to read a biography of Alexander the Great. He has never taken these Guys, seriously. And every intern in the Pentagon knew closed the straits for 40 years. That's their real deterrent. So I think Trump's doing what is going to have to do what he is doing, which is a slow motion surrender and withdrawal.
- [46:19]
B
The bottom line is this. Trump, when he went into this believed it was going to be Venezuela part two. And this is not, this is not speculation. I mean, he keeps bringing it up, right? And Venezuela for him was this tremendous success where you do a, you know, you, you snatch out the president, you get a compliant subordinate in and you call it a win. And yeah, Venezuela has been more compliant since then. Venezuela is not Iran. And anyone who tried to sell him on the idea that Venezuela is Iran was either ignorant or operating in bad faith. Iran is a twelver Shia regime that has is full of apocalyptic jihadists. These are people who are willing to die for their beliefs and also willing to see a whole lot of other people die for their beliefs. And so their point of pain, where they will yield is extreme. Their pain point where they would quote, unquote, surrender to us. It might be so extreme that they would never actually quote, surrender to us. You know, we never, we would have individual Al Qaeda fighters surrender when I was in Iraq, but Al Qaeda never surrendered to us, no matter how much we pummeled them. And so, so you have a point of pain where the Iranian regime is willing to put its people through a nightmare. Well, in America, he didn't even bother to get popular support for this. He didn't bother to get congressional support. So America's point of pain on this is we don't want any. Like the American people, they don't want to pay higher prices. They definitely do not want to see casualties. They don't want to see budget busting deficits. They don't want to see this. And so on the one hand, he's trying to turn to America and say, oh, it's all fine, everything's fine. But on the other hand, he's turning to Iran and saying, I shall rain fire and fury upon you, forgetting that both sides can see the rhetoric that's happening in all directions. So the Iranians are looking at this and going, he obviously wants this over. It's so obvious. And so that that means that every threat he gives Iran, Iran takes with a grain of salt because they can watch our domestic messaging. This is no way to run a war. I mean, the fruit of the poisonous tree here, when he failed to go to Congress, that wasn't just a matter of complying with constitutional Technicalities. That system exists for a reason, for a reason. The American people should not go to war unless the American people support the war. I mean, this is like axiomatic for a democratic republic. And he chose to circumvent that process. So he starts an illegal war, and when he starts that illegal war, he starts in such a way that he can't finish it because he didn't go through the constitutional process. And here we are.
- [49:06]
A
You know, I spoke with Biden's national security adviser, Jake Sullivan on the show last month, and he said the Iranians, in his negotiating experience, care more about pride than substance. I totally agree with David's point that so many Americans seem to think, oh, no, they're just talking like that when they say they're ready to die or whatever. But Solomon made this trenchant point. I thought that Trump is the same way, more about pride than substance, which makes it a very poor match. Do you think that Trump just personality wise is incapable of making a meaningful piece even under his terms of getting something small and calling it a victory?
- [49:50]
C
I think at this point the answer is yes. I mean, he's put himself in a box. It's such a personalist administration. He gets advice, he's told that the Strait of Hormuz might clothes and he ignores it. So, yeah, I think it's very hard. Diplomatic negotiations are about. Both sides get to save face in some way, and there doesn't seem to be any path for that. Although if you're someone who believes that you're going to go to paradise if you die, I don't know what face saving gesture you you would need. But yeah, I think it's very hard. I mean, I think he wants to get out, but he doesn't want to be humiliated. And now he has people telling him that he's being humiliated, like the Chancellor of Germany. That's why he was so infuriated at Frederick Mertz, because Mertz said that he was being humiliated.
- [50:35]
A
David and Mike, as just a matter of personality, do we have the wrong person in the White House to land this plane at all?
- [50:43]
D
Yes, we have the wrong person to land it. But he has a ferret like ability to survive in the clutch, so he will retreat. What I worry about is okay on the Greenland or some distraction.
- [50:54]
B
I mean, the plane will land in some way, so the plane is going to land. But I would say this is the worst war leader I've ever experienced as a citizen of the United States. And I've sadly been through multiple conflicts both as a citizen and then also participating when I was deployed to Iraq. And he's by far the worst. And one thing that I wish more people understood, and I keep getting this from friends and people I respect. Well, you know, there are policies that Trump has that I prefer over some of the policies that the Democrats have. But I would say to that it also really matters who executes the policy. So let's say you're an Iran hawk and you're thinking, well, I voted for Trump because I knew that he had a specific anger and animus for Iran. And I talked to people like that. They didn't believe his rhetoric when he said, no war with Iran. They actually voted for him because they thought, oh, he, he'd be more likely to bomb Iran than, say, a Kamala Harris. And so they like that he's taking on Iran. They like the policy of going to war with Iran, but then he's botching it massively, massively. So when you're talking about a policy, you always have to ask more than one question. It's not just what is the policy. It is always you have to ask who is executing it. So, like, imagine if you have D Day. Well, we had to have D Day. You have to invade Europe to get rid of Hitler. And then you present the plan and you say, I'm all in favor of invading Europe to get rid of Hitler. Who are you putting in charge? Well, may I present to you General Bozo the Clown? Well, you would immediately say, whoa, hold on. Like, I'm all in favor of invading Europe, but if you do it with this dude, we are failing. It's going to be horrible. It won't work, et cetera. And this is what he's done on issue after issue over the course of his time in office. I mean, ask honest pro lifers, even with Roe overturned, are they really actually feeling like that he's been an effective leader of a pro life party? No, not in a million years. And so you're looking at a situation where even policies you favor, his incompetence and his corruption, he's going to taint them. He's going to destroy them. He will discredit them. This is for the countless one millionth time why character and competence matter in leadership.
- [53:25]
A
I just say. Excellent point. And there's another corollary here, which is the debacle is not just about the war in Iran, as so many people pointed out. Jake Sullivan in this discussion, also, I had a really good one with Bob Kagan. The worldwide consequences in this very war of his overall fecklessness and caprice and ego arguably have remade the world order to the United States detriment, but in any event extend far beyond. Okay, we're out of time. It's been a great discussion and thank you to everybody. Just have a minute left for five Words or fewer. Our final feature, there's new reporting from the Atlantic revealing that Kash Patel has been handing out personalized bottles of Kentucky bourbon with his name on them and his official title. So our five words are for your question. Who else in the administration is next to give out custom swag and what is it? And the judges have ruled that the name of the person doesn't count towards your five words. Anyone?
- [54:32]
C
My Cabinet official is Kristi Noem, and she's handing out her face on Mount Rushmore snow globes.
- [54:42]
A
Very good.
- [54:43]
D
In the spirit of General Bozo the Clown, I would say Defense Secretary Hegseth Jumbo. Professional level beer bong.
- [54:57]
B
I'm going to include the name in the five words. A T shirt that Marco Rubio distributes called Every job belongs to Marco.
- [55:06]
A
All right, and I'm going with I just. I just really zeroed in on RFK Jr here. And so I'm going with Science is not settled. Towels. Thank you so much, David, Mara and Mike. And thank you very much, listeners for tuning in to Talking Feds. If you like what you've heard, please tell a friend to subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts or wherever they get their podcasts. And please take a moment to rate and review the show. Check us out on substack@harrylittman.substack.com where I'll be posting two or three bulletins a week breaking down the various threats to constitutional norms and the rule of law. Paid Substack subscribers can now get Talking Feds episodes completely ad free. You can also subscribe to us on YouTube, where we are posting full episodes and my daily takes on top legal stories. Talking Feds has joined forces with the Contrarian. I'm a founding contributor to this bold new media venture, committed to reviving the diversity of opinion that feels increasingly rare in today's news landscape, where legacy media seems to be tacking toward Trump for business reasons rather than editorial ones. Find out more@contrarian.substack.com thanks for tuning in. And don't worry, as long as you need answers, the Feds will keep talking. Talking Feds is produced by Luke Cregan and Katie Upshaw, associate producer Becca Haveian sound Engineering by Matt McArdle, Rosie Dawn Griffin, David Lieberman, Hamsam Hadranathan. Emma Maynard and Hallie Necker are our contributing writers and production assistants by Akshaj Turbailu. Our music, as ever, is by the Amazing Philip Glass. Talking Feds is a production of Deledo llc. I'm Harry Littman. Talk to you later.
- [57:32]
B
Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile with a message for everyone Paying big wireless way too much. Please, for the love of everything good in this world, stop with Mint. You can get premium wireless for just $15 a month. Of course, if you enjoy overpaying. No judgments. But that's weird. Okay, one judgment anyway. Give it a try. @mintmobile.com Switch upfront payment of $45 for 3 month plan equivalent to $15 per month required intro rate first 3 months only, then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra. See full terms at mintmobile. Com.