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- [00:00]
Mike Murphy
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- [01:11]
Tim Miller
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Mike Murphy
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- [01:43]
Tim Miller
Hello and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host Tim Miller. Delighted to welcome back to the show veteran political strategist. His campaigns include McCain, Romney, Schwarzenegger and Jeb. He's the co host of Hacks on Tap, co director of the center for the Political Future at usc. He also runs the American EV Jobs Alliance. We're in California, so I'm bringing in Mike Murphy. What's up Murph?
- [02:03]
Mike Murphy
Hey, good to be here Tim.
- [02:05]
Tim Miller
At last night's live show we brought out a bunch of, you know, lib content creators and commentators. Your Jon Favreau's, your Jane Costons, your Van Lathans, your Brian Tyler Cohen's.
- [02:17]
Mike Murphy
It's like a swarm here in la. You can't avoid them.
- [02:20]
Tim Miller
They're everywhere. Honestly, you know, people need Kind of like some raid to keep them away. But I subjected them to a never Trumper trivia which had like deep cuts, questions about Mitt Romney, who did Dick Cheney shoot, you know, all that kind of material. And you would have, you would have dominated. They were, it was an embarrassing performance by them last night.
- [02:40]
Mike Murphy
So, yeah, we need to start up a school to properly educate the youngins here.
- [02:44]
Tim Miller
We do, we do. All right. We've got much to get to. Part of the reason I wanted to have you were here in California. There's a lot of California politics, so we'll get to that.
- [02:52]
Mike Murphy
Sure.
- [02:53]
Tim Miller
But first I, we have some good news. So I'd like to start with some good news. Modest good news. You know, we take it where we can get it. We're seeing some Republican Hill pushback over the fund and over a couple of different things. And the reconciliation bill has been derailed. Everybody from, you know, the retiring Thom Tillis over to Tommy Tuberville, they aren't thrilled. Todd Blanche went over to the Senate to try to win people over, to try to bribe them, saying, hey, even some of you senators might be able to get some money from this fund. And it doesn't seem like it taking. And that's, that's meaningful, I think. What about you?
- [03:30]
Mike Murphy
No, I agree. I mean it, it's kind of an interesting mixture. On one hand, this, this bill, hey, let, let's have a Copa salt payola fund is so odious and horrible that even the Gumby like flexibility of the modern Republican elected federal official is like more bending than even they can do. But Trump's also got what I call the Rotary revolt going on, which is the Senate is a combination of Rotary Club and nursing home. And they're, they're, you know, they're, they're their own thing and they like Cornyn. And what they liked even more was having some hope they can hang on to majority, which by rights and by the nature of the states that are up this year, they should be able to. But this Democratic kill Trump wave, which is now a national Democrats and independents and even some Republicans punish Trump wave, is threatening the Senate. And so the one they felt pretty good about, Texas Trump, pops up and endorses the biggest loser in the history of Republican Party, this corrupt Paxton guy killing their friend Cornyn. So there's just good old institutional personal rage going on and they're looking for ways to punish him and this odious Paola thing and the blimp hanger too, that's wobbling. And then he's Got the revenge caucus, which are people he screwed with who lost primaries or could have lost primaries. You know, obviously Cassidy in Louisiana, you got Tillis, and then you've got Susan Collins, who's trying to figure out the tango to survive. So all of a sudden, his grip in the Senate's a lot weaker and they're acting up, God bless him. A little late, but I'll take it.
- [05:15]
Tim Miller
You know, it's like a nursing room cafeteria vibe. You know, I always say life is all high school cafeteria, and nursing room cafeteria is not that different from high school cafeteria. So I understood from my Mimi. And that's what you got happening here. Like they're annoyed.
- [05:28]
Mike Murphy
You know, he shot Blinky. You know, we're fist.
- [05:32]
Tim Miller
You can't sit with us. Yeah, there is a little bit of that right now post Cornyn and I do think it's funny, like the retribution campaign. We don't want to overstate all this, but it is backfiring somewhat. They were all bragging his staff, talking about, don't mess with Trump. He's the greatest political winner ever. And yeah, it's true. Bill Cassidy lost and they managed to squeak out at not overwhelming victory against Thomas Massie. He got 45% in Kentucky. And so that was true. And Cornyn, they pulled the rug out from under him. But like, to what end?
- [06:10]
Mike Murphy
Well, yeah, there's also, you know, there's. There's been kind of a courage Ray has hit him because filing deadlines are passing quickly. So, like, you take. And he's one of my favorites. And I'm a donor. Brian Fitzpatrick in the Philly suburbs who's a great member of Congress. He.
- [06:26]
Tim Miller
I don't know about great, but okay, we can agree to disagree.
- [06:29]
Mike Murphy
We're going to grade that a passable member of Congress due to the current realities. I hear you. But anyway, so Fitzpatrick, you know, Pennsylvania primary is over, so they have more maneuvering room to go screw with Trump. So the sands are shifting. And the other thing is that one
- [06:46]
Tim Miller
on Fitzpatrick worth noting. Trump went after his wife, who's a Fox News reporter the other day and was doing his sexist. You know, I'm just going to really shit talk the woman reporter and the gaggle thing. And so again to the nursing room cafeteria thing. I mean, he's younger, but there is like a little bit of that. Like he's mismanaging people that he needs with these zero majorities.
- [07:05]
Mike Murphy
Right. And if you in an election, you ask the senators, what's the president's job, it's to help Us get reelected and hold the majority. And Trump is doing the opposite. I mean, this corny thing really was, you know, nutty old man shoots and basically gives the Democrats a good shot at what could be the tipping point race for control of the Senate. And they're just flabbergasted and infuriated by that. But, you know, you get into business with a crazy guy. The other thing about Trump, you know, I was reading today on the Wire somewhere that this how you can tell I'm a Jurassic consultant. Better check the wire, you know, but I was.
- [07:44]
Tim Miller
You got the wire, I got your ticker here.
- [07:48]
Mike Murphy
It's funny because I'm a nerd. I built my first computer with a soldering iron with a kit Bill Gates sold me. So. But anyway, not to go askew on that. The. There's all this talk about Trump's birthday. You know, he's going to turn 80. He's already 80. The birthday is the last day of that year. You know, like you're a one year old, means you've been one for a year. He's been 80 for a year. We're going into 81 now, the beginning of 81. And the crazy old man stuff is really out there and becoming a thing.
- [08:20]
Tim Miller
Yeah. The last element to this kind of, this sort of swirling number of incentives that are starting to move away from him in addition to his own behavior in the cafeteria vibes and in addition to the filing deadlines passing, is the approval rating. You know, Sarah has, has coined the Bush line. I hate it because it's a little gross and it's mean to the Bushes. But okay, whatever it is, what it is, bush left at 32%. And it's one of those things, like eventually you hit a line where the number starts to get so low that the incentives for these Republicans start to change a little bit. Like it's not going to happen overnight. But where they also have gone from this thing where it's like, I can't buck him. I can't buck him because it's too, you know, the bases with him too much all of a sudden. You know, if you look at him at 34, you look at Massey only getting 55 against him, you start to think it's a. It goes from like, oh, I'm running against, you know, Bashar Assad to I can maybe get some distance from this and not worried that I'm going to get taken out back.
- [09:24]
Mike Murphy
Yeah, no, no, you start calculating, you know, the staff comes in, hey, boss, you know, we're in reelection Here. And next week, Trump's gonna be down at the Omnidome, you know, doing a cage fighting tractor pole thing dedicated to, you know, him, you know, and the senators will go from, well, you gotta get me there when he arrives. I want the picture now. It's like, I think I'm gonna have a dental emergency that night. Maybe go hit a suburban PTA unannounced and show up in care.
- [09:52]
Tim Miller
Because kind of like how Trump said about his own son's wedd yesterday at a Frescoes, he's asked if he's going to be attending Don Junior's second wedding. He's like, oh, you know, we got this thing in Iran going on and I don't know, I trust my suit.
- [10:04]
Mike Murphy
The thought bubble was won't last, not worth it. But yeah, so it look, they smell the trouble coming. It's not hard. They've been looking at lousy polls, even people in safe seats for a year that have just gotten worse. And Trump's gotten more erratic. So they're just kind of buckling down for heavy weather and trying to figure out how to survive. And hanging out with him is not as good of a survival strategy. You know, Whit Ayers, great poster. I think a lot of people ask it now. I believe he was the first. Apologies if I get this wrong, but would ask people on the ID question on a poll, you know, you were Republican, self reported. And then he'd have a follow up. Are you more of a Trump Republican or more of a party Republican? And that number moves when Trump is screwing up. He goes under 50 on the number of Republicans who say they're Trump Republican. When he's doing well, it'll push up close to 70. And after he lost to Biden, it was down, I think in the 40s. So, you know, the glue is stretchy there. And we're heading the other way on that scale. And I'm sure I haven't seen one lately in a key Senate state, but I'm sure it's declining.
- [11:18]
Tim Miller
One last factor as part of all this, I want to mention there's going to be a good deal of talk about Democratic dysfunction at the end of this podcast. So no questions about that. There are certainly, let's say, some leadership issues on the Democratic side, which we'll get into. That said, you just have to say it. The DHS shutdown fight worked like the second shutdown fight that the Democrats spurred. And the notion that we're going to separate out ICE and CBP from the rest of the funding bill, there was A lot of criticism about that on the left. People criticized it. It wasn't aggressive enough or they folded too quickly. There's all the nattering nabobs on the left complaining about everything Schumer and Jeffries do. And guess what? It worked.
- [12:11]
Mike Murphy
The Schumer, Jeffries plan worked and it
- [12:13]
Tim Miller
was always going to work. They have this leverage right now to block the funding for the ballroom and for this slush fund. The only reason they have leverage is because Trump needs something from them, which is funding for ICE and cbp.
- [12:27]
Mike Murphy
They finally found out that when there's a pain fest in Washington, ultimately it goes to the incumbent president's party because they're perceived as being in charge. So the pain does. It takes a zigzaggy route, but it'll get there. And they did. You know, the idea of federal employees missing a paycheck was so horrifying to them because the party is kind of a creature of public employee unions. They just couldn't get there. But they finally did. And you're totally right, it worked. That's the other thing about when you said before about his numbers going down. There's, there's kind of a Velcro effect. When you start getting down to the 40%, let alone 30s in approval, then everything's your fault. Because, you know, people are already sold that you're a screw up. Two thirds of the country thinks you're not good at your job, then, hey, you know, we had five days of thunderstorms that damn Trump. You know, it just becomes easier for all the bad to stick to you. And that's where he is now. So they can do stuff like that. And, and it is gonna resonate as long as they keep some kind of offensive message. This is what they're not good at. You know, you know this. You're a communicator and you, you've had a career in the communication side of politics. They just, they overthink. They still are incredibly attuned, the leadership of the party to their interest groups. You know, they just, they're, they're not good at pounding the nail proverbially. Maybe they're learning and they don't have to be good to win. You know, they can suck and still be Trump because the election is not a two way election. It's a punish the guy who screwed up the economy election. Yeah.
- [14:02]
Tim Miller
And Trump continues to help them. So just two items on the weaponization fund. Here he is. This morning. I gave up a lot of money in allowing the anti weaponization fund to go Forward, I could have settled my case. The illegal release of the tax returns and the breaking of Mar A Lago for an absolute fortune. Instead, I'm helping others who are badly abused by the Biden administration. So he's not backing down at all. And then there's the stock trade story which came out my colleague Joe Perdicombe shout out to him for doing the math on this. The total value of Trump's transactions in the first three months of this year, 750 million, is higher than the value of all trades by all 535 members of the House and Senate combined for the last few years. I'm like, that is the scale of this. And so, I mean, on the one hand there's just the corruption outrage on the merits. On the other hand, he's handing these guys the bat to hit them with.
- [14:53]
Mike Murphy
It's incredibly gross, the stock trading thing, it just shows that the one thing the founding fathers, well, foreign invasion kings, you know, we're getting in front of everything. We're design a system. They presumed honor and shame and now we have this circus freak with no honor and no shame running wild. You know, the funny thing about Trump and money is until he started using the presidency as a grifting and stealing tool for the family, which is, you know, unprecedented. I long for the days of Don Nixon and the Nixon burger being a scandal. He would have been wealthier had he taken the inheritance because he made his money the old fashioned way. He inherited it from Fred, his dad, and if he put it into an index fund, it had nothing to do with it. He would have been richer. You know, he bungled his casino companies. This one business failure after another. Just some luck and real estate appreciation. But until he became a federal pirate, he would have done better with an index fund and him having nothing to do with it. So I'd love to see the trades in terms of how they work out. My guess is, you know, they are not adroit. In fact, he seems like a serial trader, which is a good way to lose money in the market, but to your point, it's massively corrupt. Unprecedented though. I'm, I'm hoping for the future. We have a reformation, not a repeat. In terms of he set a new low ethical standard and we're going to have more people imitating him in politics, man.
- [16:24]
Tim Miller
We have a Nixon's younger brother and Spiro agnew reference already 15 minutes in and we're really putting people in the grave. Yeah, and I do think in the specifics of the Trump trades some of them. It is kind of funny. One of the ones I laughed at is it seemed like he was trying to invest in some AI company that was from Japan, but he accidentally invested in a business that is one of those sushi restaurant chains where the sushi goes around on a boat. So that one made me laugh. But also some of the ones are just blatantly corrupt, like investing in intel before announcing.
- [16:57]
Mike Murphy
And he's trying to give himself in this tax deal all kinds of get out of jail free cards for past behavior, making it impossible to audit him and everything. I mean Al Capone would say, oh, too gross. Come on, pull it back a little. This is embarrassing.
- [17:15]
Tim Miller
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- [18:43]
Mike Murphy
we're
- [18:43]
Tim Miller
going to go back a little further than the Nixon era for this next story.
- [18:47]
Mike Murphy
Good.
- [18:48]
Tim Miller
I hope you almost it's one of those things where you never have to hand it to the Trump administration, but you almost have to hand it to them. And maybe this will inspire some creativity on the left in the future when you look at the ways in which they're doing some of this shit with the arch. You see this story? Administration officials cited a 1924 report by a federal commission charged with designing the Arlington Memorial Bridge. The report called for building a pair of 166 foot tall columns surrounded by statues. I don't know. This is AI. Or if they have like one autistic guy in the bowels of the White House or whatever that is doing this shit. But you know, obviously again, it's another one of those things that it's. That it's corrupt, but it's corrupt creativity. Amanda called it yesterday. Authoritarian entrepreneurship. And there is a little bit of that happening.
- [19:34]
Mike Murphy
Yeah, I'm sure they, they brought in some, you know, awkward genius from the basement and said, find me justifications. So somebody probably wondered why they busted their ass at, you know, Notre Dame Law or whatever, spent a year looking because they know the boss wants to build crazy shit. So find the crazy shit justification. So, yeah, it's creative. I hope these people look in the mirror once in a while and say, wow, I'm using my legal intellect in the service of a madman to put a scar and a blimp hanger on the. On the White House grounds.
- [20:09]
Tim Miller
But, yeah, where are you at on Democrat wins in 2029 and what to do with the ballroom and the arch if they get built by then, or let's. Or even if they're half built, you know, what's. How do you.
- [20:19]
Mike Murphy
I'm Mr. Bulldozer. If I were. If I were running a candidate in the Democratic primaries, part of my shtick would be, you know, and donate to the campaign 50 bucks. We're going to hold a drawing. I'm going to pick 100 people day after my inauguration. We're going to walk over there with golden sledgehammers and begin to take that blight of gross corruption off the sacred grounds of the White House, the people's House. That's got to go.
- [20:46]
Tim Miller
I don't.
- [20:47]
Mike Murphy
Yeah, yeah, no, no, I'd make it a thing. Like, Pat Buchanan had a great old stump closer in the primaries. 92 and 95 in his speech. I was at Iowa event and this kind of big outdoor shed and the thunder was so loud from the crowd, I started to worry that the roof was coming down like a couple of bolts fell. And the big line was first he went after the Chinese. I'll tell that Chinese President, Mr. Pal Sh. Ping, that if he doesn't stop the forced abortion of a thousand babies a day in China, he has sold his last pair of cheap chopsticks in the shopp malls of America. And then I will put my hand on the Bible of King James, take the sacred oath of office at an inauguration day, if you honor me with this office and at that point as president, United States, I will turn to William Jefferson Clinton and say, you, sir, are under arrest. You know, the place would explode. Pat missed a great career in pro wrestling.
- [21:46]
Tim Miller
He had, he was ahead on the locker up.
- [21:50]
Mike Murphy
The other great line was I saw him in New Hampshire, gun control. Balderdash. I, I'm against controlling any gun. You do not need a trailer hitch to move. So. But the point being, I would have a line like that on getting rid of this monstrosity. You don't get.
- [22:07]
Tim Miller
Why not just use the same exact line about arresting Trump?
- [22:10]
Mike Murphy
Yeah, that's maybe.
- [22:11]
Tim Miller
Are you listening? Are you listening, Jon Ossoff West Gavin,
- [22:17]
Mike Murphy
but no, that, that thing has got to go. I would sell sledgehammers on the campaign, make it a thing.
- [22:24]
Tim Miller
That's interesting. I guess I should have predicted that you would go that route, but I don't know, sometimes you can be a squish at heart. You're a little bit of a squish.
- [22:32]
Mike Murphy
I am a right wing nut, my friend. You have no idea. So, yeah, no, I'd be hard. That thing is a symbol and it's got now if they really have a half billion dollar underground bowling alley and tanning bed factory and wherever the hell else Trump, you know, padded the budget with. Yeah, you can keep the basement, but the building's gotta go.
- [22:53]
Tim Miller
Yeah, okay, that's good. I don't know.
- [22:55]
Mike Murphy
And the Kennedy School center thing too. You gotta chip that off.
- [22:59]
Tim Miller
Of course you chip that off. Yeah. I don't know, part of me on the ballroom, you just wonder if.
- [23:02]
Mike Murphy
Yeah, where are you on that?
- [23:04]
Tim Miller
I, I, you, you just gave a really compelling pitch and I'm kind of vacillating back and forth. Maybe I was projecting since I'm the inner squish. Part of me is just like, I think you just name it the Liz Cheney and George Floyd Memorial Ballroom and like, you know, put their faces on there and, or, you know, whoever's going to annoy him the most bulldoze it.
- [23:22]
Mike Murphy
I'm like Clemensel, bury me standing up, facing Germany. I have absolutely no flex on the boardroom.
- [23:29]
Tim Miller
I do think that, you know, going back and rewatching some Pat Buchanan speeches. Yeah. Might do some of the Democrats some good going ahead to 2028.
- [23:40]
Mike Murphy
I mean, you know, in the Republican party we're brought up with one rule. When it's a confusing situation, grab the sharpest object and attack.
- [23:47]
Tim Miller
Yeah, right.
- [23:48]
Mike Murphy
They call the shrink clutch. The pearls hold a focus group, bring in the interest groups, decide the staff isn't DEI enough, and flip everybody around. I mean, that's why they're so easy to beat. Every time we get in the corner in the old days, we drag them into a culture war and they just scamper right into the mousetrap.
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- [26:01]
Tim Miller
Well, speaking of committees and waffling and being concerned, you've transitioned us nicely into the DNC Autopsy, which was I guess released yesterday. Kind of. It was essentially released as like if you know for anybody who's worked on a big project with multiple people, you know, you have a Google Doc that you've started and then maybe you have a couple of editors in there or collaborators and they're like writing comments and like that and they just kind of released the document like that. Like they hadn't even written a conclusion yet. But Ken Martin had been so bullied by people into like what really happened with this thing. He lied about what happened and then waffled and then tried to say, well, we shouldn't put it, we're not going to put it out because it's hurting us. And then the truth is that they put this thing out and it looked like it was put together by either a seventh grader who had never worked on a campaign or an 86 year old whose last campaign was the 88 Dukakis race.
- [27:01]
Mike Murphy
Yeah, look, the Dems are so hapless. The autopsy now needs an autopsy. I mean it was such a perfect example now how these things really work. And you remember the Republican one is
- [27:13]
Tim Miller
at the beginning I was one of the authors that was making the comments in the notes and I was at the conference.
- [27:19]
Mike Murphy
The thing had two purposes. One, try to have a fact based idea of the weaknesses for the political folks to chew over and spark a debate. And second, throw something out to the finance crowd that we're now a bunch of idiots here. We recognize our shortcomings, keep giving us money and you know, these guys seem to be like, well, let's just throw a lot of shit on the wall and maybe magic will appear. And I put a lot of it not only on Martin, but the way the DNC election works, they had opportunities to go find somebody like I think Rahm Emanuel would have been a terrific DNC chair because they'd all be carrying sharp sticks and heading in one direction. Instead it was a club of state party chairman. And when you're doing a big statewide campaign, you're hoping you have a decent state chairman, not an idiot. And that decent state chairman hope you're lucky if a third of the time it comes true. Often it's like the model railroad club. It just happens to be politics and they're fighting over who got the head table and whether or not my friend's banquet got to hold the volunteer of the year dinner and all this horseshit that's actually a distraction. So it's an illusion that they're all these cigar chomping pros, you know. And I've seen part the Michigan State Party used to be Patton's Third army now, now you put a tent over it and call it a circus. You could charge admission. You know, Florida is nothing like what it used to be. So the constituency and both sides, but with the White House, you can order them around on the Democrat side in the wilderness. They elect one of their own chuckleheads who's best at giving out rhinestone donkeys to you know, 80 year old committee women. And so they, they get somebody who has a political job but limited political skills outside the micropolitics of, of Democrat inside. We have to have a left handed people caucus at least 40, you know, all the crazy they do. So it's no surprise that they've got this train wreck internally and there's no discipline to it.
- [29:20]
Tim Miller
Obviously it's one of those like not funny, ha ha funny, sad situations but like the funny part about it is the discourse around the dnc, like you said, all the cigar chomping or you know, to update it. It's all, you know, these machinations happening behind the scenes with the corporate elite that own the party, et cetera. And the theory of the case that you were seeing online or one of the things that was out there about why the autopsy didn't get released was that you know, it revealed that Kamala Harris position on Gaza really harmed her and like this and there was an Axios story about this where people said that they blocked the release because you know, the powers that be don't want you to know that it was her position on Gaza that cost her the campaign.
- [30:01]
Mike Murphy
Great way to have everybody know it's secret banned in Boston. Don't read it.
- [30:06]
Tim Miller
Yeah, and then it comes out and it's like Gaza isn't even mentioned in the thing. Biden's age isn't mentioned in it. Like all of the obvious things aren't mentioned. And so what is a better encapsulation, cancellation of like all the discourse around the DNC is that everybody on the Internet, you know, thinks that they're scheming to hurt their candidate of choice at like when the reality is that they're eating the crayons and like that this was true. This has been true for like 10 years now.
- [30:31]
Mike Murphy
It's one of my favorite rules of politics that every side has a conspiracy. You know, it's like when Trump sat down with Romney after the election and Romney is writing crazy in the gravy with the fork, listening to him go on about it. You know how it works, they stole New Hampshire because they brought up the hordes from Massachusetts. You know, labor has this big army of 7,000 guerrillas, they can deploy anywhere. And, you know, the Republicans, all paranoid about that. And then over on the labor side, they're like, oh, the Koch brothers, you know, we got eight drunks here. We don't have anybody for door to door. It's all a myth. But they've got the secret republic in our. Everybody thinks these places are massively competent with. With ruthless armies. And most of the time, they're just stumbling along in the state party world.
- [31:21]
Tim Miller
What do you think? I mean, the DNC doesn't really matter that much, and it matters somewhat on the fundraising side, and that's where Ken Martin is really failing. And so those guys over there at the committee are circling the wagons today, and I feel kind of bad for the press flunkies that are calling all my friends in the media and just trying to spin them nonsense. So it's kind of like how I got refrigerator magnets.
- [31:44]
Mike Murphy
We're gonna. They're coming.
- [31:46]
Bowen Yang
Yeah.
- [31:46]
Tim Miller
I just remember one of the Biden guys calling me. I remember distinctly being at the Atlanta airport after that first debate and having one of the guys call me and being like, you're being a little harsh on Twitter. And I was like, you hang up the phone right now. I've been one of you, okay? I know. I. You know, I've. I've spun diarrhea into a. Into a chocolate cake before, and it's not gonna work with me, but they're. They were all doing that yesterday at the dnc, and part of me is like. Like, they should just have a clean break, right? Like, just move on. Just find some. Bring somebody in that can raise money and can go on TV and talk about how Donald Trump is a thief and call it good.
- [32:20]
Mike Murphy
Right? No, they need some gorillas. The problem is there aren't many left in that party because the internal incentives, you know, the other thing, and this is a delicate topic, but the DEI stuff is so strong internally. I know really good Democratic consultants who've been out there, and most of them are telling me, hey, I'm 58, white male, I'm done. You know, they tell me to shut the up in every meeting. So this is my last cycle, because it's just. It's a different world now. I mean, the D Trip chairman was bragging about they. They don't have enough firms where they. They pick them based on their gene code, not their win loss record. And, you know, it's admirable to have aspirations like that. I don't want to sound like Cotton Mather but you know what? We're in the politics business about winning. And that doesn't seem to be top of the list internally there. And frankly over the Republican side, it's all corruption. If you sucked Trump enough. So, you know, I'm not saying there's a great example there. I know more self hating Republican consultants. I'll bet you do too. They're like, I got a mortgage, so I'm going to be a fascist for 10 years.
- [33:25]
Tim Miller
They don't call me anymore because I make them feel too bad. Actually I had a lot of those for a while, but now my list
- [33:31]
Mike Murphy
is dwindling, I'll tell you.
- [33:32]
Tim Miller
Yeah, I make them feel too guilty about their summer vacation when they call me. So I don't get. The phone isn't ringing as much anymore. But there's an interesting thing happening actually in the Democratic side now that you mentioned this. It's happening a little bit underneath the surface. It's strange. It's like the establishment, and I'm saying this not really in an ideological sense, but just like the people that run the committees that are in Washington, the kind of regular Democratic functionaries are really still kind of caught up in a lot of this, the woke stuff that you're talking about. And you're seeing these two factions on different sides. You have kind of the Platner populist crowd and then you have this kind of, you know, they're calling themselves like majority Dems or the bench. It's like the Talarico campaign is on there. They have a bunch of House candidates. You can search the bench for their candidates. And they're a little bit more ideologically diverse, but they tend to be more in the middle. And they're both like running these primaries. Michigan is a good example of this. Right? It's like Mallory McMorrow is kind of the bench candidate. Abdul Al Said is a little bit more of the Platner style candidate. And then Haley Stevens is, is, you know, the, the establishment candidate. And it's like the establishment candidates are the ones that are still kind of doing the identity politics stuff. You know, it's, it isn't. You're seeing a little bit of a change, I guess from the, from internally where, where there. It's like a group of lefties that want to win very badly. And then there's kind of some fighting mods like want to win badly that are changing the culture a little bit. It's just happening. It's just not happening at the dnc, you know what I mean? And it wasn't happening at the Harris campaign.
- [35:09]
Mike Murphy
Yeah, well, they'll be the last to know, particularly the D trip, because they reflect a Democratic caucus that, you know, goes back to the 70s. And because it's been reduced to some extent, it's going to grow now. It's got a lot of people kind of frozen in time from very safe districts. But. Yeah, no, no, the splinters are starting. It's generational, too. You know, when I was a active political consultant, because I really don't do races anymore. I dabble once in a while in independent expenditure or, of course, referendum campaigns all. But I was very careful about hiring anybody out of D.C. because you would just get NRCC conventional wisdom and there are great people there. But I'd always want to find a sharp kid out of a state capitol where there's a real fight, just because often they didn't have kind of the beltway mentality of which faction I belong to and which firm do I want to wind up at? And I think both parties have plenty of that now. In fact, it's worse. The primaries do sort stuff out. Like Michigan will be a good example. We'll see who actually wins because he's. Abdul is. I know him. He's capable. And I think Mallory is capable. I think Haley is not that capable. And the dynamics of the race really want her out. And let those two opposites decide the question with the primary voters. We'll see what happens. And Duggan got out, which I'm sad about, too. I liked him.
- [36:33]
Tim Miller
Yeah. The dependent running for governor. Yeah. I do feel obligated to just do the, like, there's good DEI and there's bad dei, and to give the tepid defense of good TVI right now, which is we just had the, you know, that picture of the Trump administration and the. In the bilat with China, where they're like 24 white dudes around a table. And Mark, I guess, unless you're counting Marco, you know, it's like. It's like, well, we got our gay here with bessant down at the end, but besides that. Exactly. And it was, you know, it's like, wow.
- [37:03]
Mike Murphy
What I liked is none of the Americans were pros in Asia who could speak Chinese. You know, it used to be you had a plane load full of them. I think Trump had three guys locked in the basement nobody ever got to talk to.
- [37:13]
Tim Miller
You did have multiple reality TV stars and weekend talk show hosts, though, so that's good.
- [37:18]
Mike Murphy
The Fox green room is where you really get the geopolitical geniuses of Today the new Metternich are there putting on the makeup and the hair gel.
- [37:26]
Tim Miller
It's definitely a merit based system they're working on over there.
- [37:30]
Matt Rogers
This is Matt Rogers from Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang.
- [37:34]
Bowen Yang
This is Bowen Yang from Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang. Spend your balance instantly with a Venmo debit card and earn up to 5% cashbacks on your favorite bundle of brands. When you join Venmo Stash, your rewards
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Matt Rogers
come from bundles of brands you can keep or switch every 30 days so you can choose the ones that match your everyday spending.
- [37:50]
Bowen Yang
The more you do with Venmo, the more you get. Earn 2% cash back when you set up auto reloads. Earn 5% cash back with direct deposit.
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Matt Rogers
Great for anyone who doesn't want to transfer funds or wait days.
- [37:59]
Bowen Yang
No monthly fee, no minimum balance. Cash back is earned automatically. Just use your Venmo debit card and the rewards show up without extra steps.
- [38:05]
Matt Rogers
It's a simple way to get rewarded on things you're already buying, whether that's groceries, groceries, coffee or your go to online shops.
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Bowen Yang
Everything lives right inside the Venmo app so you can track your spending, check your balance and see your rewards all in one place.
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Matt Rogers
The Venmo debit card works just like the app you already use. Fast, flexible and built around your day to day life.
- [38:21]
Bowen Yang
It's a great option if you want a debit card that fits seamlessly into your routine and gives you a little extra back on the things you're already doing.
- [38:27]
Matt Rogers
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- [39:16]
Tim Miller
Two other things in midterms I guess we just because we mentioned Michigan, just give me your Murphy handicapping of the Senate right now. Like what's your sense of the state of play? What states are you watching?
- [39:26]
Mike Murphy
Well, it is in play and I think one thing people miss and then I'll do a few races quickly. You know the House is very binary. When you lose the House, you're screwed. The minority has no power. You know, free haircuts and hang around. I mean you can make speeches but you have no power in the Senate. Of course minority has power. So people are kind of obsessed at making the Senate and the House look good. Could the Democrats win the Senate? The answer is maybe because It's a huge wave election. But if the Senate goes from four to two, Republican advantage, that is still a massive earthquake power wise because it'll be hard for the Republican leadership to control it anymore. You know, we'll see who loses and who doesn't. But you're still going to have Rand Paul who goes to his own drummer and is honest about that. You got Murkowski, you know, you've got in Utah, Curtis.
- [40:22]
Tim Miller
He's checked him out. I think he wants to run for governor in two years.
- [40:25]
Mike Murphy
Right, right. And you have the ashes of Trump with people thinking about, all right, that's the old song. I'm gonna pick up some new riffs here. So they barely can control it. They've had votes. They'd need advance to break the tie with four. So if it goes down to two or one, it is a whole new world now.
- [40:42]
Tim Miller
They'll get judges through. I know it would still be meaningful though for them to be up 1 just for judges and for investigations.
- [40:49]
Mike Murphy
No, no, no doubt. But it's not like the highest house. You can be in the minority and be quite powerful and they're on the cusp of doing that. So to actually win the thing or get it tied. Alaska, Republican state. But Dan Sullivan, who knows better, is one of these in trouble? He's probably six or seven down. I saw a poll about.
- [41:10]
Tim Miller
You forget he's in the Senate kind of until Alaska.
- [41:13]
Mike Murphy
Yeah, so has Alaska because I don't think he's very visible when he's there, maybe partially out of shame because he's not an idiot. So that's a loose end. Now you can argue it's Alaska and when it comes down to it, the party brand is powerful there and they're going to spend a fortune. But that thing is definitely in play. I think Texas is now in play, which I don't think would have been of Cornyn, really in play. So that, that is a big earthquake to the map. And then you've got the somewhat easier ones like Ohio, where I think Brown will probably have his comeback as a old kind of union manufacturing jobs kind of Democrat, which is perfect for this year. Michigan, I think is going to tilt to the Ds, though, if Abdul wins the nomination. It'll be more complicated though. He's an underrated candidate. I know him. He's basically a high school quarterback from Dearborn with a complicated ballot name and some pretty lefty positions. But he, he, he's got some skills. Of course, Collins, you know, the thing about Platner is how Will the second look go? I mean, Mills getting out was not good for him. He needed to go beat somebody. Now it's all going to be. Well, wait a minute. What about the Nazi tattoo? It's some I Heart us. What does it say? You know, I mean, it's. It's not a subtle Nazi tattoo.
- [42:31]
Tim Miller
It kind of is. I kind. It kind of is. You. You knew it was a Nazi tattoo when you saw it. The Totenkopf. That's a skull. And it's not like it was a swastika.
- [42:42]
Mike Murphy
Not. Well, the. The thing is, the skull department were the SS guys who thought the swastika was a little too soft and squishy. So if you were at a concentration camp and you looked at the uniform. Yeah, sure.
- [42:58]
Tim Miller
Anyway. Okay.
- [42:59]
Mike Murphy
Point. Point. Yeah, you're flacking. I just.
- [43:03]
Tim Miller
I just. I'm saying the reality. I did not. I would not have looked out of that. I would have thought, I'm a badass drunk. You know, whatever partying guy, and I want to get the coolest looking skull.
- [43:14]
Mike Murphy
You know, that might be what happened, but it's a pretty get. Get David French going on this. He'll give you an hour and a half on it. Yeah, so the point is, he's going to get more of a second look now, but generically, I still think he's the favorite, if he can withstand that.
- [43:29]
Tim Miller
And Collins is not the Collins of past, by the way. I mean, she's also, you know, getting up there and it's. And she's walking a delicate tightrope and doesn't have the same ballerina skills that she did two cycles ago.
- [43:41]
Mike Murphy
I agree. And they've seen the magic act. They know the rabbit's gonna come out of their bag of groceries.
- [43:46]
Tim Miller
Any stretches Iowa or Florida is. There was kind of. It's kind of a weird Florida poll.
- [43:51]
Mike Murphy
I think Florida could come to life. I really do.
- [43:54]
Tim Miller
Do.
- [43:54]
Mike Murphy
I really do. So I don't count that one out. Iowa's trickier, but in the hunt now, which is saying something, of course. They got the superstar governor, Nebraska stuff going on.
- [44:05]
Tim Miller
Independent Nebraska, Osborne. That race looks close.
- [44:08]
Mike Murphy
Look, even I'm gonna plug. There's a young kid who is a state senator in Kansas.
- [44:13]
Tim Miller
There are two good candidates in Kansas, actually. It's so funny. They're better just being blunt. Sorry. You get my real opinions on the show. Like, they're better than the Iowa candidates. I was an easier state. But the Kansas candidates are better. There's the young GU Guy you're talking about. Then there's a pastor who's like a religious.
- [44:29]
Mike Murphy
Yeah, the pastor is interesting but he's a pro life Republican in a Democratic primary.
- [44:33]
Tim Miller
Maybe that works in Kansas.
- [44:34]
Mike Murphy
You know, at first look it's kind of the old, you know, the miracle candidate but the primary motive, smoke. Go Patrick Schmidt. The young guys Navy moderate, Tori Dem. And he's got a poll showing it like a two point race with Marshall who kind of like is like Sullivan
- [44:51]
Tim Miller
but kook year but dumber. Yeah.
- [44:53]
Mike Murphy
So if the Dems can, you know, raise the money which has been an underperforming category and play wide in a wave election, lightning can strike in one of these seats. So yeah, if I had to handicap I say they don't get majority but they close it to 2 or 1 or tied and it's not impossible to get majority which is really saying something with the portfolio of seats that are
- [45:18]
Tim Miller
I think tide is kind of the median for me. It's so important for them to win for the investigations because there's so much shit to investigate. When we were talking about yesterday audit the White House should be the motto for 2027. And the House can only do so much, right. There's just only so many hours of the day, there's only so many committees and anyway to me the oversight in the appointment and what if a Supreme Court justice goes away? What if Blanche. They try to make Blanche permanent. You know what I mean? For all those reasons, I think the
- [45:48]
Mike Murphy
Crim Investig litigations are so much smarter to run on than impeachment. You know, just say the voters already impeached him, they wiped out his party. But let's look at all the corruption here. The family has raided the treasury.
- [46:02]
Matt Rogers
This is Matt Rogers from Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang.
- [46:06]
Bowen Yang
This is Bowen Yang from Los Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang. Spend your balance instantly with a Venmo debit card and earn up to 5% cashbacks on your favorite bundle of brands. When you join Venmo Stash your rewards
- [46:16]
Matt Rogers
come from bundles of brands you can keep or switch every 30 days so you can choose the ones that match your every everyday spending.
- [46:22]
Bowen Yang
The more you do with Venmo, the more you get. Earn 2% cash back when you set up auto reloads. Earn 5% cash back with direct deposit.
- [46:28]
Matt Rogers
Great for anyone who doesn't want to transfer funds or wait days.
- [46:31]
Bowen Yang
No monthly fee, no minimum balance.
- [46:33]
Matt Rogers
And now you can earn up to 5% cash back at select brands in your bundle every time you check out
- [46:37]
Bowen Yang
online with the Venmo button Cash back is earned automatically. Just use your Venmo debit card and the rewards show up without extra steps.
- [46:43]
Matt Rogers
It's a simple way to get rewarded on things you're already buying, whether that's groceries, coffee or your go to online shop shops.
- [46:49]
Bowen Yang
Everything lives right inside the Venmo app so you can track your spending, check your balance and see your rewards all in one place.
- [46:54]
Matt Rogers
The Venmo debit card works just like the app you already use. Fast, flexible and built around your day to day life.
- [46:59]
Bowen Yang
It's a great option if you want a debit card that fits seamlessly into your routine and gives you a little extra back on the things you're already doing.
- [47:05]
Matt Rogers
The Venmo MasterCard is issued by the Bancorp Bank N.A. pursuant to license by Mastercard International Incorporated. Venmo stash bundle terms and exclusion supply max 100 cash back per month month requires $500 plus in direct deposits. See terms at Venmo me terms. Venmo checkout not available at all Merchants.
- [47:56]
Tim Miller
One more thing I just want to flag with the midterms this scheme did not come to pass, but I think it's worth addressing the potential schemes. This was from Reuters, your friends at the wire. Trump's election security czar Kurt Olson sought to ban Dominion voting machines. They're still on this and more than half of of the US states by asking whether the haunted. Yeah, he was asking the Commerce Department to declare their components national security risks. The plan to exclude the machines got far enough that in September, Commerce Department officials were exploring what grounds could be evoked to execute it. Three additional sources said it eventually collapsed however because there wasn't any evidence. So you know, this is whatever, you know, the Watergate burglar style scheme here. But you know, I don't know, maybe one of the times they figure something out and I just want what is your kind of alarm about monkey business in the midterms?
- [48:47]
Mike Murphy
You know, I think it's the thing Axelrod and I argue about this on hacks on tap a lot because he's very pearl clutchy about it and then he accuses me of ignoring it. I'm like no, it's out there, but it's like a three foot break wall against a 20 foot wall of water. There's just limits to how much they can get away with. Are they going to try to do? Yes. Yeah. I mean the biggest thing and he's on this and this one, I don't disagree is they're doing a lot better at raising money you know, now of course they use extortion, but the Dems need to get their finance thing in order.
- [49:18]
Tim Miller
They don't have mention the extortion. I don't think there's, it's interesting there's not more reporting on this like because, and for me this is all smoke. I'm not an investigative reporter, but the number of anecdotes I hear about things like people calling up Brian Ballard's lobbying firm or one of these lobbying firms and saying, hey, you know, I'd like to hire you to help help lobby the administration. And in addition to the 50 grand a month or whatever it is for the firm, it's like for me to take you on as a client, you got to give MAGA pack over here a million bucks. Like that is happening right now.
- [49:48]
Mike Murphy
No, no, I mean the thing is when you have a reputation for corruption and thuggery as the Trump administration does, it's pretty easy to go out raising money without any threatening because people just assume, you know, like, oh God, these guys are. I'm going to have a regulatory case. It's all political. And you know, the, the administration has tried to purge all the old mandarin kind of public service types out wherever they can. So they know they got some 30 year old political appointee who was a deputy advance knucklehead on the Alabama campaign who's now deciding who they turn the unlimited legal resources of the federal government loose on. So people are paying to play or paying to survive. So just the knowledge that people, their thugs raises money by itself. So yeah, yeah, I. But the Dems auto on a grassroots basis because of the wave and low dollar, low cost of transaction web based fundraising. They ought to be able to do better and they just need to like get on that. They don't have to match the Republican number. My old joke is what hurts more. Dropping one piano on your head from 100ft or two pianos, but they got to get to one piano and they're not there yet.
- [51:02]
Tim Miller
All right, deep breath. We gotta do California now.
- [51:05]
Mike Murphy
Yeah.
- [51:05]
Tim Miller
I don't understand why my Democratic friends and listeners. So people get mad at me when I bring this up. Like why they're not more apoplectic about what's happening. California is not going well. I landed in San Diego for the live show. I walked out the door of the hotel across the street in downtown San Diego. There was a marquee that was like opening the doors again soon. Socially distance mask up. Stay safe. I went to sit at a juice bar. They do still have good fruit and juice here. California. A nice woman walked up to me, recognized me, said, hey, introduce me to a New Orleans real estate agent. It's too expensive for me to live here now. Like people, it's too expensive to live here. The state is tough. They can't build the fucking train. Texas is building more green energy plants than California as Texas is.
- [51:49]
Mike Murphy
No, it takes three years to open an electric vehicle fast charging station here.
- [51:54]
Tim Miller
It's crazy and it's not going well. And we're in an election year and the establishment of the California Democrats are putting up the same mayor here in LA that has been. That has done a disastrous job rebuilding from the fires and the yahoos they have lead in the governor's race. It's Biden's worst cabinet member and the corniest guy on the 2020 debate stage who nobody really is excited about that is it? There's no reform.
- [52:23]
Mike Murphy
Yeah. You would think the biggest powerful economic engine of America could have actually. Well, disclosure. I'm for Matt Mahan, who of course is not doing particularly well simply because common sense and Silicon Valley guys who promise money and never write the check is hard campaign formula to purchase.
- [52:41]
Tim Miller
Just before you give the pitch on this, can I just offer. I think I want to just at least do one other thing because I'm obviously I'm from Mahan too. But it's not just a couple former Republican guys. I was just reading this morning. I was going down Twitter. This is on the lefty side of the Dem party. Matt Stoller wrote this about Becerra. Who's the. Who's the front rider? Becerra is likely the California governor. He's arrogant, incompetent and tolerates criminal behavior by staff. He'll likely be recalled fairly soon. I agree with that. Susan Rice. I've been on the show multiple times. Who's in the main body of the Democratic Party was retweeting really negative reviews about Becerra. So it's like across the era. And so why is everyone going along with this?
- [53:19]
Mike Murphy
Don't they have a department store mannequin they can run instead? Because Becerra's, you know, nobody trembles at that name. So here's what happened. First of all, let me do Karen Bass, who's quite unpopular mayor. But like a lot of places that are very blue, the public employee unions do like to elect the people they negotiate their salary deals with. And that is a function here. So at the last minute, a young DSA super lefty, Nithya Raman, jumped in against her a political ally 48 hours before. And then Spencer Pratt, because everybody's on one ballot with no party label, who's kind of the rage against the situation candidate, no solutions. But he can explain how to get stabbed in the neck at an underpass, which is fairly easy to do here if you, you know, drive quarter mile, any direction, is kind of the novelty candidate. Although right now he and Rahman are in a tight two way race, around 20 each to try to make the runoff against Bass, who's stuck at like 39. So yeah, it's kind of uninspiring. My friend Rick Caruso came very close to running. A lot of people wish he had. My fix for it is to do what San Francisco did, which is go to ranked choice, get rid of the low turnout primary and widen the voter pool for all parties and let second and third choice mean something. So frankly, the more right of center people can have a candidate who can compete with the lefty public employee thing in the governor's race. Same thing thing. California is so hard to govern and we got a lot of budget problems, some of which are driven by the Trump administration, that there just wasn't a candidate. So Swalwell, because He lives on MSNBC, had some name ID and this is a big state TV will cost you 4 to 5 million a week. So getting famous, very expensive here if you're not already famous, like Arnold, my old client, you know, we came in as somebody people would listen to because they knew who he was and swallow imploded, which everybody knew was coming, coming. And then Becerra was kind of the generic acceptable Latino guy from the south, but nobody knew anything about him. But the public poll showed him in front. And then the Sacramento crowd said, well, he's not going to change anything. Safe bet, pour money in. And then he had Stier, who's going to spend 200 million bucks or probably more, who. It was like trying to put a cinder block into orbit. You know, he's just not the most compelling candidate. And then you had Katie trying to. Katie Porter, who would come in third for Senate, trying to.
- [55:56]
Tim Miller
She, by the way, I like better than the other two and it's not exactly my.
- [56:00]
Mike Murphy
And mayhem coming from the center. And neither of them could really get the money they needed to break through and get famous in California. So we kind of defaulted to the minimum sufficient.
- [56:10]
Tim Miller
One thing that frustrates me is a lot of Democrats I talk to hear about this race, even especially sophisticated Democrats actually are like, well, what are you going to do? We don't want it to be a top two Republican situation. But that's not going to happen anymore.
- [56:22]
Mike Murphy
That was never going to happen. And that's part of what.
- [56:24]
Tim Miller
So just vote for who you want. People are just like, oh, I can't throw away my vote for Katie. I had somebody tell me that in San Diego yesterday, a friend of mine, and then I had somebody tell me that about Mahan today or yesterday in la. And I'm like, it's not over. The race isn't over.
- [56:38]
Mike Murphy
I know this spectrum of two Republicans, Steve Hilton and Sheriff Bianco, who's the handcuff candidate breaking through became a thing. And the psychology in the Democrat electorate of the half that really pay attention at money most was oh my God, oh my God. Whoever's in front in the polls, we have to vote for it, defend. So the hapless Becerra kind of, you know, stumbled in with no money, no message, weak resume. But you know, it was the. He had been known, he'd been attorney General and you know, he had some name ID and they said we better vote for him to stop Republicans. It's stupid herd behavior. But it, but it happened.
- [57:20]
Tim Miller
All right. It's frustrating. Do better Democrats in California. It's like, you know, be a model for the country. Yeah, yeah. Last thing I'm. You let you put on your, you know, kind of monorail, get your cane out, do the monorail thing about EVs, which I like to let you do on the show, particularly after this, after the China summit and we talked about this a little bit. I don't know one of the recent times you're on and this relates to the California incompetence, honestly, the degree to which we're getting our ass beat by China. China in this space.
- [57:50]
Mike Murphy
It's unbelievable. Trump is the Henry Ford of the Chinese auto industry. They should build a monument to him over there. I mean he's declared war in the American one with the stupid tariffs. And here's the bottom line on UVs. Don't think about environment or any of that. One is a better car. Take one for a weekend from your dealer. You're thank me and you're saved to well now probably 2,800 bucks a year on gas. But the real deal is the Chinese have decided to eat the world car industry to de industrialize the competition. They, they have the capacity to make 50 million cars a year. We would stretch to make 12. And so you say union in a Chinese auto plant, you're going to be making license plates and you're making 10 bucks an hour. So they export cheap. Good. We taught them how. And the Germans did cars and they go conquest foreign markets because they have more capacity than they can use. Nobody in the Chinese auto industry makes any money. The government just props everything and like a thing. They're invading everywhere. So if you're curious if a Chinese car is any good, go to your Lincoln dealer and look at a Nautilus that is made in China. They sold 75, 000 of them last two years. And Ford would rather not do that. But tariffs and everything and having to have, you know, hedge the future is kind of forced them to. Most Buicks now are made in, in Korea. So. So the problem is EVs are the better product. They're going to win in the end. We are still competitive, as are the Europeans. But the Chinese with all their subsidies and their scale are eating the world. And the way to compete is to subsidize American manufacturing. Not just Detroit guys, but also the Germans and the Koreans who make great EVs in Georgia to let them export and let them compete. If the Chinese are going to try to buy the market, we got to defend our guys for a few years of subsidies. And Trump has tried to kill every, every single thing to help American auto manufacturing compete. Every one of them. He ought to have a I heart BYD and Geely tattoo on his forehead. And now we don't know what he agreed to. You know, there's rumors he gave Taiwan away for a soybean deal, which I think he's capable of. And talking about the Chinese, well, why don't you build one assembly plant here and I'll open the floodgates. And there are national security implications and everything. So go to evsforallamerica.com learn all about it.
- [60:17]
Tim Miller
It's so funny. It's like literally the cliche, like he's selling us out for a bunch of beans. Like, literally beans.
- [60:23]
Mike Murphy
No, no. Very cheap. Yeah, yeah, it's really something I was
- [60:26]
Tim Miller
talking to from about this. It is the tariffs, it is, you know, the China policy. But also the way in which he's turning off our allies is also helping China take the world. And he was talking about just the Canada example. Canada, because, you know, they want to have a good trading relationship with US. US was not importing Chinese EVs like up until recently. And you know, Trump talks about making them the 51st state and invading them and punishing them and making their economy worse. And they're just like, well, screw it, like, fine, we'll do a Deal with China, let that BYD cars come in. The people in Ottawa will like those better than the cars that they're getting
- [61:04]
Mike Murphy
anyway and, and teach the Chinese how to sell in the North American market. Let's, let's open a little Universe university called Canada 50,000 cars. I mean, here's my favorite tariff story. Subaru, one of the smaller manufacturers, but they make a good car, has a big plant in Lafayette, Indiana, and they were sending, I don't remember the number, maybe, maybe 25,000 cars a year from the US to Canada. If you buy a Subaru in Canada, most of them are made in Lafayette, Indiana. The terrorists came down. Wham, that's gone. Now it's cheaper for Subaru to ship them from Japan to Canada. Canada because of Trump's trade war with Canada. So if you're on the line in Lafayette, Indiana, why are we cutting shifts back? Well, the Orange Menace is trying to inject anthrax into US Auto manufacturing and it's working pretty well. So, yeah, this is a huge thing. I'm happy that the Democrats are going to move Michigan up, it looks like, into the big four presidential states because that may put a little visibility on this because the two biggest states for EV capex are Georgia number one, Michigan number two. And South Carolina is a big manufacturing state for automotive. So we're going to have early states.
- [62:15]
Tim Miller
Ethanol in with EVs. Sorry, ethanol mandates.
- [62:19]
Mike Murphy
American auto manufacturing.
- [62:20]
Tim Miller
It's been fun while it lasted.
- [62:22]
Mike Murphy
Corn farmers drive an ev. You will get hooked. Unless you're towing a horse trailer. Then wait for an E rev in a year or two.
- [62:29]
Tim Miller
All right, that's Mike Murphy, man. I always appreciate the time. Thanks so much for doing this.
- [62:32]
Mike Murphy
Thanks, pal. It's good to see you every. Every time.
- [62:34]
Tim Miller
All right, everybody else will be back here Monday with Bill Kristol. See y' all then. Peace. The Bork pod is brought to you thanks to the work of lead producer Katie Cooper, associate producer Ansley Skipper, and with video editing by Katie Lutz and audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.
- [63:40]
Mike Murphy
Want to keep up with everything trendy?
- [63:42]
Tim Miller
From breaking news to shareable jokes, pop culture bites to viral food spots, it's all on TikTok.
- [63:50]
Mike Murphy
Download TikTok now to explore.
- [63:55]
Tim Miller
Hey, campers, it's Jan from Toyota. This summer, we're headed to Camp Toyota. And the fun starts now. We're kicking things off by kicking up mud.
- [64:04]
Mike Murphy
Jump in, campers.
- [64:05]
Tim Miller
We're going off roading in a 4Runner next. We're heading to the Hot Springs in Arav 4. And finally park your Tundras and Tacomas around the campfire because we're roasting marshmallows. This your summer starts here.
- [64:18]
Pharmaceutical Advertiser
Dealer inventory may vary, so your participating
- [64:20]
Mike Murphy
Toyota dealer for details.
- [64:21]
Pharmaceutical Advertiser
Event ends June 1st. Toyota let's go Places.