Tim Miller (1:55)

They got a great theme. They got a great school song. Rocky Top can't beat Rocky Top. Yeah. Fuck Bama. Yeah. Where's Smokey? Good luck. Don't. Don't get too drunk and get in a fight, though, since, you know, it's.

Peter Hamby (2:05)

Not really your school. That's more your speed.

Tim Miller (2:07)

All right. You're here to discuss mostly politics. Politics as. As. As usual. And we're together. We got elections coming up in a couple of weeks. Want to do midterms I'm talking about the ballot initiative in California where you now reside. But we have a few news things I got to head up on. First, the John Bolton. A grand jury indictment came down last night. If folks want to get into, like, the legal side of that, I would recommend our friend Ben Wittes over at Lawfare has a great piece, thoughts on the John Bolton indictment that talks about there's some ways in which it's different than the Comey and Tish James indictment in the sense that, like, there's at least a little bit of a there there as opposed to be. As opposed to being a totally sham indictment. That said, I don't think anybody thinks that John Bolton would be indicted right now if he had endorsed Donald Trump in the 2024 election. And so it obviously is a political move. And I'm wondering what you think about it.

Peter Hamby (2:56)

Yeah, look, I think you're right that this is different from the Tish James indictment. It's different from the Comey indictment. Clearly different from the Comey indictment because Donald Trump was busted sending a DM to Pam Bondi saying, indict this man. The evidence, though, you watch the CNN legal analysts, they're like, this is a pretty credible indictment. Also shout out to John Bolton for being extremely on brand as a boomer and using his AOL email. Yeah, I think, I think both of us have worked with older political consultants and you email them at their like yahoo.net or whatever.

Tim Miller (3:33)

So nice.

Peter Hamby (3:33)

There's 18 counts here. You know, as the Washington Post pointed out, her name is Kelly O. Hayes, who's a, you know, respected, at least in that world, prosecutor who signed off on this. Unlike other federal prosecutors who did not want to sign off on the Comey thing, on the Tish James thing. This is one of the things where I, as a journalist and, you know, JVL might hate me for saying this. This is one of those things I put in, in a bucket of like in the outrage machine, you got to pick your battles. And, you know, right wing neocon, like war freak John Bolton seems like he might have broken the law here and there are things to get mad about. Tish James and Comey are probably two of those things. But it's very clear that you're exactly right that this is part of Donald Trump's revenge tour against his political opponents and critics.

Tim Miller (4:26)

You do have to pick your battles. I will side with the mustache. I'll take this one onto my outrage list because I don't know that John Bolton's gonna have a lot of Defenders John Bolton's poor wife. This is crazy. I mean the degree of the hassle that they're going to go through. I mean who knows what the actual punishment will be. The lawyer's fees, their house gets raided, you know, depositions, financial.

Peter Hamby (4:48)

But if you break the law, that's what happens.

Tim Miller (4:50)

Well, but like did he, I mean, did he. I guess my point is like the amount of like kind of ticky tack misuse of classified documents violations and we could do this if the administration wants to do this. The administration wants to decide, okay, you know what? The two things that we're going to investigate in this administration are unlawful use of classified documents, something we cared very deeply about. The president had classified documents in his bathroom and immigration crimes. And those are the only things we're going to do because we're not, you know, they don't, we're no more white collar crime. We don't care about that. There's a bunch of other stuff. We're going to use the limited resources we have to focus on this then. Okay, I think that probably there'd be some interest. I think there are probably some other people in the Trump administration that mishandled classified information I would imagine. And I think that they would, they would go after them with the equal fervor under the law. I would be totally fine with that. That is not what is happening here. This feels like banana republic shit where one mini dictator comes in and sends the law after his opponents and the next mini dictator comes in and sends the law after their guys opponents. And I don't like it to be.

Peter Hamby (5:48)

Clear, to use a journalist phrase, to be clear. You're exactly right. But the heart of the matter in this indictment is just a little more inarguable than the others. That's all I'm saying.

Tim Miller (6:02)

Fair enough. I agree with that. People should read Ben Witteson who's gone much deeper on this on Venezuela. So apparently we have special ops in Venezuela and around Venezuela now the administrator's admitted to this. The head of the Southern Command is resigning. I should say that. Over on. I couldn't get Mark Hurtling to come on this morning for a bonus segment but over on our YouTube and the board takes feed he's going to talk to Bill Kristol this afternoon. So by the time this is up people can go see, check that out. And I think Mark Hartling will have a lot of deeper thoughts on this on the military side of things but from like a more political level it seems like we're kind of planning for A war in Venezuela, which I think has obviously substantive concerns, but I think there's some potential political fallout here as well. What do you make of it?

Peter Hamby (6:47)

I'm fascinated by the story and glad you brought it up today rather than talk about just campaign politics. This is my Georgetown SFS brain flaring right now.

Tim Miller (6:57)

Thought you did Africa studies, though.

Peter Hamby (6:59)

I did, but you hang out with the Latam nerds, so I pick up some stuff glancingly. Spent some time in South America. Just read a great book about migration that everyone should read. Everyone who's Gone Is Here. Have you read that yet?

Tim Miller (7:11)

Everyone who's Gone Is Here. I've not read that yet.

Peter Hamby (7:14)

Yeah, it's basically about the history of migration from Central America to the US and, you know, all the stuff, all the bad stuff in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador that basically led to, you know, the situation we're in today, the lack of immigration policy. It's literally one of the best books I've ever read. Literally.

Tim Miller (7:32)

Big book club week for us. Frank Foer had book advice. Anna Applebaum.

Peter Hamby (7:36)

Yeah, it was written by Jonathan Blitzer, who's a New Yorker reporter. I think this was on, like, Obama's Best Books of the Year list last year or something. But anyway, in school, you don't learn a lot about the history of violence in El Salvador and why it led to, obviously, a lot of bad things. So Venezuela, there's a bunch of things going on here. Marco Rubio, the threat of war. Trump's campaign promises to be anti war. But let's step back. Like, this is a huge tragedy, first of all, and I know you've talked about this. Who is your boy that you are really campaigning for?

Tim Miller (8:05)

Andre.

Peter Hamby (8:06)

Yes, Andre. So, you know, Venezuela is a petro state. They've had terrible leadership. But, you know, in the 70s and 80s, this was a wonderful country. In the last 10 years, 7 million people have fled. I think it's the largest migration crisis. Largest, like, group of displaced people in the Western Hemisphere. Most of them are going to South American countries. Some are coming here. Hugo Chavez, bad guy. Nicolas Maduro, who came into power in 2013. Bad guy. He was indicted in 2020, by the way, by the US for drug and terrorism charges. Joe Biden put a $25 million bounty on his head. Some insane number which basically, I looked it up. It was the same price on his head as was on Osama bin Laden's head. So known bad guy in both parties cracking down on opposition, exploiting the oil wealth there, which is plummeting in value. We need to Step back and just like, look at the migration crisis. This is bad. And so this sort of gets to the outrage stuff with Trump as well. This feels like a Reagan era thing, like a Tom Clancy novel, you know, which isn't necessarily good.

Tim Miller (9:11)

But we're sending people after Pinochet, you know.

Peter Hamby (9:13)

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like a clear and present danger thing. Except we're probably pressuring regime change there. David Sanger is a good explainer on this today. I generally, like, trust his opinion here. This isn't really about combating drug trafficking. Even though we're blowing up boats.

Tim Miller (9:30)

Don't say.

Peter Hamby (9:31)

Yeah, well, I'm just giving you some facts here and for the listeners.

Tim Miller (9:34)

Well, I mean, yeah, not, not that neither of us have, would have any knowledge of this, but my understanding is that most of the drugs that come into the country are not coming from Venezuela. There's some other countries that are a little higher on the list if we're doing just drug trafficking.

Peter Hamby (9:45)

Correct? Yeah, I don't know anything about that, but what I hear is that most of it's coming up through Mexico and the Pacific coast, not Venezuelan speedboats. The Rubio aspect here is very interesting to me. Marco Rubio has called for going back to like since he was running for senate back in 2010, but I think explicitly in 2018 said Venezuela is a national security threat, we should use military force there. And Rubio, this is so crazy to you and me from 2015, all that stuff. Trump listens to Rubio. Rubio has a wide berth, a huge portfolio inside the administration. I'm sure he can boss around Pete Hegseth and tell him whatever he wants. It's in Rubio's blood to be anti communist. And Maduro, there's plenty of Venezuelans in Florida. So I think he's had this hobby horse for a very long time and is happy to flex American muscles against Maduro. And we should want regime change in Venezuela.

Tim Miller (10:44)

I do.

Peter Hamby (10:45)

We should want regime change.

Tim Miller (10:46)

I just don't think that we really. That Trump really cares. But I do.

Peter Hamby (10:49)

But this, but one more point, but one more point on this, though. The anti war thing, like Rubio does come cut from a John Bolton kind of cloth. And this also comes on the heels of Trump for some reason giving $20 billion to Milei in Argentina.

Tim Miller (11:05)

40 now, I guess if we have a public private partnership for the other 20. No, it's $20 currency purchase. And now we're doing another 20. It's kind of a private public thing.

Peter Hamby (11:13)

That's crazy. Have you been Argentina by the way. Yeah, I have not. But Katie went to business school with this bunch of Argentinas and they were explaining the currency stuff to me down there. The people just hoard American dollars. Yeah.

Tim Miller (11:25)

I went to a cigarette store and went into the back with the guy that runs the store to do a currency exchange. This was recommended by our Airbnb host. That was an interesting experience.

Peter Hamby (11:33)

That's very. Yeah, I want to go. Beautiful country. But I'm flashing back to my conversations last during the. On the campaign trail with those college students, especially the young men who were. Maybe a lot of people said they were stupid for saying this when I posted it on social media, because everyone on Twitter is right. But they were afraid that they were going to be drafted or that there's these wars like Israel, Ukraine, Gaza. They were worried that Joe Biden was presiding over basically, you know, a neocon administration that was going to interfere in foreign countries. And fast forward to now. You have a Secretary of Defense who wants to talk about war fighting and call it the Department of War and talks about how he should be the Secretary of War. You have Trump giving money to a bunch of other countries, hasn't done anything in Ukraine. This is the third ceasefire in Gaza. We'll see if it holds. I think they're taking a victory lap right now. That might be a little premature. I'm glad the hostages are out. But anyway, this is just part and parcel of this, like, piecemeal interventionism. It is not neoconservatism. This is not rooted in some, like, library at the University of Chicago in 1980, you know, where all the thinkers gathered. And Bill Kristol probably has some thoughts on that. This is just Trump doing favors or listening to the last person he talked to. But, you know, he does like to flex, he does like to use the military where possible. I'm skeptical that we're going to send troops in, but the fact that he's admitting that we. We're doing CIA ops is, of course we're doing CIA ops. But the answer usually for any president is, I don't know what you're talking about. And if I did, I wouldn't comment.

Tim Miller (13:09)

Yeah.

Peter Hamby (13:10)

And so that is a breaking of a norm, as they say in the Trump era.

Tim Miller (13:14)

Yeah. To that point, a couple of things. Just because our very smart listeners will comment and email me. I'm aware that we are on the. We're on the side of Pinochet and his coup. So that was a little misstatement at the beginning there. But, you know, it's set era. It's as that feel, that's a Pinochet style feel to the CIA thing is interesting that he admitted it because there are two other theories out there besides the Rubio theory on why we're doing this right now, one Ann Applebaum offered yesterday, which is that being in an actual war with Venezuela makes it easier to do domestic emergency crackdowns and that. Like, that's kind of why Stephen Miller is for it.

Peter Hamby (13:45)

Yeah. I think you have to correlate it to the deportation and arrests here.

Tim Miller (13:48)

Yeah. And I think that there's definitely something to that. Some other lefty world people say this is like Iraq again and we want Venezuela as oil. I wouldn't put it past Trump to want to do a war for oil, but I feel like he would have blurted it out by now if that's what he really wanted, just like he blurted out the CIA thing. So I find that to be a less likely rationale.

Peter Hamby (14:10)

You have to layer into that theory that he went over to the Middle east and played wookie cookie with every single OPEC member. I think our oil connections are pretty good. I mean, obviously Russia is a casualty currently in the global oil supply, but maybe. Yeah, maybe he wants oil. Sure.

Tim Miller (14:28)

Much more on this next week. And go check out Bill Kristol and Mark Kirtling. So are you on the record? You're a no on yeeting boats out of the Caribbean.

Peter Hamby (14:36)

I think again, I watched Clear and present danger again when I was on leave. I think it's pretty sick if the CAA does it clandestinely and kills some bad guys. But bragging about it breaking international law? No, I'm a no.

Tim Miller (14:54)

Yeah, okay, that's a no for you. Okay, one in five Americans have learned a new language on their bucket list. If that's you, make 2025 dear you finally check it off. You're running out of time with Babbel, the language app that makes grammar fun and is actually worth your time. Learning a language with Babbel is all about small steps, big wins and progress. You can actually track and feel. Their bite sized lessons fit easily into your daily routine and are also easy to remember. Just 10 minutes a day is enough to start seeing real results. Babel lets you practice real life conversation step by step, without the stress. You'll build the confidence to speak up when it matters, from ordering coffee to chatting with new friends abroad. As for me, as I've mentioned before, I've been trying to use this to keep up with my daughter's French and she's learning French in school here. It's Louisiana, after all. You know, I'm doing my best out here. Babble's hassling me though. Thing I like about it, I like about it. They're friendly, it's cute, they send me little texts. They're just like, you didn't babble yesterday. You were doing too much podcasting. You did too many Bulwark takes about creeping authoritarianism. And maybe you should spend 10 minutes with me instead, learning about Al Shaat. And I'm doing my best on that. I am doing my best. However, you learn best by listening, speaking, reading or writing. Babbel adapts to your style and keeps you motivated with personalized learning plans, real time feedback and progress tracking. Here's a special limited time deal for our listeners right now. Get up to 55% off your Babbel subscription at babbel.com bulwark get up to 55% off at babbel.com bulWark spelled B A B B E L.com bulWark rules and restrictions may apply. I want to go to California Prop 50, which is the ballot initiative on the redistricting. You've done a bunch of reporting on that. I want to hear about what's happening in California in particular and then kind of broaden it out to national.

Peter Hamby (16:48)

Yeah. So Prop 50 is Gavin Newsom's response to redistricting efforts by Republicans mid decade. A huge aberration, obviously, first in Texas, possibly in Indiana, Missouri. And we can talk more about the voting rights arguments at the Supreme Court and whether that's going to impact how many seats Democrats can get in the midterms and beyond. But basically Gavin Newsom after Texas rising to what he sees as the occasion to fight against Donald Trump. And we text about this in private too right now, both online and in real life. It's hard to think of somebody with the stature and profile who can go head to head with Donald Trump more than Gavin Newsom. And so he understands that as he looks to be running for president.

Tim Miller (17:34)

JB was pretty good on the podcast Tuesday. JB is doing well too.

Peter Hamby (17:37)

Yeah.

Tim Miller (17:37)

And they both have the same issue, I think, which is being blue state governors. Like deep blue state governors.

Peter Hamby (17:42)

But anyway, yeah, no, I think that's right. I think Gavin's got some problems in California that he'll have to answer for. JB Pritzker, I would love your take on another podcast. What is gambling winnings? Because I don't gamble fucking huge.

Tim Miller (17:52)

The only bad thing was that the news came out after I interviewed him. I just wanted to vibe out with him on gambling.

Peter Hamby (17:57)

How do you, how do you win? Was that gambling? Over the course of a year he.

Tim Miller (18:00)

Made 1.4 million in net winnings in black. And he plays, plays cards. A lot of it was blackjack. I forget what the other card game he plays was. I'm a craps man. That is like a lot of action. And so I wanted to, I wanted to kind of do some rounders, chat with him, you know, talk about the game of choice. I'm like, I'm annoyed. Next time me and JB get together, full podcast on gambling talk.

Peter Hamby (18:22)

That's how Democrats win back the bruise. Yeah, talk about gambling. So Anyway, Gavin with Prop 50 got a super majority legislature in Sacramento to rush through over the summer. A new map. And this map is locked in. So basically it writes out five Republican seats to counteract Texas. It's a huge gerrymander of the state and it's on the ballot this fall because in 2008 California voters and Arnold Schwarzenegger, our friend's former boss, was the, was leading the charge on this. It's as one of his most, you know, prized accomplishments, created an independent redistricting commission and that basically took the right to draw congressional boundaries outside of politicians hands and put it into an independent commission. By the way, for years this is what we have all wanted and good government people have wanted, the left has wanted independent redistricting is what should be the case. Prop 50 is probably going to win because the multimillion dollar ad campaign, which is how you win campaigns in California because it's so big and expensive, is just like stick it to Trump. They've got Obama, they've got aoc, they've got Warren, they've got Gavin and everyone is on TV saying if you are fed up with Donald Trump. These ads are also showing like images of like ice raids in the background and protests, etc. So like the advertising, the messaging isn't just about redistricting. It's basically just like this is an opportunity to send a message to Donald Trump. It's winning in the polls. It's like 50% to like 35%. No, with a bunch undecided. Probably should be higher, honestly. And this gets to what I was reporting on. You talk to Latinos, you talk to millennials. It's an off year election in California. We have off year elections in Virginia and New Jersey. That doesn't happen in California. Really. So you have to raise awareness about what this is and that you have to go vote and start to return your ballots. Early, which is what's happening right now. The interesting thing about it, Tim, to me is that you've got Republicans who are going to vote against it. And there's, you know, Democrats outnumber Republicans basically 2 to 1 in California with voter registration. They're all going to vote against it. But there's still a shitload of Republicans in California. There are also some like good government libs who are really proud of the fact that they got rid of gerrymandering. And I talked to some of them at a fair in Manhattan Beach, Katie's hometown, the other day. You know, these are like sort of MSNBC viewing moms who care and want to stick it to Trump. But some of them were really proud and don't want to, don't want to get rid of it. And they also don't trust like Newsom and Democrats to give up the redistricting power in 2030, which is what's written in to this prop.

Tim Miller (21:02)

It's written into the prop that they do have to give it up in 2030. Yes.

Peter Hamby (21:05)

So basically they will either go back to the independent redistricting commission in 2030 or maybe revisit this. But the map is locked in. So, you know, Democrats will probably gain five seats at minimum in the midterms because, you know, they're writing Devin Nunez out of the map or his old district at least. So.

Tim Miller (21:26)

Yeah, right.

Peter Hamby (21:26)

The, the way that I think some of these good government liberals will get to. Yes. Is that five year window. Like we'll go back after this. But again, we're, we're in a new era, man. Like states are rewriting these rules constantly. Are we going to go back? But I think Gavin Newsom realizes this is the biggest state in the country, the biggest blue state in the country. You know, all everyone who's listening to this is in D.C. in New York and the Acelic corridor with east coast bias. Like you watch the midterm returns every four years.

Tim Miller (21:55)

Everybody listen to this big guy. We're out there. We're, you know, we're, we're talking the norms.

Peter Hamby (22:00)

Okay, okay, so Norm is out there. You stay up late. California is the last state to count the votes. Tons of seats out there. Gavin realize it. It's going to pass. Just looking under the hood though, it's just going to be interesting for me as a dork political journalist to see like, does a working class Latino person show up for this in an off year for a democracy initiative? Because it looks like the coalition currently that's going to push it over the edge, just based on pure numbers, is the typical off year slash, midterm Democratic coalition. Affluent, college educated white people. There's enough of them for this to win in a blowout. And Republicans and opponents of this measure don't have enough money to compete. But it is fascinating. And then if Gavin wins, of course, it's one more notch in his belt as he, you know, builds toward that first visit to New Hampshire.

Tim Miller (22:44)

I want to do a little more Gavin talk for a second, but I want to kind of broaden this out to the national state of play. I'm not sure it's really sunk in yet for people how bad the redistricting battle could end up being for Democrats. And I was a little disappointed with Pritzker when I talked to him on Tuesday that he felt a little bit, kind of like, well, you know, we'll see what happens. There's some issues or some concerns. And I.

Peter Hamby (23:08)

So he's not, he's not doing this well.

Tim Miller (23:10)

He's a maybe. He's a maybe. Illinois is already gerrymandered to shit. No doubt. I get it. And he's like, there's some members who are worried that they're D + 15. For people knocking the jargon that their district, maybe they would have won on average about 15% more Democrats than Republicans. It goes down to 8% more. So they become a little bit vulnerable. They go from having a safe seat to more of a competitive seat. That's the only way to squeeze out more Democratic seats in Illinois. But if you just look at the total state of play with Texas, changing Missouri, changing Indiana, changing other Republican states out there, maybe Ohio, North Carolina is now talking about changing, going around the Democratic governor. Florida could still do it. And then there's this Voting Rights act repeal potentially, which could be coming. If that happens early in the year, it seems like it's going to. The Voting Rights act is, you know, basically provides, you know, for majority minority districts, which means that in the south, like here in Louisiana, they have to have a majority black district. If that gets repealed, then Louisiana can redistrict and Louisiana could redistrict in a way that gets rid of the black Democratic district here. That could also happen in Alabama, a bunch of other states. Anyway, once you start adding it all up, the five seats or four or five seats that Gavin squeezes out of California with this Prop 50 is great. Good for Gavin. Good for doing that. But there may be 25 seats. 30. The VRA gets repealed, 35 even maybe that the Republicans could squeeze out of Redistricting in all their various states, and it makes the map very hard. Like, even in kind of a wave year, the Democrats, like, it starts to become hard for them to get to 218. To me, I don't feel like the panic alarm is high enough on that yet on the Democratic side. And I think that's probably not a threat if the VRA doesn't, you know, if they can't change the Southern states by 2026. But if they can, the math gets tough.

Peter Hamby (25:05)

I screenshotted one of my friends Instagram stories this week, which I never do, and I text her. I was like, I never screen grab infographics, but it was about this very story. And I think you're right. There should be much more panic and awareness about this. The Supreme Court, gosh, going back to 2013, has gradually neutered the Voting Rights Act. Their arguments that they heard this week on section two in that district in Louisiana, that second district. By the way, I'm curious about this. You know, Louisiana has a long, rich history of racist politic down the aoteal. Why are there two majority minorities voice? I don't know what voice that is, but is there. Is there a. Like in South Carolina, for example, you've got that one Clyburn district. It looks totally gerrymandered. Whatever. Why are there two majority minority districts in Louisiana? Because I thought the Watts would have written in only one.

Tim Miller (25:59)

It's a good question. It's a good question. And a lot of it is like anything local, still local political stuff, sometimes parochial concerns. And basically the Republicans could have fought that second majority minority district in Louisiana and probably won at the Supreme Court already. But they were pissed at Garrett Graves, your boy, for being friendly with McCarthy and going against Mike Johnson when he tried to get the speakership. So it was like, it's kind of all wrapped up in this local politics. And so they drew out Garrett Graves and they were basically like, well, one more Democratic seat's better than having this cuck that tried to backstab me in there. It's more complicated than that. But, like, that was basically the short of it, which was the Republicans did not maximize the fight, the legal fight on that second district. But they could end up now, now drawing out both of them.

Peter Hamby (26:48)

Conceivably, yeah, okay, so maybe Ben Wittes is better on this than I am. But, like, Voting Rights act was passed in 1965. You know, Kavanaugh, Roberts, Alito, obviously, you know, they were very skeptical of Thomas that, you know, is racism still a consideration when People draw these lines. This was passed, you know, 70 years ago, they're thinking at least. And this has flared in previous cases, including one focused on Alabama a couple of years ago. This, this thought from the right leaning court majority that, you know, racism is done is the Cliff Notes version.

Tim Miller (27:27)

Right.

Peter Hamby (27:28)

So the interesting thing as to whether this would affect this midterm is important. Remember, they hear arguments now unless something is expedited and who knows what they would do? Maybe they would expedite it to get rid of it ahead of the midterms. But typically the Supreme Court announces their rulings in June. So what is June? June is after most primaries are over. So you've got nominees running. It would be pretty hard to turn around dramatically new districts by next fall for the election after June ruling. And on top of that, something you have to consider is while yes, they would probably write out a bunch of majority minority districts. And you're right. Even last night you mentioned North Carolina, looked up North Carolina. I was like, oh, North Carolina is not Louisiana, it's not Mississippi, it's not Tennessee. They Republicans do control, you know, state capital. They don't have the governorship, but they can, they can do what they want.

Tim Miller (28:22)

Yeah.

Peter Hamby (28:23)

So there's that. And because of that you'd have to write out if you redo all the districts sitting Republican incumbents. And so there's all these like party considerations that you have to deal with.

Tim Miller (28:34)

Yeah. If they don't do it till June of next year, it's going to go and they can maybe squeeze out a couple. That's a question.

Peter Hamby (28:39)

Yeah, you can scale. So, so you know, Nate Cohn did a good piece on this this week that I think everyone should take a look at. And he did the nerd Nate Cohen math thing and basically said if Texas, Missouri, Florida, Indiana, Ohio, Kansas, all redistrict Republican states and section two is struck down and basically at minimum, Republicans can erase 12 Dem seats in the south and deep South. That would mean that for Democrats to win the House, they need to win the national popular vote in the midterms next year. Somewhere between four and a half and five and a half points.

Tim Miller (29:19)

So crazy.

Peter Hamby (29:20)

That's a lot.

Tim Miller (29:21)

House basically becomes the Senate. House basically, basically.

Peter Hamby (29:23)

But I went back and looked the, the best comp we have is the 2018 midterms. That was a blue wave. Democrats won the national popular vote by 8 points that year. Okay. So maybe they can withstand all of these changes. It doesn't feel right now, with apologies to Bulwarkian listeners out there, it doesn't feel right now like the same energy is afoot as 2018. So then there's 2022, where Democrats, you know, surprise expectations. Biden was president. They won the midterm popular vote by 3 points. Different dynamics, different incumbent, whatever. But that would not be enough under this Nate Cohn model to keep up the House. So you can do really well in California. This is the other thing, too. I double checked yesterday when I knew we were going to talk about this. That map that Newsom and the Democrats in Sacramento wrote, it's locked in, so it's not like Prop 50 could pass and then they could go back and redo a new map where they add five or six more seats. It's just five. All you're getting is five. So, yeah, it's not great.

Tim Miller (30:25)

Yeah. In retrospect, dark. Gavin maybe should have drawn, like, an absurd map where, like, you know, you have Los Angeles, and it's just like little strings that come out of Los Angeles go all the way up to, you know, Lake Shasta or something.

Peter Hamby (30:43)

There's a very funny, like, I don't even call it a barbell district. It's a district they drew. People might have seen it. It goes from Marin, near your former hometown.

Tim Miller (30:51)

Yeah.

Peter Hamby (30:52)

And it goes. It's a little string up the coast, and then it goes all the way up the coast and then that entire big block of Northern California that no one ever goes to, where they just have weed farms and Bigfoot. Like, it's that. So it's just like people in Marin who have nothing in common with, you know, the separatists up north. Northern. Northern California. There's some funny districts that are.

Tim Miller (31:12)

John.

Peter Hamby (31:13)

But I did talk to a Democrat, nsf, an operative yesterday who, by the way, said he was a huge fan of yours. Who said? He's. He said the same thing. He's like, Gavin should have gone full dark, just right in 10 seats. Like, fuck these people. So very interesting discussion, but the best case scenario is that even if they strike down section two, it's 20, 28, that this will really happen in the South. And then maybe you've got, you know, Newsom and Westmore or, or, you know, some oysterman running for president and there's a blue wave and, you know, they saved the.

Tim Miller (31:47)

Save the country while we're doing California. Just really quick covered it last week, but it's your state, so I do have to get a take on the governor's race. Katie Porter seems a little unstable. Did not have a great interview with Sacramento tv. We played that she started shouting about how she's a leader and wouldn't answer questions. Antonio Villagarrosa is the other candidate. He's run a lot of times. I don't sense a lot of excitement there. How can California Democrats not produce an exciting candidate for governor?

Peter Hamby (32:20)

Yeah, I think about this also sometimes with Florida, obviously more Republican state, but you've got theoretically just like a bunch of young, diverse politicians, and you can't go up the ranks. California is fascinating to me, though. One, I was not surprised when Kamala Harris decided not to run for governor because, you know, she, in fairness, she's tired. Like, let her do her thing. But, like, why do you want that job? Is the question. And I hear that a lot from Democrats in California. It's hard. It's hard in a sense. Right? You have to manage this huge state. You take a lot of incoming. You know, the Palisades burned down and Spencer Pratt is pointing at Gavin Newsom and blaming him for the fires. It's. It's impossible state to manage because of all the competing jurisdictions, counties, county executives, sheriffs, city councils. Like, it's just wild. But you do have a super majority. Yeah.

Tim Miller (33:13)

Pretty fun job to me, actually. I'm a.

Peter Hamby (33:15)

This is also to Gavin's, you know, if you're buying Gavin, if you're long on Gavin, you know, has passed a bunch of stuff and signed a bunch of stuff without objection that can play to progressives. At the same time, there's probably stuff that would turn off swing voters. So, yeah, the field is pretty whack, man. It's. It's Porter who was the front runner, but the front runner only notionally. It was like her and Via Ragosa and Javier Becerra, and they're each at like 25, 26, 20. And people are talking about Rick Caruso getting in the race. I don't see a path there. The state's too partisan. Padilla is the only big name. Alex Padilla, the center, if he leaves the Senate and comes back, he's friendly with Newsom. He would. Is not famous famous, but by virtue of the money and connections and credibility.

Tim Miller (33:57)

In California, getting tackled by ICE helped very.

Peter Hamby (34:00)

Yeah, that was a good moment for him. You know, the state's never had a Latino governor. I could see him doing it. And the path is open for him because the Porter thing seems like a.

Tim Miller (34:10)

Better fit than Biden's worst cabinet member in Becerra and Katie Porter, who can't handle basic interview. And the guys run a million times. Like, Padilla seems better than all those. Yes, we. Dan Pfeiffer is what I'm pushing for though.

Peter Hamby (34:22)

There's an interesting for people who want to watch this. Villar Grossa is interesting because he ran one time, I think for governor or Senate as like the charter school guy and the labor unions were against him, but he, he could make a play for those. And he had a sex scandal too. Those like anti woke Latino bro types as a Democrat.

Tim Miller (34:40)

But he's like, he's a retread and he's 72.

Peter Hamby (34:44)

He is. Oh, he looks great.

Tim Miller (34:46)

He's 72. He's run 100 times anyway.

Peter Hamby (34:48)

Yeah, well, perma candidate. But Porter, I told this to someone working with Porter. I was like, maybe you could just pitch her as like Sacramento like needs someone really mean to go in and go Sacramento, like, oh yeah, you know.

Tim Miller (35:01)

The Kool Aid man needs to come in here and fuck shit up.

Peter Hamby (35:05)

But she's not dropping out. Obviously. These whispers have been out there for a long time about her. I've known people who have applied for jobs for her and decided not to go work there because of this stuff. My interaction there have been great. But like I also say this to Favreau sometimes when he talks about politicians being great. It's like they're nice to you because like you're. They're supposed to be, you know, like they're at. And like that's true with reporters sometimes most of the time. But she was always nice to me. But it was not surprising that the other video leaked to Politico because these rumors have been out there for a while.

Tim Miller (35:35)

I wanted to do Gavin 28. We have so much to do. I'm skipping it.

Peter Hamby (35:38)

Move on.

Tim Miller (35:38)

Maybe we'll get back to it at the end.

Peter Hamby (35:40)

I'm tired of talking about Gavin.

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Tim Miller (36:13)

You're talking about the DSCC stuff in the midterms. There's a lot happening here. The Democratic Senate Campaign Committee, that's the dscc. It's run by Christian, Gillibrand and Schumer. Basically New York Centers.

Peter Hamby (36:23)

God they are so electric, aren't they?

Tim Miller (36:25)

Yeah. Yeah. Really electric. Usually the job of that committee is to support the Democratic nominee, you know, with fundraising strategy, et cetera. Like in a Senate race. Like, that's generally the job the DSCC is doing this cycle. Something the nrsc, the Republican one, did in my day, back when I was a Republican. So I want to get to that in a second. Which is starting to interfere in the primaries. They have now quasi endorsed Janet Mills in Maine and Haley Stevens in Michigan. Haley Stevens is running against Mallory McMorrow, friend of the pod, Abdullah Sayed, who is more of a populist, lefty type candidate in Maine. Obviously you have Mills running against Graham Platner, the oyster farmer fella. And we've now seen, since Mills got in the race, several oppo dumps against the oyster farmer that I want to talk about. But just at the biggest picture first, I don't understand what they're doing. Why do Schumer and Gillibrand think that this is the moment to interfere in these races? I feel like it might backfire, particularly in Michigan. Did the Democratic base want Chuck Schumer telling them who to nominate in a primary?

Peter Hamby (37:28)

No. I'm going to play contrarian here, though.

Tim Miller (37:30)

Please do.

Peter Hamby (37:31)

The Democratic base is not always right. The people in line are not always right. Chuck Schumer was right not to shut down the government in March. He was. And he was right to shut it down this time. And he had a strategy and he was right. This is not to defend either of them. Kirsten Gillibrand's presidential campaign. Gay rights was sold.

Tim Miller (37:45)

There is no more contrarian take than being. Than coming on the POD and being like Chuck Schumer.

Peter Hamby (37:49)

No, no, no.

Tim Miller (37:50)

And Kirsten Gillibrand are nailing it. That is great. No, I love that we hold space for that take.

Peter Hamby (37:54)

That's not what I said. You're manipulating my words, you former political hack. So what I'm saying is, why do we reflexively give credit to Graham Platner, who has passed the first test of what you need to do. Yes. In 2025, which is get attention and be different. Okay. Yes. That does not mean we need to or the Democrats need to, like, rush to anoint a oyster farmer. Okay. It doesn't. He has to go out there and win it. And there is this collective revulsion against Janet Mills, in part. In part because she's a Washington establishment recruit. Yes. In part because she's old. What's is she, like, 77? She'd be the oldest senator ever.

Tim Miller (38:38)

77.

Peter Hamby (38:39)

However, like, impressive career, people like her, she's won more votes in that state than any, any politician running for governor ever. And, like, I just think that the political practitioners, some of whom are terrible in Washington, but some of them are good. I'm not. And by the way, it's not like Schumer and Gillibrand necessarily. Yes, they're putting some stamp on this stuff. It's the whoever the executive director and, like, the political operatives are. The oppo dumps, whatever they are. The Andrews, Kaczynski K file stuff that gets dropped on Platner this week. Welcome to the fucking big leagues, dude. Like, you can't just. This is what the people on the Internet need to get over. Like, you can't just anoint these people and think that, like, they deserve to win the primary in the election. You have to win in Maine, which is not a lefty state. There are more unaffiliated registered voters in Maine than there are Democrats and Republicans. And maybe Platner becomes a nominee and because of his different profile, he comes from the community. Like, he's been honest about ptsd. He was a veteran, by the way. I think people focus too much on the oyster thing and less on the veteran thing. Like, he's good at the Internet. Maybe he can pull over those fabled, like, blue collar Trump voters. Maybe. But maybe Janet Mills is the person who's better equipped to beat Susan Casu. Like, why does Graham Platner get the benefit of the doubt? Because he got a bunch of fucking clicks on his videos. This far, you have to win.

Tim Miller (39:59)

But isn't this the argument for the DSCC not being involved and letting the primary play out? That's what I'm saying. I don't even think it's good strategy.

Peter Hamby (40:06)

Sorry, sorry, you're saying. What is their thing?

Tim Miller (40:08)

I don't understand.

Peter Hamby (40:08)

They recruited Mills.

Tim Miller (40:09)

Yeah, yeah. The DSCC is working with Janet Mills. They're fundraising with Janet Mills. They are obviously involved in these oppo dumps on Platner.

Peter Hamby (40:17)

But there's no primary without. You want Platner to just walk to the nomination and then they drop the fact that he thinks you should be armed insurrection and he thinks they should.

Tim Miller (40:24)

Have a fucking campaign, right? No, I think they should have a fucking campaign. I don't think the DC strategists should be involved. And I certainly don't think they should be involved in the Michigan race where I think objectively. Obviously, I know Mallory and I like her personally, but objectively, to me, she seems like just a better candidate. On paper, I mean, she's, she's compelling. Haley Stevens has trouble doing interviews. Like, maybe Haley Stevens is great, I don't know. But like I just objectively just watching their performance, so. And Mallory's not a crazy leftist. And so like, I don't, I don't understand what they're doing. And to me, my point is like, even if they thought, okay, we need Mills actually, because this Platinum guy, people are very excited about him. But we know more than you do, people of the Internet. This is very possible. I, I've heard some, I've heard some rumors, some I'm not going to share on here just because like, I don't know if they're true or not. But like there's scuttlebutt going around D.C. about some platinum oppo that's like bad. Okay, so, but this, maybe it's true, maybe it's not. The out. The opposite is already out there now. Like, he posted that if you expect us to fight fascism without a good semi automatic rifle, you ought to do some reading of history and armed working classes requirement for economic justice. Maybe those are good. I don't know, maybe people want that. Now that's not my cup of tea. My point is like, I think that they're doing it in a hacky way. Like, why do you want Chuck Schumer unpopular Chuck Schumer's fingerprints on this race. Like, I don't understand, they should just be fucking neutral and stand back and let them. Janet Mill should hire a good strategist and maybe get a super PAC out there that does this work. I don't understand what they're doing.

Peter Hamby (41:55)

I am anti gerontocracy. I am, despite what I'm doing, arguing with you right now. Like, my inclination is not to trust Chuck Schumer and the establishment. And this all gives Platner ammo to run against both Mills and the establishment. And Susan Collins, you just articulated a very important point, which is maybe sometimes the committees with researchers and money and polls know something. And the Greek chorus of Twitter and blue sky is not automatically correct, in fact frequently wrong. They're right about Zorong in a lot of ways, but I just think that we shouldn't assume that this guy who came out of nowhere is this a perfect bulletproof candidate. You know, people in politics like to use that Mike Tyson term, like, everyone has a plan until you get punched in the face. But you know, if you don't have a plan for this stuff, like Mike Tyson's going to like fucking beat you to Death and eat your ear off. Like, yeah, he's got it. If he can survive this and bend the electorate to his will and like, explain away some of these posts. It's only October of 2025. All these things are going to be all over the advertising, you know, then, wow, what an incredible. And this is why we need primaries, right? I just don't think that, like, people should reflexively be like, fuck Janet Mills, man. Because the oyster guy has some cool videos on the Internet. Like, let us see what else you got. Yeah, that's my take, by the way. On Michigan. On Michigan. It's clear that the NRC and Republicans think Mallory is the strongest candidate. Like, it's. It's clear they would think they could beat Sayed. It's clear, like, Haley Stevens has some wacky moments on video. I don't know why the DC folks put their stamp on her if that's what's happening. Like, just not proving up to the occasion. Mallory's got work to do, obviously. I will say this though. When we were prepping for this pod, you were like, why didn't the DSCC learn their lessons from McConnell in the tea Party era? Yeah, like, guess what? They went back like, like Rick Scott when he was NRC chairman in 2122, stayed out of primaries and they lost some big races because of that. And then Danes comes in in 24 and is like, fuck, like, we're gonna like winners. And guess what they did. So, like, they did. They went away for a minute and then they went back.

Tim Miller (44:14)

They lost a lot of senate races in 24, but sure.

Peter Hamby (44:16)

But they did better than.

Tim Miller (44:17)

The candidates were better. Yeah, exactly. The candidates were better. My point was, I'll just be brief because people don't really care about the history of the 2012 NRSC. I'll just say this for those of us in the establishment at that time on the Republican side who are worried about far right candidates are going to hurt the party brand. And I do not want to compare Graham Platner to like the witch lady Christine o' Donnell or Sharon Angle or some of the fucking awful loons that we were.

Peter Hamby (44:40)

Ovid La Montaigne.

Tim Miller (44:41)

Yeah, the fucking race at the White nationalists that we had to stave off and miss Mississippi. I forget his name to get. We had to get Thad. Thad Cochran corpse across the line. Before that, shout out to Stevens. Shout out the white nationalist Mississippi guy. 1. So we did some work back then. My point is we had to learn some lessons because the first round through at the Tea Party, they won everything. And, and Mitch McConnell was getting too involved. Yeah. And he's doing what Chuck Schumer is doing. And, and, and people didn't like it. People are like, fuck you, Mitch McConnell. I don't want you telling me who to vote for. I'm going to vote for this insane person who, like, writes in feces on 4chan. Like, that's who I'm going to vote for more. Represent me in the base. And then eventually Mitch McConnell was like, oh, wait, I need to be a little smarter about this. Like, we're gonna have some cutouts. Like, we're gonna have some operatives over here and this other group that are gonna do that are gonna do the dirty work for me and I'm gonna stay out. You know what I mean? Like, you just gotta be a little smarter about it. Chuck Schumer is Christian Gillibrand don't seem to be very savvy.

Peter Hamby (45:37)

McConnell had one. I mean, McConnell, very smart operative. But, like, at the time, he would also say things publicly like, I want this candidate, or that candidate is an electable and his people would too. You know, the host of the ruthless POD now.

Tim Miller (45:52)

Yeah.

Peter Hamby (45:53)

And he also was dealing with rivalries. Like Jim DeMint had, what was it, the Senate Leadership Fund. And like, Sarah Palin was out there raising money endorsing candidates like Adam Kinzinger. Your boy, he was a Sarah Palin guy. But like, the Democrats currently, like, Schumer isn't coming out and being like, vote for Janet Mills while he's flipping hamburgers. There's not, like, affiliated outside like Bernie. And they're in for, for Graham Platner. Bernie's in for Abdullah Said, Justice Dems. Yeah, but there's not a lot of, like, other Democratic groups, like, fueling the, the fire to like, get the. Christine Quinn's in the race, too. So there's a little. There's some distinctions between then and now. But I. Overall, despite our disagreement on the nitty gritty here, I agree that the Democratic base does not want to deal with the establishment. And, and Liz made this point. Liz Smith, on psaki's podcast this week, like, it is true that beyond the issue set that's at stake in a lot of these campaigns, Democrats really don't want old people running. And my colleague Abby Livingston at Puck, who covers Capitol Hill, a lot of races, is very hot on this. Like, she thinks that these aging dinosaur members on the Hill don't. Like, she thinks it's crazy. They're not walking away. They don't get it. They Live in a bubble. She thinks some people are going to get. This is where it's similar to the Tea Party from a generational perspective. She thinks that some people are just going to get swept away in primaries.

Tim Miller (47:17)

Like and aren't even participating State center and San Francisco. Now, see, he's going to primary Pelosi this time, which is interesting.

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Tim Miller (47:56)

We got to get to the upcoming November elections here. We'll do New York first since we're already talking about the lefty populace. There's a debate last night, which I watched this morning. I don't know why.

Peter Hamby (48:07)

Watch the whole thing.

Tim Miller (48:09)

I was on two speed, so Cuomo and the beret man, Sliwa and Zoran. It was like, literally it's 45 minutes before they talked about anything about New York. And they spent like 20 minutes on Israel. And it's just like, okay. There's one, one exchange though, that I thought was pretty important that I want to play for you.

Peter Hamby (48:27)

Have you ever purchased anything in a cannabis shop? And if so, what did you buy? Mr. Mamdani, I have. I have purchased marijuana at illegal cannabis shop.

Tim Miller (48:38)

Okay.

Peter Hamby (48:38)

Mr. Cuomo. No, Mr. Sliwa, when I was shot five times.

Tim Miller (48:43)

I've had Crohn's disease. I did use medical marijuana.

Peter Hamby (48:46)

Yes, dude, Sliwa. The other thing that I said this, I said this to one of our 100 group chats this morning or yesterday morning. They asked about parades in this debate and they said, are there any parades that you would not go to of the many parades in New York? And Sleeve was like, I think the mayor should go to all the parades. Parades are an important, important expression of New Yorker's pride. And then they go to Cuomo. He's like, I'll go to the parades. And then they go to Zoron. He's like, I probably skipped some parades, man. And like, people tweeted. Someone tweeted like, is this an I think you should leave sketch? It's so funny. And then the moderator and like, I think Cuomo and Sliwa Both pile on Zoran, like which parades would you.

Tim Miller (49:31)

Yeah, there's a follow up. It's like, it's like, can we. I'm going to get a follow up on what Dominicans.

Peter Hamby (49:36)

The Dominicans need to know Zoran, if you're going to skip. But thank you for being honest. Zorin, like, Zoran's also kind of a. But like for all his following and his, his celebrated campaign and it's been a very good campaign. He is kind of a nerd too though. Like, he. I know he's. I know, I know he's. He's Muslim and like doesn't party. You know, he likes. He used to be a rapper, but I feel like he doesn't know a lot about like you. Not that LCD sounds. This was cool. But I remember when you interviewed him, he like didn't know who they were. He's like a little straight edge, you know. But like, I just like the fact that he's.

Tim Miller (50:04)

Here's class president.

Peter Hamby (50:05)

Purebred, like millennial. I was like, yeah, but no fucking weed shop. And like millennials. Millennials vote.

Tim Miller (50:10)

They live in Europe. Yeah, well, that was nerdy. Yeah, he's a chugimonial. There's nothing wrong with that. Here's Josh Barrows take. I'm just going to read it because it encapsulates everything I feel about the race. Mamdani won the debate for the same reason he's winning the campaign. He's the only candidate with a coherent vision that addresses New Yorker's concerns about affordability. He's the only one that actually seems like he wants to be mayor. This campaign has been kind of painful for me as a political centrist because Cuomo, the purported standard bearer of the political center, has no vision and is the architect of many of the policies that have led to the disorder in the city that he now decries. He also has personal behavior problems sometimes. Your side deserves to lose an election. This feels like one of those times. I agree with all of that and I guess I would go a little bit further, which is like, it kind of hasn't been that painful for me because number one, I don't live in New York, so the results don't really matter to me. And number two, Zoran's just likable. He's just likable. Those clips are funny. He's funny. He's great. He's trying. He seems like he's trying. He is not. There are strident leftists that support him that are annoying as fuck, and there are Strident leftists who are doing a bad job running other cities. Like the mayor of Chicago, he seems very likable and a little malleable and I don't know, that's where I'm at on it.

Peter Hamby (51:21)

Malleable. Yeah. He has apologized to police officers for previous posts he made. I agree with Barrow. Barrow sometimes, like, will write things that I agree with and just like, articulates them better than I do. Like, part of the reason Zoran's winning is all of those things. It's also that the field is fucking terrible. Like, it's like the California gov race. Like, someone with talent and a message step in. And this is also. There are no rules in politics anymore. But there are some fundamentals that I keep going back to. Like, if you think Back to the 2019 primaries, 2020 presidential primaries for the Dems, like, people jumped in the race and it was like, I should be president. Why? Like, what's your bumper sticker? Like, whatever it is, reminds me of.

Tim Miller (52:05)

When I met with Scott Walker to interview, to do his campaign. And I asked him, so why? What is going to be the rationale for this campaign? Why do you want to run? And he responded to me, isn't that what I'm hiring you for? And I was like, no, actually I'm 29.

Peter Hamby (52:17)

Wow, you did the Roger Mudd on Scott Walker and now look at you. You're a content man. Like Roger Mudd.

Tim Miller (52:23)

No, he's just eating ham sandwiches.

Peter Hamby (52:25)

But think about the. Think about the final competitors in that race. It was Bernie and it was Biden. And like, whatever you think about either of them, they had a clear and affirmative message. Biden's a little hazy, like, save the soul of America. Right, Whatever. But like. And people were blown away by Trump. And back in that primary in 2016, dude had a fucking message. Make America great again. Build the wall, Ban the Muslims. Like these. You point to these things. And Zoran has an affirmative message with base, let's say three key points at this point, like childcare, affordable housing, I forget what else. And he's asking for your vote. He's smiling. He thinks he doesn't deserve it. He worked hard. And all the victory laps that that campaign team took after the primary, well deserved. But like, it's not about tactics in the end. It's like, about what the candidate is saying, selling how he looks and how he connects with voters. And like, he's. He's his authentic self and whatever the annoying leftists are saying, great. But he also, by the way, if he had if he had been running against, like, if Eric Adams wasn't indicted, if someone other than Cuomo was able to coalesce the Republicans and normies and Sliwa wasn't in the race. Like, you know, I could. You could see it slipping away from Zoran, but it's a little. It's a perfect. One thing I do agree with you.

Tim Miller (53:43)

Though, we're never taking off.

Peter Hamby (53:45)

Exactly. Yeah. One thing I do agree with you on is I tried for a minute years ago to care about New York City politics. I've lived there twice, and I love California politics. I think we're going to talk about my home state of Virginia. Like, there's not, there's not a lot of learnings for the rest of the country that come out of the New York City race. Really, it's important.

Tim Miller (54:03)

Bloomberg ism. Did Bloombergism take the country by storm after he won three times? I don't remember.

Peter Hamby (54:08)

No. Giuliani is the same thing. Like, it's great. It's great for this huge city. It's interesting for this huge city, rather. We'll see if Zoron is as capable of manager. Like, he's got to be in rooms with like union people and he's got to be in rooms with business people and he's got to be in rooms with the COP union and is a 34 year old who, in fairness to Cuomo, hasn't really had a real job. Is he going to be okay in those rooms? We'll see. But he's a good campaigner, at least.

Tim Miller (54:34)

Took Obama a year to get it figured out. Really. And even his people would say that. All right, we got to do the other Virginia, New Jersey. As you said, you grew up in Virginia, so you follow that race closely. I want to talk about the governor's races first and then ask about Jay Jones. I did a little shtick in New York. Not. It wasn't a shtick. I expressed my true feelings in New York about these two candidates, Spamberger and Sheryl, and it's kind of like more sadness than an anger. I just, I want them to be great. I love, I love Abigail and Mikey. We probably don't agree on every single issue, but, like, they're about as close to, you know, the Bulwark staff consensus as any candidates are going to be out there in the country. Yeah, you know, it's just, it's felt a little milquetoast in both cases, and I think probably both of them will win. And so maybe this is an unnecessary complaint. Maybe this is more about my emotional needs than it is about actual, actual campaign strategy. But I don't know, it's pretty, it's pretty concerning to me that there's not any. Like the Democrats still continue to struggle to produce dynamic center candidates.

Peter Hamby (55:44)

Yeah, they're really boring. I mean, by the way, we should say going back to that midterm discussion, like the generic ballot, still not great. Trump is unpopular, Democrats are not popular. And the only way they're going to become popular is if you have compelling figures who capture attention, like Zoran, maybe Platner, if he can get through it. But the, the Bulwark Dems who are stars on the Hill. Right. Abby Abigail Spanberger went to my rival high school, Tucker. Mikey Sherrill, you know, celebrated class of 2018, pushing into the suburbs, talked about his future governors and presidential candidates, et cetera. Not lighting the world on fire on the campaign show at all. Right. And it's not like in the primary. Let me just do a quick breakdown of both of them. Okay. So Mikey is in New Jersey, Mikey Sherrill running against Jack Cittarelli, who ran last time, almost knocked off in a surprise. Phil Murphy. Different dynamics in these races. Mikey Sherrill has not proven herself to be like great on the debate stage, not great off the cuff. Neither of them have. And you know, maybe that's because, you know, statewide is different than running a house campaign. You know, it's just more attention, the issue set changes.

Tim Miller (56:50)

Maybe it's strategic safety I do just want to throw out there. Like Abigail Sandberg is running against a horrific opponent. And so it' kind of like maybe playing prevent defense is the right thing to do in that race. Is a narrow question of what is the right move for winning the Virginia governor race, which I think is a different question for like the broad question of how do Democrats, you know, have dynamic candidates.

Peter Hamby (57:10)

Right, Totally. And I've been, I've been saying the same thing. She's playing prevent, she's playing four corners, whatever. But in New Jersey, it's interesting. Like, I think most people around this race, which is Mikey, Cheryl's got a lead of like six points. Okay. Phil Murphy was winning right now by like eight or nine, only one by three. I think people think this race is going to get closer in the end. Although I do think most Dems think Mike Show's going to win. It's going to be close. An interesting reason is the voters there. Donald Trump only lost New Jersey last year by five points. There's a lot of Latino voters, like non college Latino types. There's a lot of white ethnic folks who like Trump. Like, it's a different state than Virginia. Cheryl has been a little more. And Phil Murphy's approval rating is lower than Trump's right now in New Jersey. So she's basically running as like. Like to extend this incumbent Democratic government in Trenton. So it's like a different dynamic than Virginia. You're right about Spanberger. I'm more fascinated by this race because I'm a homer in the primary. She was like, cutting balls off. Like, she was like, I will. I'm a just win baby candidate. Right? There was a. There's a right to work law in Virginia. And she was asked in the primary, in a Democratic primary, you know what, if your elected governor is a Democrat, would you get rid of right to work? She's like, no, yeah, we're good. And you know, that stuck its finger in the eye of a lot of people on the left and labor and activist types. But Virginia is first and foremost. You land in the Richmond airport, you see a video from Glenn Youngkin. And before that, you saw a video from Terry McAuliffe and going back to George Allen. We are a state for business. Like, it is the Virginia way to be a good business state. Look out for schools. It's like very focused on moderation. So, okay, I'm like, maybe Abigail will continue to do this and set up a model for other Democrats around the country. In the general. Well, you get to the general, we have multiple October surprises. There's the J. Jones text message thing we can talk about. Spamberger is like her answer on trans youth and sports terrible. And she's still dogged by that. But like, her opponent is a weirdo. She's terrible. If Republicans. I was talking several Republicans. Like, there's a world where Republicans win the LG race, win AG race and act and lose the governorship because Winsomerle Sears is so bad in looney. Youngkin didn't like she won her own primary back in the day. Youngkin's not helping her. She's just an odd person. And Spamberger campaign has done an admirable job putting her on television.

Tim Miller (59:34)

Isn't the Republican lieutenant governor candidate also a lunatic? Wasn't he. Isn't he the guy.

Peter Hamby (59:39)

You should like him. He's a gay. Gay normie, gay, moderate.

Tim Miller (59:42)

I mean, I don't like. I don't. I don't like MAGA gays. I don't know what makes you think that I. Do you see me hanging out with him?

Peter Hamby (59:48)

Sorry. I Shouldn't say that. He's a little less.

Tim Miller (59:50)

I guess he was a little less.

Peter Hamby (59:51)

MAGA he's like went to St. Christopher's he's like a talk show host. He just presents as a little less like maga e than the other guys. Anyway, I think the lower. The lower ballot races will be a little tighter. But Spamberger has. And Mikey, Sheryl, I've talked to plenty of Democrats for this. Underwhelming campaigns again, again, playing it safe in Virginia. Doge is an issue education. And Abigail Spinberger has done what we all said Democrats need to do after Biden lost. And this is why the trans attacks don't stick to her like they did to Kamala. She just immediately pivots to crime, safety and affordability, affordability, cost affordability. And she's been doing it relentlessly. And, you know, winsome Earl Sears is just running on trans stuff. And that doesn't, you know, that doesn't animate voters because Abigail can turn the page. She's not Kamala. She's not on camera saying transgender surgery.

Tim Miller (60:42)

Of all the government workers in Virginia. It's just like. It's just was Abigail. Abigail had won this election before it started.

Peter Hamby (60:49)

Yeah, basically, like, once she got in the race. But the state always reacts to whoever's in office. And here we are. And like, I. I think the race will. We. By the way, we have not had a high quality poll out of Virginia, unfortunately. Washington Post, Christopher Newport, Quinnipiac for several weeks now. And we need one. But, yeah, the last serious poll had spamberger up like 8, 9, 10.

Tim Miller (61:10)

Do you have any J. Jones thoughts?

Peter Hamby (61:12)

I mean, how much does your audience know about this story?

Tim Miller (61:14)

We know the fucking Bowler podcast listeners know everything, Peter. They know too much. I'm begging them to take a day off sometimes, you know, because you don't need to know everything. You don't need to know everything about the Attorney General's race in Virginia. But he sent the texts. For anybody who doesn't know he's a guy sent the text that, you know, basically said that he wanted the Republican speaker of the House to be killed and he'd, like, piss on the grave of the kids. And it's like. And he sent insane, insane, insane texts to another legislator, apparently. Maybe he was flirting with Corey Lewandowski style. It's just, like, really embarrassing stuff. Crystal and I talked about it on either this Monday or last Monday's show where he was like, he won very narrowly in the primary. Bill had voted for the guy on the other side. And here we are.

Peter Hamby (61:57)

This guy was in Richmond, thought to be a rising star in the party. I will say that. Hired a good team. One up and coming telegenic guy and family running against Jason Miaris, who's the attorney general. Chris Lacivita, client. Our list, Bulwark listeners will know who that is. Jay Jones, you are a moron, dude. Don't put that in text. You're a lawyer. Don't put that in text. But also, like, people joke in private with their friends about like, I want to fuck that guy up or, God, I wish that guy would die of a heart attack. This was like, he kept pushing it like, yes, they deserve to die and feel pain at a moment when. And unfortunately polls show this. Maybe Trump has won the argument here. Like, people blame Democrats and Republicans equally for stoking political violence in this country. Again, maybe it's the Trump assassination attempts. Charlie Kirk, maybe it's some, like, shooters out there. But that was not the case in the first term of Trump. Most Americans thought the Republicans and conservatives both caused and were the perpetrators of political violence. That has totally. It's a jump ball now. Like, people blame both parties and the Democratic number has gone up. And he. This is, by the way, this text is 2023. It's not from recently, but still, it's just like, I can see an undervote on the AG ballot. This is what I was saying earlier, like, I think the Dem is going to win the LG race at Gosla Hashmi. I can see some people just leaving that blank. Honestly, at the same time, this is a question. I love Bulwark feedback on this because I talked to my parents about it. This is, this will kill J. Jones's career whether he wins or not. Like, I just don't see him going anywhere. But do you go vote in Virginia as a Democrat or, or someone who just doesn't like the Republicans right now and make this, like, moral choice where you're like, I'd rather have this guy who seems like a looney Tunes guy who's clearly unqualified, making decisions as Attorney general, joining lawsuits against Trump administration, like Attorney General of Virginia. Like, they, they're, they can be pretty active. Or do I just not vote and let the Trumpy rising star win? Like, it's an interesting conflict. I, I can see in our partisan era, people not thinking about those things at all.

Tim Miller (64:05)

Sarah asked our audience, actually at the, at the Bullock Live event. And it was, it was mixed. And they started arguing amongst themselves. And then I was like, sarah, why Are you doing this?

Peter Hamby (64:13)

Like, we're trying to run the show.

Tim Miller (64:14)

Here, so we didn't, we didn't really work it up. People, Folks arguing about themselves. The Attorney General is like, you have to make a job, you have to make judgment calls. And so I'm not voting for either of those guys. That's my call. Anybody that is a supporter of Donald Trump, I don't want to be a top law enforcement official. Anyone that's wishing death upon children. I don't want to be a top law enforcement official. So I don't, I don't have to.

Peter Hamby (64:33)

Choose beyond the content of text that are terrible. You're absolutely right. These things are about something bigger and it's about judgment.

Tim Miller (64:41)

Yeah.

Peter Hamby (64:41)

And like, maybe you're drinking and flirting with another state legislator. Like, okay, bad judgment. Like, don't do that.

Tim Miller (64:49)

Yeah, bro, sorry.

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Tim Miller (65:22)

Okay, we are one hour into this podcast and I need to bring up the fact that the government is shut down. It's so weird. Like, it's so, like, this is the weirdest shutdown. Like, it's. The vibes are very strange about it. I think it's because, like, traditionally the presidents would not want the government to be shut down. Right. And so there's a push and pull where, like, you have, like, radical right wing guys that are trying to shut down the government that are happy for it to be shut down because they don't want government services to go out, they don't care about them, versus, like a Democratic administration where they want to keep the government open because they care about good government and they care about such things. Now we have a situation where it's like, neither side is really incentivized to come to the table for good reason on both sides. Like, I think the Democrats rightly think they're kind of winning on this politically. They're raising the salience of health care. They're finally showing they have some backbone. The Republican side, they're like, okay, well, we'll just not pay for the programs. We don't like, and so it's just kind of like sitting there. It's a very. It's a very strange, strange, like, fight for me. What do you make of it?

Peter Hamby (66:26)

Well, a couple thoughts. One, and I wrote about this for Puck. I think Democrats, for the first time this year figured out, because they were all on the same page, from AOC all the way to Hakeem Jeffries, up to Schumer, Bernie, whatever, governors, to, like, they came up with a message. And then it was the first time they figured out how to use the Internet and the creator economy and podcasters to get a message out and not just MSNBC. And I wrote about how in the first 48 hours after the shutdown, talking to a bunch of sort of data people and Democrats measuring sort of web engagement, like, JD Vance got up on stage and thought they had won the sombrero meme argument. They got fucking cucked, man. They lost, like, Republic. Like, they didn't have a message. No one bought the illegal thing. And they were just so cocky to think that, like, I talked to Leanne Caldwell, my colleague, about this, too.

Tim Miller (67:18)

Shut down.

Peter Hamby (67:19)

No, but we go into. As a reporter, like, you go into the shutdown, you're like, who's going to, like, win the. Like. I think a lot of reporters thought that Democrats were gonna lose, like, the public opinion on this and were surprised that they won. And, like, of course Trump controls the government. Republicans control the government. And the fact that Trump also, in the middle of that, went out and said, I'm going to use this opportunity to fire workers. Like, what normal person would hear that even in passing and think that Republicans are the benevolent actors, the good government actors in this situation? The thing with the winning, the healthcare messaging in the first few days, you know, Taylor Swift album came out the next day. Like, people, attention spans, move on. Brendan Buck tweeted yesterday there was no stories about the shutdown in the print edition of the Washington Post. Maybe New York Times or Wall Street Journal, probably the Washington Post. But that's. That's wild. And maybe. Tim, this sounds crazy. I'm not one of these 750,000 government workers. I'm not someone who's, like, relying on certain government services right now that I can think of. But, like, like, is this exposing airports? Yeah, sorry, Burbank, but is this exposing that government shutdowns aren't as big a deal as we've been told about for these many years? You know, I mean, I'm gonna regret this if there's fucking plane crash.

Tim Miller (68:40)

Especially the way they're going.

Peter Hamby (68:41)

It seems like things are. This is what's weird about it. Things are going on apace.

Tim Miller (68:47)

Yeah. Because it's like partial. It's not a real government shit. That's fake. Like they're just keeping the stuff open. That's what I'm saying. That's why there's no incentive for anybody to come to the table table. Because anything that's like really annoying, they're just paying for. Like they're paying the soldiers now. And so eventually the rubber will beat the road. And. And I've already got some emails from people on various things. Like people that work in at faa, people that aren't getting paid. Like there will event. Like there will be real problems. And I mean some people are already dealing with like missed paychecks and stuff. So like some things are already happening. But I just mean like problems that are significant enough. Enough to force the politicians to act right. And like, yeah, yeah.

Peter Hamby (69:26)

That guy, like when I wrote posted the Puck article again, which was filled with data and evidence, that guy, comfortably smug, like tweeted at me like. Like the headline was Democrats are winning the message war finally. And he retweeted me being like, lol, Go look at every poll. Like it's. It's just night and day again. Republican Democrats need to continue pushing this health care thing to get back in the attention economy.

Tim Miller (69:49)

And the other thing, people are gonna start getting their premiums. Exactly. They are already some people. But more and more, we're at that time the new bills Open enrollment starts.

Peter Hamby (69:59)

November 1st and people are going to be like, oh shit. And we'll see what Mike Johnson does then.

Tim Miller (70:04)

Last thing, you have been hassling me for a year or more about doing a music podcast. Unfortunately, my podcasting plate is extremely full. I podcast too much for my take. So I don't have time to do a music podcast with you though. I'd love to spend time with you, but I want to give you a chance right now to show what that would be like. Do you have a music hot take you want to share with people before we leave?

Peter Hamby (70:23)

You sent some notes. You want to talk about geese? I do have a music hot take. People who've listened to us yap about this before. No, we have a wide pallet and lots of interest. I have a rant about the bad bunny complaints from the right.

Tim Miller (70:36)

Okay, great.

Peter Hamby (70:37)

These fucking nerd losers who like, couldn't talk to somebody at a party in high school or college and it's defined the rest of their life. Megyn Kelly, Ben Shapiro, whatever Complaining. Benny Johnson complaining about Bad Bunny, like, as if he's un American. Like, it is the dumbest shit in the world. Puerto Rico is American. There are lots of Puerto Ricans in Orlando, Florida and fucking New York, whatever. Wherever you go, you know that Bad Bunny is the most famous artist in the entire world. This goes back to, like, when people like Dan Quayle would complain.

Tim Miller (71:15)

Brian Taylor behind Taylor.

Peter Hamby (71:16)

Not according.

Tim Miller (71:17)

He's more famous than Taylor around the world.

Peter Hamby (71:19)

No, he's not. Well, maybe he is. According to. Sorry, I should say according to chart metric, like recent albums, etc, he's the top artist, I think, with more songs from an album with over a billion streams. Over Olivia Rodrigo, over Ed Sheeran, over Drake and Post Malone. Like, this guy. This again, this goes back to, like, Dan Quail, Tipper Gore, like, grudges I have. But when they were complaining about rap music and from N.W.A. all the way through fucking, like, Tupac or, you know, whatever else. White people are the ones listening to this stuff. Like white people like Kendrick Lamar. But also, like, Bad Bunny's most recent album isn't some just, like, stupid reggaeton album. It's like this beautiful, like, homage to Puerto Rico and salsa music that's fused with, like, it's great. And I like, I. I've come. I didn't like reggaeton at first. I went to Columbia a few years ago. I, like, read up on J. Balvin. I love Carol G. Like, she's playing at Coachella next year. Like, Bad Bunny is awesome. And they don't like him because I think he endorsed Kamala. But the fact that he speaks Spanish is just so that. That's the reason. I think it's just so racist and so dumb, but also just, like, fucking have a drink and have some fun instead of being a stick in the mud. Like, these people are such a losers when it comes to culture. None of them play fantasy football. None of them fucking know how to gamble. None of them know anything about music. Their entire personalities is politics. And in any other era, we would shove those people in a locker. It's so fucking stupid. I love that bunny go in a locker.

Tim Miller (72:56)

Ben Shapiro. All right, my geese take is this. Listeners haven't heard about geese. They are the hot. They're the hot young indie rock Gen Z band. Basically, the best way to describe them is they're kind of like. They're sort of like a post punk. They kind of have like a. A vibe of, like, television. I don't know if you remember that song Marquee Moon. They kind of sound like that a little bit, I guess I would say. I think somebody's like. It's like the Strokes have. The Strokes guys had kids and they went to art school and got weird and so like, there's a little bit of that. That's a good way to describe them. And I was so, so. I saw you do the so so thing. I was so, so in the first record or two as well. But the lead singer, Cameron Winter, did a solo record. It's unbelievable.

Peter Hamby (73:34)

That's good. That's a good album.

Tim Miller (73:35)

It's unbelievable. It's really good. It's emo, it's soft boy. If you want crying boy music, it's for that. The Geese record is more hard rock and more punky.

Peter Hamby (73:46)

There's a little curmudgeonly millennial dad thing going. Oh, I can call myself a dad rock guy now that I have a.

Tim Miller (73:51)

Kid millennial dad now. Congrats.

Peter Hamby (73:52)

You see the Gen Alpha, Gen Z kid kids, like, you see some videos of them. Like they had a pop up show in New York and people were like jamming out to them. And like mj, by the way, MJ Linderman has sort of captured their attention too. The older guy is like, oh, like there's so many other cool bands that are like, better than Geese out there. But if we can get Gen Z to care about guitars again and noise because like, I love edm, I love house music, I love rap, like, I love, like, I love everything but. But you go to Coachella, man, there are no guitars. And we need more guitars in our lives. And if Geese is doing that, more power to him.

Tim Miller (74:29)

Exactly right. This is why the take is not curmudgeonly dad. I'm the opposite curmudgeonly dad. Yeah. I had an initial curmudgeonly feel about it. Like it didn't land with me, but I spent more time with the record the Alpes de Cocaine as relevant to the beginning of the topic with Venezuela song, which doesn't mention cocaine at all, is just beautiful. And we'll take people out with it.

Peter Hamby (74:51)

Not Bad Bunny.

Tim Miller (74:53)

No, not take people out with Bad Bunny. To me, that video of the Youngs, I like it because the only argument against us moving towards dystopia and letting your friend Sam Altman and all of these awful AI slop practitioners ruin everything about our society. When I have Cuban on, his argument was that eventually people will crave the tangible, right? And that there will be like a backlash against it. And after going through a long period where like actual performers that Play instruments are kind of like on the outs at music festivals. And, you know, EDM artists, I love EDM too, but like that EDM was on the rise. Like the idea that maybe the Geese boys can be a sign that people, that young people really are craving folks that are doing tangible art. I'm encouraged by that.

Peter Hamby (75:46)

Or just getting in a room with. This is a Scott Galloway take. But like getting in a room with people, drinking, putting your phones down, could be a sweaty bar. It could be like a club in Brooklyn, whatever. And seeing a band and just understanding your. That's why we like music in the first place, man. Like understanding your humanity and the shared experience, you know? And I think we see New York Times sort of style trend pieces about this. It's hard to tell whether it's real. Although the trend of having the dangly earplugs Instead of the AirPods you're doing right now, that's apparently becoming clear. My friend Mike Linton, I was visiting this weekend. My college buddy said he got his daughter Olivia a CD Walkman, and she likes to collect tapes. And I'm like, She's like, I think she's 16, 15, 16. I'm like, okay, good, good. If the younger folks are figuring out phone habits and managing it by balancing it with tactile real world experiences, I root for that more than. More than anything in our society, honestly.

Tim Miller (76:45)

All right. Amen. Peter Hamby. Enjoy the football game this weekend. Go Vols. Everybody else, go Vols. We'll see you back here on Monday for another edition of the Bulwark Podcast with Bill Kristol.

Peter Hamby (76:55)

Peace.

Musical Outro Singer (76:56)

You can stay with me, baby you can stay with me and nobody would care. You can stay with me, you can stay with me. Just pretend I'm not there. Like a sailor in a big green boat. Like a sailor in a big green coal. You and me free? You can be free and still come home. It's all right. I'm all right. You can change, you can change, you can change, you can change, you can change, you can change, you can change, you can change, you can change baby, you can change Instead will choose me. Like a sailor and a bear green boat Like a sailor and a bad green co. You can be free, you can be free. Just come home, please. I'm alright. It's all right. It's fine.

Tim Miller (79:25)

The Bulwark Podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.