The Gen Z Activist Taking On Outrage Culture

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Chris Cuomo Project

Episode: The Gen Z Activist Taking On Outrage Culture

Date: October 21, 2025
Host: Chris Cuomo
Guest: Manu Meel (CEO, Bridge USA)

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Overview

In this episode, Chris Cuomo sits down with Manu Meel, a young activist leading Bridge USA, a rapidly growing Gen Z movement focused on bridge-building and constructive civic dialogue. The conversation explores the roots and dangers of outrage culture, the role of social media in amplifying division, and how Gen Z is pushing back against radicalization. Manu shares personal stories, practical strategies, and the philosophy behind his organization, arguing passionately that dialogue, not division, is the path forward for democracy and social change.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Problem: Social Media, Algorithms, and Outrage Culture

• Manu describes the current climate as an "outrage industrial complex" (03:56), where algorithms and 15-second content feed anger and division, recruiting young people through emotional manipulation.

• Social media radicalizes not just the young but people in general by reinforcing echo chambers and exploiting their emotions for profit (02:44).

  "You recruit people with anger and you keep them with joy."
  — Manu Meel (01:07)

2. Bridge-Building in the Age of Outrage

• Manu’s unique strategy: Use the same tools—outrage and anger—but redirect them toward building bridges and reclaiming agency from the systems exploiting users.

  "Bridge building and dialogue is actually the ejection button out of the exploitation machine. It’s a way for you to reclaim...your free agency."
  — Manu Meel (03:56)

• The shift: open hand (dialogue) instead of closed fist (anger) as the strategy for change in contemporary democracy, though it’s not always the answer (05:23).

3. Outrage Sells—But So Can Counterculture

• Chris challenges Manu: Algorithms reward rage bait, not reasoned dialogue.

• Manu asserts that while outrage sells, there’s an untapped hunger, especially among young people, for something countercultural—which now is civil discourse.

• Bridge USA’s recent explosive growth on social media (from 7,500 to 35,000 followers in a month) cited as evidence (09:15).

  "Rocket fuel burns quickly...We have sustained burn. We have love, we have joy."
  — Manu Meel (10:26)

4. Changing the Incentives: Can Joy and Dialogue Go Viral?

• Chris presses on the practical barriers: "Don’t you have to change the algorithm to have real change?" (16:15)
• Manu predicts the craving for difference will eventually make bridge-building content stand out: "When someone sees something different...they’ll hang on for that extra five seconds. And I think the algorithm is going to push that more and more." (19:31)
• Case Study: A Bridge USA video had little traction until a key political event changed the mood—then it exploded with engagement, validating this "readiness for hope" (18:24).

5. Real Life Bridge-Building: How It Works

• Personal story: Manu’s immigrant upbringing made him a natural bridge-builder—moving and making new friends every two years (12:53).

• Founding story: Began at UC Berkeley after the Milo Yiannopoulos protests; initial discussions proved people crave real connection but don’t believe it’s possible at scale (41:36).

• Bridge USA’s events always start by establishing clear norms:

  1. Listen to listen, not respond
  2. Don’t interrupt
  3. Debate arguments, not people
  4. Represent yourself, not groups (48:15)

• Moderator training and peer enforcement of these norms leads to social disincentives for bad behavior.

  "There’s a social disadvantage to being an asshole."
  — Manu Meel (49:38)

• Success is measured not by "winning" but by understanding the reasons for the other side’s beliefs—building trust and empathy instead of just agreement (50:18).

6. The David and Goliath Dynamic

• Manu and Chris discuss the American love for underdogs and how bridge-building is, in a sense, the ultimate underdog effort—going against the grain and being disruptive through dialogue rather than outrage (35:15).
• Modern American politics sees even privileged people claiming underdog status, showing how deep the appeal runs (36:55).

7. Scaling Bridge USA & The "15-Second Sell"

• The "15-second sell" for civility:
  1. You’re being exploited—turned against family and friends for someone else’s profit.
  2. They want your vote/like, not your well-being (46:33).
• The challenge: Transform norms and prove that constructive disagreement can be empowering, cool, and scalable.

8. Assessing Success, Pitfalls, and the Path Forward

• Dialogue as disruptive, compelling content—but hard to capture (and scale) genuine vulnerable moments on camera (65:30).
• Chris draws comparison to historical moments like John McCain’s viral defense of Obama—unexpected bridge-building goes viral because it’s rare and authentic (65:05).
• Gen Z’s apathy (and radicalism) partly comes from the false sense that democracy is old and broken; Manu reframes it as "we’re at the start, not the end" (68:24).

9. Choosing a Side: The Real Divide

• Manu makes clear: "I am on a side. I’m on the side of conversation over conflict" (72:05).

• Argues the true political divide is now between the open-minded and the closed-minded, not left-right (29:13).

  "The real divide in this country is not between left and right. It’s between people that are open-minded and closed-minded."
  — Manu Meel (29:13)

10. Future Plans & Closing Thoughts

• Chris proposes a national series of Bridge USA events in election battleground states, to be televised as an antidote to toxic debate formats (74:36).
• Suggests flipping the typical debate script to find common ground and agreement, not just highlight differences (75:54).
• Both agree: conversation is the cure, even though the incentives are stacked against it. It’s the only sustainable path to a better politics and a stronger democracy (77:29).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Outrage and Joy

  "You recruit people with anger and you keep them with joy."
  (Manu Meel, 01:07)

• On Social Media Algorithms

  "We have an outrage industrial complex that recognizes and understands that we’re all pawns in a game."
  (Manu Meel, 03:56)

  "What is easiest to monetize? Outrage. And that is why the Greeks gave us the word demagogue."
  (Chris Cuomo, 15:31)

• On Effectiveness of Hopeful Content

  "After that tragic assassination...the American people are exhausted and they’re now going to vote and act with their click because they understand."
  (Manu Meel, 19:31)

• On the New Divide

  "The real divide in this country is not between left, right. It’s between people that are open minded and closed minded...I think we’re in a battle between two theories of change."
  (Manu Meel, 29:13)

• On Moderation Founding Story

  "My friend Ross...said, let’s forget policy. Let’s lead with vulnerability. Let’s talk about people’s moms, dads, backgrounds...the next 75 minutes...it literally transformed and came to this point that we radically underestimate the power of human connection."
  (Manu Meel, 43:32)

• On the 15-Second Sell

  "You’re being exploited. You’re being turned against your mom, your dad, your sister...They want your vote and they want your 'like.' They don’t care about you."
  (Manu Meel, 46:33)

• On Events and Norms

  "Suddenly there’s now a social disadvantage to being an asshole. That’s essentially what that does."
  (Manu Meel, 49:38)

• On Hope & American Experiment

  "The United States is not at the end of its story; it’s in chapter one or two."
  (Manu Meel, 68:24)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Intro & Definition of the Problem — 00:28–03:50
• Social Media's Radicalizing Effects — 02:35–03:51
• Recruiting with Anger, Retaining with Joy — 01:07–03:56
• Explaining the Overton Window, Social Media Incentives — 10:49–15:31
• Real Life Experiences: Origin Story & Why Dialogue Works — 41:36–46:33
• The 15-Second Sell for Bridging — 46:30–47:09
• How Bridge USA Events Work — 47:49–50:18
• Scaling and Viral Moments — 65:05–68:24
• The Real Divide: Open-minded vs. Closed-minded — 29:13–33:04
• On Choosing Sides in Polarized Times — 72:05–74:36
• Future Series Proposal for Election-Year Dialogue — 74:36–75:48
• Final Thoughts: Conversation Is the Cure — 77:29–79:58

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Conclusion

Chris Cuomo and Manu Meel deliver a hopeful but deeply realistic exploration of modern outrage dynamics and the possibilities of countercultural, Gen Z-powered bridge-building. While algorithms and attention economies reward division, Bridge USA shows the hunger for something more sustainable—dialogue, connection, and true understanding. The episode offers practical inspiration for anyone exhausted by rage culture, and a playbook for scaling meaningful conversation in the 21st century.

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Essential Takeaway:
Even in an environment dominated by outrage, there’s a powerful, growing, youth-led movement for constructive dialogue. The challenge is scaling it, selling it in seconds, and making conversation—and not conflict—the prevailing norm.

"I am on a side. I’m on the side of conversation over conflict...Wouldn’t it be awesome to be on the side of the people that are trying to pull off the greatest experiment in the history of humanity? Count me in."
— Manu Meel (72:05–73:38)

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Listen if you want:

• To understand Gen Z activism beyond stereotypes
• Real-world tactics for building dialogue on polarized campuses
• Insight into how hope and counterculture can challenge outrage—and maybe win

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For more, follow The Chris Cuomo Project and learn about Bridge USA at bridgeusa.org

Transcript

[Chris Cuomo]

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[Manu Meel]

Measure at no cost.

[Chris Cuomo]

Rules and restrictions apply. We all know what's wrong, but I have somebody who has the solution to our political division. I'm Chris Cuomo. Welcome to the Chris Cuomo Project. So we all know what's wrong, but how do you get people away from what is amplified by the algorithms, away from the rage bait? You know how you don't. You're about to meet somebody named Manu Meal. And not only do I believe he is an instrument of hope for the young people that we're also worried about right now in this society, but he put together an organization, an effort, an initiative, a dynamic called Bridge usa, which doesn't negate outrage, but it uses it in a different way to hook people on something that is better than division. How? Why. Why is it growing so much? Why is there actually hope? See? Manu, thank you very much for making time for me. I told you we were going to work together.

[Manu Meel]

Chris, thanks for. Thanks for having me on. I don't think you'll regret it. Hopefully, we'll see.

[Chris Cuomo]

So educate me, handsome. What is the problem?

[Manu Meel]

So I think the problem is exactly what you and I were just talking about, which is that we live in a world in which young people, and people in general get their content in 15 seconds. And that's how we get our information, that's how we get our news, and that's what the algorithms privilege. And so the question is, what sells in 15 seconds? And a fascinating mentor of mine recently said that you recruit people with anger and you keep them a joy. And I think the problem is how do you actually recruit people into the work of bridge building, which is what I focus on in civic dialogue through that lens, which seems counterintuitive, because I don't think we have a problem keeping them. And people love the work of talking to people that are different than them and getting engaged. But the recruitment with anger, I think is the critical problem to solve for. And that's what we're trying to think about, how to Do.

[Chris Cuomo]

What do you think of the idea that social media has made younger people uniquely vulnerable to radicalization?

[Manu Meel]

I think it's true, but I don't think it's just younger people. I think it's people in general. One of the things that I've learned doing this work, and you've been doing it far longer than I have, is building these Bridge USA chapters. We have college chapters all across the country. We've got 105 chapters right now. Public schools, elite schools, small vocational schools. It's that human beings are human beings across the board, whether they're in Georgia, whether in Russia, whether they're in Germany, whether they're in UC Berkeley. And that is that we like to have our views reinforced and then we like to have fire fueled on those views. Because who doesn't like to feel like, hey, I'm the person that's right and I live in an echo chamber. So I don't think it's just a young people problem, but I actually also think there's a lot of opportunity in this moment, especially after the tragic assassination of Charlie Kirk, who's someone that, you know, while I disagreed often on form and style with someone that I respected, I mean, it takes one to know one and you understand what they were working on. Since that moment, I've seen a tide turning and the question is, how do you capitalize on people's desire to break out of this mess? And I actually think we have an opportunity to recruit with anger. And that's what I'm really interested in thinking through.

[Chris Cuomo]

Well, as a bridge builder, how do you recruit with anger?

[Manu Meel]

People are being exploited. You talk about this all the time. We have an outrage industrial complex that recognizes and understands that we're all pawns in a game. And the worst thing that you can tell a young person is you're being used. Nobody likes being used, especially our kids, especially our college students. And I think for the last 20, 25 years, especially since 9 11, you know, I'm, I'm 26. I was born around 9 1998. I graduated high school at the first Trump election. I graduated in 2020 from college, which was the pandemic, the insurrection, the, the, the first Biden election. Now we're seeing students graduate into the second Trump election. The fact is that we've been primed to have our feelings and views exploited. And when we operate in a world in which people are being exploited, the question becomes that bridge building and dialogue is actually the ejection button. Add the exploitation machine. It's a way for you to reclaim, as you say, your free agency. And when you meet a student on campus for the last 20 years, the closed fist is what you feel like is the way you create change in the world. The open hand is what cowards do. And that equation is now different. The open hand is the way forward. That's the way you create change at this moment. And here's the critical last thing I'll say on this, because you have a far reaching audience of people that are on left, on the right, all across the place. Manu, is the open hand always the right thing to do? No, it's about the time and place you live in in a democracy. In the 1960s, Martin Luther King had a different approach. But then he recognized that after he got his Overton window shifted. The open hand is how you build coalitions. So we live in a moment where people fundamentally misunderstand each other's intentions. If you're trying to create real change in the world, you should ask yourself, is it dialogue or discord? And I think the answer's pretty easy.

[Chris Cuomo]

I want you to be right. But I don't know that you are right. So let's test it. Okay, how do we test it? If you wanna look at who is successful on social media right now, they are doing the opposite of what you are saying. Even after Charlie Kirk's assassination. I watched Ilhan Omar, I think this morning, saying, yeah, I'm not gonna say anything nice about a guy who sold hate. Even though I believe that she pushes globalizing, the intifada and active Jihadism on a regular basis, which she can only do because she has an oversampled population of uneducated Muslims in her district. Otherwise I don't know how she would get elected. But that's also shifting because more and more it's rage baiting. That's what gets the following. I've watched Don Lemon go from being a hash mark to, to his rage bait interviews with people on the street to make them feel that ICE are the storm troopers. And it doesn't matter if I agree with him or not. The way he's doing it is making people angry, getting up in Congress members faces and saying things that are never gonna lead anywhere. But they make people angry and they stoke their anger. And that's what is growing, because that's what the algorithms reward and amplify, which is outrage and provocativeness. So that everything you want. I don't see how there's an explain in your answer what the Overton's window theory is about. Because it seems like everything that is being rewarded is the opposite.

[Manu Meel]

I had a conversation with Don Lemon in April, and I, and I really appreciated it because this was something that I was testing on this conversation, which is, yes, you recruit people through anger. That's how Ilhan Omar recruits people. Who follows Ilhan Omar? Who's going to follow someone like Don Lemon? Who's going to follow angry lefties?

[Chris Cuomo]

Someone hate Trump and think he's a fascist? Who is turning our democracy into an autocracy? That is.

[Manu Meel]

Yes. The question is, how many of those people are actually out there?

[Chris Cuomo]

Millions. Millions and millions.

[Manu Meel]

There's, There's, there's probably about 9 to 10 million of them out there, and there's probably 9 to 10 million on the other side. Now, the United States is 350 million and growing, counting. So, and you know this better than I do, 9 million plus 9 million is 18. Now, let's say 30% of that 350 million are kids, okay? Under the age of 18. I don't even know. I'm just pulling that out of my ass. But let's say it's. Let's say you got 200 million people left. That's our target market. Their target market is saturated and capped. And what the greatest social change makers of the 20th century, from Mahatma Gandhi and the Salt March in 45 to Martin Luther King, 60s civil rights to Nelson Mandela in the 90s in South Africa to Barack Obama to Donald Trump, is what they understand is, how do you reach the silent majority? The 9 million people that follow Trump now to the core were not active until the Tea Party came online. So the question to me is, you're describing the status quo, and I think you and I are aligned on this. The question is, how do you actually execute against the opportunity? Charlie, Kirk, Chris, here's what I deeply respect him for. You show up on a college campus in 2012, and you ask a young person, tell me what a Republican is. They'll be quiet, they'll be shy. They'll say, some country club, you know, bumpkin. You know, it's. It's someone in a suit, very educated. Now, you show up to a campus like uva, where I am right now, great effort. You gotta check out by the. Called the Karsh Institute of Democracy. They're doing some great work on this. You ask someone, what is a Republican? They'll say, they'll give you an image of a firebrand that is building something. So my response to that is we actually have to shift the conversation and the data Point I was just sharing with you when we hit record is Bridge USA till September 10th of 2025 had 7500 followers, which is negligent. Now we've been working our butts off. Our students have been hitting attendance records across the board, but no one's hearing about it since September 11, 2025 to today as we talk right now, we're growing at 100 followers an hour, which is, by the way, also drop in the bucket. But we're now at 35,000 followers and counting. We might be at 35.1 by the end of this conversation. There are efforts across the board that are scaling. So my point is that young people are actually hungry for a new type of leadership. And the Achilles heel of the people that we are, I wouldn't say fighting, but challenging is that rocket fuel burns quickly, but there's not a lot of it. It's not a sustained burn. We have sustained burn. We have love, we have joy. We just got to figure out how to beat that 15 second shot clock.

[Chris Cuomo]

Okay, next step of bursting your optimism is your own analogy of Overton's window. What is Overton's window? If, if you look up the theory real easy, it's a sliding scale where extremes are on both ends. And you're sweet spot, which is where this, this is where it comes from. Sweet spot as a euphemism, comes from this idea of finding that not middle, not middle, but that when you get inside of extreme, unthinkable. There is a range of popular and pragmatic where you'll find the most people, but not in a social media ecosystem. And that's the problem. If you were thinking, if Manu came to me and said, man, I'm thinking of running, man, I'm run running for national office and I gotta build a movement, we would be having the exact conversation you're having. That was Obama's whole thing. But in social media reality, which was a pivot point that began in Obama's first campaign, which he got ahead of the curve on into Trump, it's all social media. It's all the flex points at the end of Overton's window, at the sill and at the top of the frame of the window of fringe fury, and that's how he wound up getting elected the first time for sure. Second time was a little bit more complicated. So in that environment, when I go to visit my kid on college campus and there are people running around looking like Anwar Sadat, and they're mostly white and privileged, some of them are even Jewish. And they're saying from the river to the sea and all these other extreme things. Where do you see that as beckoning opportunity for reasonableness?

[Manu Meel]

I'll tell you, by the way, that my optimism has been burst many times over. I've been doing this work for nine years. I started off, Chris, as a pre med student. I had no interest in any of this stuff. My mom is still confused. She's like, what the hell is this guy doing?

[Chris Cuomo]

Where are your parents from?

[Manu Meel]

My parents are from India. They moved to the United States in 1997. I was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey. I then lived in India for the first six years of my life with my grandparents alone on and off while my parents were out in the U.S. u.S. Grinding to, you know, get their education and to become doctors and engineers. I then moved back and I moved every two years for the rest of my life till high school. I then went to high school in Boston. Here's why I tell you that now. I ended up in Berkeley of all places, because they were actually the only school that let me in. And I got off the wait list and I ended up there. So for the first 17 years of my life, that's when I went to College at age 17. I was one of the young ones. My entire life was meeting new people and not having friendships sustained beyond two to three years. And my entire life was about figuring out how to adapt and create space for other people so that I could create friendships. It was that simple. The work I do now is not rocket science. It was literally what I did for the first 17 years of my life. And it's what most people do in their daily life. When you start to see the work that way, right? It's not some thing that I'm serving you on a dish, right? It's not broccoli. It's dialogue is a survival tactic for humanity to actually create the greatest innovations in the history of the world. Humanity started off in tribes of eight, and now we're in eight billion. It was all because of the species's ability to communicate. You clip that, by the way, that that does well. And here's why. It's because people don't know how to sell this work effectively. There are a few of us like you out there doing it. I just don't think the volume exists. And I think this is a volume game. And the the conservative movement fig figure this out in 2012, 2013. People like Ben Shapiro were disparate and, and what they did was they consolidated. And then what they did was they just took their message and they pushed it through at high volume frequency. I tell you all this because my view on this is that for the longest time, I thought outrage was what sells, and I still believe that. But in the last month and a half, and especially after the Israel Palestine protests after October 7, I think what actually sells is what's disruptive and countercultural. I think counterculture sells actually more effectively. It's whatever cuts against the grain in that moment. Right now, you see another angry video on your clip, I guarantee you Instagram is seeing the swipe up on that be a lot faster. That's why I think they're putting our stuff out there and other people's stuff.

[Chris Cuomo]

You think they're changing the algorithms? Because I believe that that is the linking mechanism to your theory and your practice is the fact that these guys are making money doing the opposite.

[Manu Meel]

I agree.

[Chris Cuomo]

And with no responsibility. My favorite thing that was said at the town hall, which I'm sure is not resonating anywhere because nobody wants to hear this, who likes social media is that section 230 is way, way past its due date, which is, of course, the operative mechanism that insulates social media providers from litigation because they are not considered publishers. The way News Nation is, the New York Times is, et cetera. I believe that that is, you know, just absurd today, because what they do is obviously curate content and they amplify what they decide to monetize. And what they decide to monetize is what's easiest to do so as any business would. And what is easiest to monetize? Outrage. Outrage. And that is why the Greeks gave us the word demagogue. And even educated guys like you and me do not know the positive opposite of that word from the Greek, because.

[Manu Meel]

I did not know that demagogue started.

[Chris Cuomo]

Demagogue is a Greek word, and it comes from the ability of using prejudice and anger to rally. And I don't know what the positive opposite is of that word. I don't know. We never use it because it's not as effective to rally people on positivity. Like you say, your metaphor is better. It's jet fuel. It lights quickly, has a different flash point, but it burns quickly as well. Yes, but that's where we are, and that's what they're hyping all the time, is constant hits of jet fuel. Don't you have to change that to have any real change?

[Manu Meel]

I think so. I think so. But I have a different role to play in society. That's the battle space I'm operating in the battle space I'm operating in is the assumption the algorithm doesn't change. But what I think is critical to the algorithm is engagement. And this prediction might sound incredibly stupid. Great thing is, I've got nothing to lose because I ended up doing this work, not because it was my vocation. It's because, you know, there were a bunch of protests on my campus. I made some of my best friends doing it. I'll go, you know, try something else. But here's my prediction. My prediction is that the algorithms will not have to change, but joy and bridging will sell. It's not because it's good news bullshit. It's because it's different engagement. When someone sees something, right, you're gonna hit somebody over the head a hundred times with crazy content, and they're gonna keep looking at it. But I think what happens is in the middle of that hundredth clip, you get hit with something different. And I'll give you a story of this. Can I give you a story on this, please? Because I have a clear data point on this. Please.

[Chris Cuomo]

This is the beauty of the difference between having advertisers pay per block and having what really everybody's gonna have to move towards. And good. Cause fuck the advertisers for how they've been running the game for so long, which is subsc. So here we can talk as long as you want. Go ahead.

[Manu Meel]

Well, thank God for people like you building independent platforms, too, because that's what's fueling it, right? And it takes courage to do that. And I think that's. That's. That's something that you should be commended for, and a lot of other people should be, too. So here's my view on this. Last October, we had a really courageous student at our Pittsburgh chapter, University of Pittsburgh Bridge Pittsburgh, named Rachel. And she went to an event where Charlie Kirk and Vivek Ramaswamy showed up on campus. And it was one of those prove me wrong events. And she goes on camera and she says something like, charlie, I'm really glad you're here, but I have to say I deeply disagree with everything you're gonna say. But I want you to know that I have some of my friends standing behind you who are in the Turning Point USA chapter. And I know that the right way to engage you is to have a civic disagreement. Sounds great. We post that clip. Nobody saw it, nobody heard of it. Boom, it vanished. September 13th. Chris, our amazing man behind the social scenes, Adam Calder, pulls up that clip and posts that same Clip. Same music, same cuts. 42,000 likes in 15 hours. 2,700 and counting shares. Got a 7,000 followers. Why? It's because after that tragic assassination, and I think this is the hope in, in this sad moment we live in, is that the American people are exhausted and they're now going to vote and act with their clique because they understand. I think they understand. So you're getting a hundred pieces of bullshit and then suddenly hit with hope you'll hang on for that for an extra five seconds. And I think the algorithm is going to push that more and more. Now, of course you need real fixes. Of course you need real fixes. And I think that's going to happen. But my job is someone who's out there organizing thousands students to change the conversation is to recognize the battle space I operate in. And again, you know this better than I do. The best people in this country that have created change, people like Charlie understood the tools they have at their disposal, they got to execute. So we've got a 15 second window to recruit. That's our challenge. We have a whiteboard. 15 seconds, you got to recruit somebody. 15 seconds. What are you going to say? What are you going to do? And the biggest thing that we have on our side, they've got anger, we've got exploitation. And there's an example of this, actually, in the 90s, a whole group of tobacco company people that were against cigarettes met in Florida, all right? Because for the last 20 years, they've been putting up all these ads of people with crazy lungs and stuff. And it wasn't working. Wasn't selling. Cigarette smoking wasn't going down. So they had a, they had an idea. They said, hey, forget all this. You know, forget the guy that's croaking with cancer on his throat on tv. What if we just said your addiction is fueling the fat cats in New York City that run giant tobacco companies? And it worked. People don't like to be exploited. The emperor has no clothes. And man, when you, when you start to, when you start to see pieces, that emperor, you're like, oh, I want more, tell me more. And I think it'll work.

[Chris Cuomo]

Support comes from True Classic. And here's the part of the show that Greg loves most. All right, here's my biggest problem with shirts. Okay? I got two problems with shirts that I want to see if True Classic can deal with. Because they say they started with a simple mission. Bring premium comfortable clothing to the masses. Why? Because you want to look good, but you want to feel good. About it also. So it's about price point. But for me, it's about two things. Fit and durability. Fit and durability. Why? Well, one, I'm not exactly known for my fashion sense. Two, I like to have a quality garment and wear it often and clean it, versus having a lot of things. The older I get, the more I evolve, the more I give things away because I notice I just don't wear them. And a big part of that for me is about wearability and durability. What is wearability? Here's wearability. Wearability for me is, can I take this off and put this on in an easy way? Greg right now is incredibly intimidated by my traps, but he shouldn't be because I'm not here to hurt him.

[Manu Meel]

You haven't tried these on yet. I don't know if they're gonna fit.

[Chris Cuomo]

All right, so. But that's what I'm saying is that they said that this would be my size, right? You told me the size. You sent me the size, all right? And look, I. And I got it right, okay? So it's easy to put on. That really matters to me. Because if I have to stretch it around all of these different little man made lumps that I have on my body, I get frustrated and I don't like it. You can find these on Amazon, Target, Costco, Sam's Club, or just head to truclassic.como try them out for yourself. So I think here's what's being fair to you. What's being fair to you is that you are probably going to be right from a straight pendular. Right? I don't think we're cyclical as much as we're pendular here because we're locked in a binary system with the two parties, which are, of course, the root cause of this is that as uncomfortable as this is and is for them, in moments, it works best for them. Because the easiest, easiest way for Manu to beat Cuomo is to show that Cuomo is worse, not that Manu is better. That's too hard. So that's why when you buy commercials with a consultant, the ratio is usually 7 to 1. Hit ads versus proof of concept, which is proof of concept is, hi, I'm a new and you should vote for me because I believe in this and this and this, and I'll do a good job. That's positive about you. Seven for every one of that is Cuomo hates dogs, Cuomo kills puppies, and Cuomo wants to eat your lunch. Why? Because that's what works. So being fair to you, could it be that you will be right? But, man, is it early to tell right now because you are still riding the wave of the rage bait culture?

[Manu Meel]

Yeah, I think it's a very fair point. I think it begs the question of what does success look like? Right. I think. I think if I took your point farther, essentially what you're saying is, all right, Manu, the pendulum was here. Now the ball is a little bit closer down here. So maybe you're getting some likes, maybe you're getting some content, maybe even last a couple years, maybe you'll sell some more merch, but then it'll swing back. Right. And I think this raises the question of what are we actually trying to build towards? And I think the critical thing when this ball is swinging, to keep it there's for a longer time is people have to win elections on this type of platform. And people have to see that their followings and their content gets more engagement when they post this type of content.

[Chris Cuomo]

100%.

[Manu Meel]

It's simple. It's incentive space. And I think you have a very unique critical window. And that's why people like James Talarico, the guy down in Texas, is doing really well.

[Chris Cuomo]

Yes, I've had him on. I've had him on here and I've had him on Twitter.

[Manu Meel]

I think I saw that conversation, by the way. And I think I saw that conversation.

[Chris Cuomo]

I said to him, you're going to have to run for higher office. You know, and he was like, well, you know, he gave me the typical, oh, I'm really focused on what I'm now.

[Manu Meel]

And look what, you know, he's in Senate.

[Chris Cuomo]

He's going to run for Senate. And I think that it's a really interesting race for him. Now he is being.

[Manu Meel]

How do you think he's going to do?

[Chris Cuomo]

So I think here's why you don't know. There has been no money put against him yet. What do I mean by that? There's been no effort to make him undesirable yet. He's been doing the hard work of being seen as desirable. Now, does he run the risk of being limited out as another Buttigieg? Maybe, but he's a heavy Christian Buttigieg. So is that better than Buttigieg? Yeah. In America, if you're pushing your faith. I'm not saying Pete Buttigieg, Christian doesn't have faith. I'm not saying that. But Talarico leads with it. Okay. I think there's a saleability to that that is Very attractive. He's young, he's single. Does that mean he's gay? How does that work? He hasn't really broached that. I wish he never had to, but that's not how American politics works. And so there's been no money put against him yet to otherize him. So I can't really tell you how he's going to do. But I will say he or she who sits down or stands on the same stage with that guy have better eaten their fucking Wheaties because he is a deft, you know, a signature of your generation. You know, we've had you guys on camera since you popped out the shoot. So you are all telegenic, you know, you are all glib, you are all well spoken and conversant on camera. Remember?

[Manu Meel]

Right.

[Chris Cuomo]

In my generation you had to learn that you'd be one guy in person, another guy on tv. Now you guys are all the same all the time. If anything, you're better when you're on tv. So he has that going for him. It is too soon to say, especially in Texas, which is definitely not in the part of the Overton window that you want it to be. They always say it is, but it isn't. I don't know. But I do know this, he is proof of what you're selling.

[Manu Meel]

They will otherize him and I think they will critique him. And by the way, there's great people on the right that are rising as well, that are excellent in terms of their execution, their capacity. But here's my broader point, which is why I think we can actually still win even if the pendulum swings back. The negative partisanship, which it will, by the way, that's like the history of this country. I mean, the Constitution almost failed ratification. Right. Like our birth was unruly. Right. Which is why when I ask what does success look like, I'm not imagining some Kumbaya Republic. I think you need disagreement. I just think we need to course correct a little bit on how that disagreement happened. And I think you'd agree with that. But here's where I think a negative partisanship world actually still helps us. I think if we can succeed in changing the terms of the debate, I think if we can succeed in creating a new divide in this country, and I think a lot of people are trying, that's not a unique concept. But my view is that the real divide in this country is not between left, right. It's between people that are open minded and closed minded. It's what you talk about. It's between the Talaricos of the world and the MTGs of the world. Right. It's between the rokhanas of the world. Right. And then someone like the AOCs of the world. Right. I think we're in a battle between two theories of change. It's not actually about what that change is. I think what my generation is going to have to legislate is how do you create change? Because everybody wants change. And frankly, there's actually a lot of unity around some of the problems. That's why our politics right now is a horseshoe. And so in the world of negative partisanship, the two theories of change that have to fight each other is one is conflict, outrage, turn out your base. That is how I win and build a better world. It's actually not going to be about healthcare because both candidates are going to say, I want more money in your pockets and lower premiums. I think everybody's going to say that today. But the second theory of change is what this country's built on is this idea that talking to people that are fundamentally different than you is how you create plus one e pluribus unum out of many one that is the alternative. And in that world, I'm ready for that fight. I actually hope that that fight happens because what that means is that's going to simplify the debate to very simply not whether or not we should disagree. It's going to be about how. And I think that's really powerful. And I hope that someone like Talarico, even if he goes down, succeeds in doing. And I think that'll be effective.

[Chris Cuomo]

Beto o' Rourke was supposed to be that.

[Manu Meel]

Why do you think he. Why do you think he went down a different route?

[Chris Cuomo]

Well, I don't know that he went down a different route. I think he lost and then he lost again. But he was the hope for this of kind of kindler and gentler. Although those virtues are now seen as weaknesses in this society. Now they're not in terms of what you teach your kid. Right. That's the irony. They're not in what you expect from your employees. They're not in terms of what you want from your partner in life. They're not in terms of what you expect from your friendships and relationships. But in politics, we have abdicated that agency to a different dynamic and value system where I don't really care if Tom Holman took 50 grand. I don't know why you're talking about this so much. He said he didn't do it. It's an anonymous report. When it comes out, it comes out. But how about all these killers on the street? Like, that's what I'm afraid of, because all I'm primed for is my fears. Explain what you mean when you say politics is a horseshoe.

[Manu Meel]

I mean, very simply, the idea is that Bernie and Trump are actually a lot closer than someone like Obama. And, you know, Obama and Bernie. And some people might say, what, what are you saying? But when you go down their policy platforms and you go down the ways in which they're offering prescriptions, it's the populace versus the anti populace. It's the establishment versus the anti establishment. But that's sort of where I would see the horseshoe theory coming into play. But if I can just offer why I think people, especially in the influencer world, jumping on this establishment, anti establishment thing, why I think it's actually a false, it's a flashbang in our politics, is that the deepest divides in this country have, have actually not been about establishment, anti establishment. I think the deepest divides in this country have been about how you actually engage and listen and coexist with someone that is sitting right next to you. And when you're talking to an American and they're sitting at their dinner table, they're not thinking about the establishing the anti establishment. They're thinking, my neighbor down the street has a Trump sign. Is that going to threaten my kids when they're going on a bike ride? Or my neighbor down the street has got a giant LGBTQ flag. Is my kid gonna get indoctrinated on the way? On the by the way, has been the conversation on American dinner table since the start, which is why I think we are actually on the side of while it's not rocket fuel, we've got more sustainable fuel. And I think that's really powerful right now.

[Chris Cuomo]

Are you asking people to do what's hard when what we're looking for is easy?

[Manu Meel]

Oh, yeah. It's like trying to convince people to go to the gym. I mean, if everyone, if everyone went to the gym, they'd look like you. And, and, and, which is why, by the way, I don't think I would ever want to say maneu fights, Chris. You would literally just do a side by side comparison of our, of us standing with our shirts off. And I think it'd be pretty quick. I am picking up some techniques.

[Chris Cuomo]

Well, let me tell you something. This is a digression.

[Manu Meel]

Maybe you can educate me.

[Chris Cuomo]

I will take technique over strength any day of the week. I could train you for about 15 minutes, and 80% of the time would be concentrated on getting your mind around the idea of making violent choices. You know that expression choosing violence. I have been training, learning and teaching self defense for decades. Okay? I abandoned martial arts, boxing, all fighting. I don't do any fighting because self defense isn't about fighting. Fighting is rules, fighting is style. Fighting is dynamics of competition. Self defense is you taking your glasses off and sticking them in my eye, you know, and you'll be like, oh, that's terrible. But well, what are we talking about? Are we talking about guys who get us on campus when you and I do an event together? And they're like, you guys are fucking pinkos and you're not going home tonight. Cause we're gonna take care of this right now. And you wanna like talk to them. And I'm like, yeah, great, great, you'll talk to em after I knock em both unfucking conscious. Cause you know, you have to do what you have to do. Technique wins all the time. I can't tell you how many big fellows I have seen balled up, up because a female had foot stomped them, hit them in the throat and now had them on the ground. Technique wins. So never be that.

[Manu Meel]

That's actually, this is actually the funniest tangent because it actually links very strongly to basically you posing this idea of us being David and there's a giant Goliath out there. Right. Like not to stretch the metaphor, but.

[Chris Cuomo]

But.

[Manu Meel]

Yes, you've got 9 to 10 million people that are incredibly loud, but we've got a scalpel. And that scalpel is made of joy and it's made of happiness. It's made of excitement and interest. And the question is, how do you manipulate the tools of the moment and have good technique in executing a mission that frankly has always been the underdog in this country. And my favorite part about the David and Glad story, the idea of technique, the idea of me potentially beating you, which would be, by the way, I think that would sell. I think that would.

[Chris Cuomo]

Anything bad happening to me would be good for you. By the way, Indian.

[Manu Meel]

Indian, Indian nerd fights. Are you Italian?

[Chris Cuomo]

I am.

[Manu Meel]

Okay, Indian, Indian nerd fights. Italian. My grandpa would be rolling over in his grave. But I think like the, the reason why that story is so interesting is because America loves underdogs.

[Chris Cuomo]

Yes.

[Manu Meel]

And you're, you've been on PBD's podcast, right? And like I, I, I, I, I think about this a lot when he's talking America bets on countercultures. America bets on people that are climbing a mountain. And it's why people bet on Trump, it's why people bet on Obama. It's why people bet on Reagan, it's why people bet on Nixon, it's why they bet on fdr, it's why they bet on Lincoln. That's the story of this country, man. And so it's why they bet on the colonists. That's why the French bet on the colonists. It's underdogs taking down Goliath. And so. So when you cast it like that, I didn't even say bridging. I didn't even say dialogue. But now the person listening is like, oh, at least he's the underdog. I know that, right? What does he got to sell me?

[Chris Cuomo]

And that's why everybody wants to sell themselves. Have somehow victimized now. You know, it used to be that you didn't want to own being victimized. One of our big problems with mental health in this country is that people don't want to admit they have a problem because they get written off as weak and crazy and nobody wants to deal with them anymore. So there's all this stigma attached because everybody had to be seen as hard. Now what does everybody have to have to make a foray into politics? They need a hard luck story. I came up from nothing. My father was this, my mother was that. You know what I mean? I barely made it. You know, everybody's got to have that, otherwise they get written off as privileged. Even though we live in a country where what's the ultimate American dream? Wealth. But all of a sudden, the people who have wealth. And I was raised by one of those, by the way, Manu. My father, first generation, right. Was a real one. Anti elitist.

[Manu Meel]

I just finished his biography, by the way, in prep for this conversation. Mario.

[Chris Cuomo]

Yeah, he was. I'm so so with that book, but it's better than nothing. He was seen as an ethnic like you, not as a white guy. I am white. He was not. He was an ethnic. He had to share being valedictorian in college and law school with Irish guys because he was an Italian and they were kind of. He couldn't get a job on Wall street as a lawyer, even though he was a fucking genius. So he wound up in Brooklyn and he was constantly seen as a Mafiosi. And that's why my father hated all mafia things. The Sopranos, Godfather. He wouldn't watch them because he was like, you know, this has done nothing but destroy us. What's my point? My point is he was a real underdog. He was a real one. When I Got into an Ivy League school. He was upset and did not want me to go when, you know, anything went. And I made a choice to, like, go to a big law firm so I could pay off my, you know, debt. He was like, ugh, why?

[Manu Meel]

Which is funny. We're back to that now, by the way.

[Chris Cuomo]

Yes, but for the opposite reasons that he was. He was against it because they had held him down on purpose and for bad reasons. Reason. So he wanted to show them. He always wanted to show those people. Now, I believe it's being used as an artifice. I think it's a boogeyman. Everybody has to be victimized. Everything has to be unfair. Everything has to be some kind of instrument of us versus them, because that's what is selling. So this is the right point of the conversation to go to what you've come up with as a solution, which now, after Charlie Kirk's assassination, people now know Turning Point USA in a way that they probably didn't before. And they're growing leaps and bounds. Last night, their guy told me that they've had 130,000 new inquiries for chapters. And you have Bridge USA, which is why I fell for you in the first place. That Manu is one of the most impressive guys in the space of we can do better than this. And I'm going with the hardest group, which is young people in the place where we've seen the most extremism, which is on campus. And I'm gonna get people to talk to each other and how does it work? And why does it work?

[Manu Meel]

Work? So I. I'm really glad, actually, that you brought up your story about your.

[Chris Cuomo]

Your.

[Manu Meel]

Your father, because it's a story that's. That's interesting in that it had a lot of resonance and lost resonance and has resonance again. And it has that resonance because he was someone that showed up as an ethnic, and he built a legacy in this country. Right. And. And I bring that up because the common thread I've seen between a lot of interesting Americans that are first generation, you know, someone like me as well, is it's like you oftentimes end up doing something that you never wanted to or were interested in doing. So I'll actually tell you really quickly about how we started. The reason is because I think that people are going to understand why this thing is taking off now. And. And part of that is because I have no issue toiling away in obscurity. And the reason for that is because I fundamentally love what I do. And that is. Is how do you convince People that we radically overestimate how divided we are, and we radically underestimate the power of a dialogue. How did I come to that? So, Chris, I told you earlier, I came to UC Berkeley after getting off the wait list.

[Chris Cuomo]

See, even you have a hard luck story. Keep going, keep going.

[Manu Meel]

I know, I. And so I ended up in the Republic of Berkeley where I really cut my teeth, you know. So here's what happened. Right? Right. So February 2, 2017, I'm walking back from my math seminar and I hear helicopters overhead and I hear protests in the distance. Now, none of this is. This is all par for the course. This is Berkeley. What was different was I was walking past this cafe and you'll relate to see our past colleagues. And there's a window that was broken and it was shattered by protester. And inside it said, CNN UC Berkeley students protest Breitbart editor speech. Now, I didn't know what any of that meant, meant, but the television crew that was filming that segment was led by a woman named Kyung La, who was standing right next to me, and they were filming that. And that was sort of the breaking of the fourth wall. That was where I went from, I'm gonna try to be a doctor.

[Chris Cuomo]

And.

[Manu Meel]

And I've always had an interest in politics, but this thing is for, you know, as my grandpa always said, those. Those goody two shoe people that wear those suits, right? And now I'm suddenly a part of this, whether I wanted it or not. And so I walk into the middle of campus and there's a giant tree on fire in MLK Student union. I remember like it was yesterday. Walk past the Amazon store, which is broken in, by the way, that fact. Everyone in the protest united around that. At least the Amazon store got popped. So I walk into the center and there are hundreds of students. There's antifa, which, by the way, was a word that got popularized because that protest. There's a guy named Milo Yiannopoulos who had shown up to campus. He got popular because of that protest. And the next day, I walk on campus and we just start picking up all this. I mean, our campus had been vandalized by outside people, by inside people, and students were just hurting. And I distinctly remember, I walk into the center of plaza and I walk into a circle of students that are standing there, and one of them raised their hand and he's like, yo, I think we gotta host a discussion. Like, let's just have a conversation on campus. That's it. Nothing. No admin. Nothing. Let's just Have a conversation. And I thought that was a great idea. Now, that was incredibly naive, because anyone listening to this right now says, so you're telling me. And you throw out all the critiques. You're gonna get the most. The largest protest in Berkeley's history since the 60s, since MLK came to campus. And you're gonna get the protests and the protest to sit in a room, go back to being a doctor. And honestly, my mom would agree. And so I decide with my friend and a couple other people, and we're gonna host this conversation. We called it Bridge Berkeley. First discussion, we bring each other. Everyone. 70 people show up, which is a big deal for me. 30 of them leave immediately because they thought it was a civic architecture frat, because they thought we were literally building real bridges, because the logo was a Golden Gate bridge. So now you're getting the vibe of why it's so hard to burst my optimism. Because we started from rock bott bottom. So we have a second discussion. And this discussion, Chris, changed the trajectory of my life. And here's the point I'll get to. So we're sitting there and all these students are showing up. Some of them invited Milo, some of them protested Milo. Some of the admin are there. A faculty member in the back is there who. Who then became the chair of our board. And everyone is tight. Everyone is nervous. It's like that Thanksgiving dinner table conversation. Or it's like watching the YouTube comments. Everyone's clenched. And my friend Ross, who's now the co founder and chief operating officer at BridgeUSA, had this brilliant idea. He said, let's forget policy. Let's lead with vulnerability. Let's talk about people's moms, let's talk about people's dads. What is your background? Where'd you come from? And man, the next 75 minutes, it literally transformed and came to this point that we radically underestimate the power of human connection. So then the question becomes, how do you scale this thing? How do you grow this thing? Because you got that one conversation. What's the impact? So this spread to campuses. There are already two chapters, chapters at Notre Dame and at Colorado Boulder. It grew in 2020. I graduated, took this thing full time from 2020 to 2024. I call the years of obscurity. Why? Because we wanted to know three things. One is, how do you actually sell this thing in 15 seconds? 2 is, how do you get young people to show up to a conversation and feel like they're the courageous ones? Because young people will follow anything that is Courageous and different. And three, if you. Is how do you turn this. And you know, this is where I had deep respect for someone like Charlie into frankly, a turning point for where young people are now energized. And so I'll wrap with this, which is Bridge USA's job is fundamentally to empower young people to have these constructive conversations, but to build an identity. And when you build an identity, that is powerful, and that's what the greatest social change makers of our time have done, that's what you're doing with the concept of being a free agent. That's what someone like President Trump did with magazine, and it's what we're doing. And the final piece of this is this is not about giving people the skills of bridging. Everyone has these skills. I firmly believe that because they're fundamentally human. My job is to win the norms battle. How do you make dialogue the norm of the moment? It's not always the norm, but it's the norm of the moment, and that's what we're doing.

[Chris Cuomo]

What is the 15 second cell?

[Manu Meel]

The 15 second cell is very simple and it's twofold. First is you're being exploited. You're being turned against your mom, your dad and your sister. Second, why? It's because they want your vote and they want your. Like, they don't care about you. They care about their pockets. That's it. Now. Now you ask. What are you talking about? What are you talking about? I'm being turned against my mom. Wait, I just had that conversation with my mom last week at Thanksgiving dinner. Table. Table. And we haven't talked in a week. Oh, I get it. Tell me more.

[Chris Cuomo]

So you have the event. You and I show up. You are a MAGA guy. I have a keffiyeh on. And I believe that we both believe on one way or another that the country has to burn because of what it has done to us. Or so we are told. And now we're going to debate healthcare. Okay. And what's happening with the shutdown? How does Bridge USA make it different than you're a fucking liar, and that's all you guys do is lie. How does it work? How do you make it work?

[Manu Meel]

Human beings are social creatures. And you'd be shocked at how quickly we abandon the algorithm when we're in person. Person. So I'm going to give you a great example. In 2019, one of the biggest problems at Berkeley was student homelessness. Student homelessness. Berkeley didn't have enough housing for all these kids that are coming up. Housing Got too expensive, and all these kids are now homeless. Now, Berkeley also has a resident homeless population. So we partner with this organization called the College Debates and Discourse Alliance.

[Chris Cuomo]

They.

[Manu Meel]

They work with another organization called Braver Angels, acta, you may have heard some of these folks, and they modeled this concept of a Braver Angels do debate. So we decide, like the freaking tactical geniuses that we aren't. That we're going to invite the people that are at People's park in Berkeley that are actually homeless to this conversation. We're going to invite the kids that are homeless to the conversation, the folks that represent their population. We're going to invite some of the students that want more housing, and then we're going to invite the people that are just curious, you know? And the person that was at People's park shows up to this dialogue, and he starts getting angry and he says, like, I'm going to protest this thing. I'm going to protest this thing. Exactly what you'd expect. And it wasn't me. It was actually the director of this debate, I think it was, told this person, give us five minutes. Give us five minutes. He said, what do you mean, five minutes? He said, give us five minutes. Okay, I'm going to sit here, I'm going to listen. Listen. By the end of that debate, Chris, this guy logged the most speaking minutes of anyone in this audience. Why? It's because we do three things. The first is every conversation. And this was a Braver Angels debate. With the college debates and discourse lines, we also have separate events that we do across our chapters. But at every event, we do three things. One, you lead with the norms. There's four norms to every bridge event. You listen to listen, not to respond. You. You don't interrupt or have side conversations. You debate the argument, not the person. And everyone represents themselves, not broad social groups. Nothing about that is brand new. But you institute the norms at the front of the conversation. Suddenly there's now a social disadvantage to being an asshole. That's essentially what that does.

[Chris Cuomo]

How do you police it?

[Manu Meel]

Well, that's the second piece. So we train moderators, we train students. They start learning these techniques. There's great literature and research out there from people like Jonathan Haidt that we take from. From. We've built a moderation training. These students are now engaged. They understand their jobs, and importantly now they feel like they actually have some real social currency behind what they're doing. And their job is to facilitate a dialogue where people start to see that this is actually not about blunting my convictions. Like I can actually show up and have the disagreement because that's oftentimes a misconception that this is a bunch of squishy, you know, white bread moderates. But this is about not hating the person at the end of the conversation. And then here's a third thing, and this is the most important thing thing is it's what I asked you when you asked me about the pendulum question. What does success look like? Success in this conversation is not the win. Success in this conversation is to understand why the person that's sitting across from you believes what they believe. Because that will equip you to be a better change maker. That will equip them to be able to listen to you, and that builds trust. And man, I'm telling you, the critical part of this that we've solved is it's all about scale fail. I'm confident that when we're at 800 college campuses in four years, you're going to see a shift because people love this. The problem with bridging, Chris, is not that people don't like it, it's that they don't think it's possible. That's the thing, they don't think it's possible. They've given up on it. And I think the American people are ready. They're ready. I'm already giddy thinking about it.

[Chris Cuomo]

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[Manu Meel]

Uh, Limu is that guy with the binoculars watching us.

[Chris Cuomo]

Cut the camera. They see us. Only pay for what you [e-mail] Liberty.

[Manu Meel]

Liberty. Liberty.

[Chris Cuomo]

Liberty Savings. Very unwritten by Liberty Mutual Insurance Company and affiliates. Excludes Massachusetts. I hope you're right. I mean, look, obviously I hope you're right, right when we first met.

[Manu Meel]

Well, I got nothing to lose, so it's okay.

[Chris Cuomo]

Well, I think that we have a lot to lose, first of all. I mean, look.

[Manu Meel]

No, we do.

[Chris Cuomo]

You are young and you don't have, you know, dependents that are making you second guess every judgment, you know, and you're able to balance a vocation and an avocation, which is great. And if this scales the way you want it to, you know, you'll probably merge those and that's. That is absolutely what success should look like for you. But the reason I fell for it is I'm desperate for better. And I know what's wrong. I don't know how to put it right. And I believe that you're onto something, but there's no but. I think you're onto something. Period. Period. However, comma, when I look at Turning Point, what's the difference between the two? So what Turning Point does is. And there are others who do this also. But bring in Patrick. Bet David. And he's like, my proposition is that capitalism is all based off incentives. And now it's how many people can he beat on this point, right? And you'll see, like a trained debater, like a Mehdi Hassan, okay, Does exactly the same thing. He calls his company now Zateo, which means it's a Greek derived term for profound curiosity. And I find that very ironic because I find that what he has done is gone to the clever and not real cogency, not depth. So he's all gotcha all the time, which makes him perfect for social media, as all these guys are. And it's just a gotcha contest. And it's always, yeah, but, but, yeah, but. Oh, you say that but you said this. And you say you want this, but what about that? And you think you're right about this, but what about when you did that? And that's what's working right now. They just happen to be playing with fire. So, Mehdi Hasan, doing that about taxation is one thing. You say it's a middle class tax cut. Oh, yeah. Well, then what about this? What about that? But this, that's one thing. When you're doing it with whether Israel should exist and whether Hamas are terrorists. That's why I get into it with Mehdi. I think he's very clever and good. It's just like, you know, this is not what you should be with.

[Manu Meel]

These are real life.

[Chris Cuomo]

And you're playing. And he'll say, no, I'm not. Yeah, you are. You're fucking playing because you know what Hamas is. And that's why I am playing right now. The absolute. I'm guilty. I am messing with Free Palestine. I'm saying, where's. I'm Free Palestine right now. I'm Free Palestine. Hamas is killing people in street streets. Free Palestine. Free, free, free Palestine. Why aren't they saying it now? So if it's not the Jews, you don't care? They don't like the game. They're accusing me of playing the game because I'm disrupting their game, which is another kinetic kind of connection for me to what you're trying to do. The problem is that what is selling right now is winning and gotchas. Yes. And owning. That's why. Why did Tucker shift? Why did Candace shift? What? You know, why is Tucker all of a sudden talking about things that were usually the great evil for him? He's into disruption also. Candace is into disruption. Right. She got a little kicked, you know, she got a little kicked in the stomach when she left Shapiro because he didn't like what she said. So she decided to go all in down the road of Israel is the end enemy. Why? Why not? It works. Controversy, provocative, outrage, demagoguery, very powerful Trump. Why is he. Look, I had one of the smartest guys I know sit on a stage and say, James Comey is the worst. What he did on the Russia probe. And then I heard a senator echo it. Yeah, that was. And then I heard the. Whatever Jordan's title is on the right. The whip, the leader, whatever. He. Yeah, I mean, Comey was terrible with the dossier. And all of them were using that as a rationale for why it was okay to prosecute him for something that they don't have. Proof of. And that's where we are. And I don't know how to bridge that because the only way I know how to deal with it is say that's wrong, that's wrong what you're doing. It's not justice. That's unsatisfying to people.

[Manu Meel]

I agree. And that's actually exactly why, why I think we have the potential to win because the people hold a lot more power in this equation than they think they do. The reason why Mehdi, the reason why mtg, the reason why people from across the political spectrum play that game is because ultimately the consumer is what's rewarding them. Tomorrow, if the consumer shifted the customer left, I mean, PBD would understand this. Capitalism is all about incentives. Tomorrow the consumer shifts, PBD shifts, Medi shifts. I'm not saying they're all in the same category, but everybody shifts because they follow the customer. Customer. And that's why my job and I spend much more energy thinking about that 300 million person target market from 15 to 75 that doesn't understand that they're a sleeping giant. And when you realize that you have more power than you thought you did in the exploitation of the moment, things start to switch. The real problem, I think, and I spend 90% of my time thinking about why this won't work. Because I should rephrase. It's not that I don't have much to lose. I have everything to lose. I love this country. I mean, I'm glib about it primarily because it's. I find a lot of refuge in humor. But I would not be doing this work if I didn't think that this is the greatest experiment of all time. And I think we need to do everything we can to make sure that it lasts for the next generation. That said, the question then becomes, how do you activate. The real critique is can I actually activate those people? Can I get them excited? Can I get them them excited about pragmatism, which is really hard.

[Chris Cuomo]

You know, that's what my father called himself when my father hated labels because he saw them as self limiting. Right? You're a liberal, you're a conservative. He thought that they were all too simple and done so by design to limit and exaggerate and reduce the need for comprehensive understanding and application. So he would call himself a progressive, progressive pragmatist. Now, would he still call himself that today? I don't know because progressive has been tainted as a term to mean like kind of farther to the left. But that's how he defined himself. The Problem with it. I can help you with this is.

[Manu Meel]

Tell me, please, is we are trained.

[Chris Cuomo]

To battle who is wrong. And what is worse, we are dealing in flavors of shit all the time. Right? It's like piss soup versus shit sandwich. You know, it's like, oh, the Democrats are piss soup on this. They wanna give healthcare to illegals. Which is like one of my least favorite words in our political vernacular. And then what is the response? It's not. No, we're not piss soup. Here's why it's actually good. And it's actually lentil soup or whatever the fuck souple you like. It's. Yeah, yeah, but you're a shit sandwich because you wanna steal healthcare from 50,000 people in your own district. You're even worse. I'd rather drink the piss. That's what's being sold as a commodity. What is the trouble for a pragmatic person in that you're not touching either of those things. You're not touching them. You will wait, you will starve. And that fights the natural appetites and inclinations. And that's where are right now. That's the problem with yeah, but. Which again, you don't apply anywhere else in your life. We both overlapped in terms of private equity. I did mezzanine finance, Chase Capital Partners. I was a lawyer, but I was in that space. Never in my life did I show someone like you. Right, because you'd be on the deal side, the term sheet that you asked me for, and you're like. Like half these covenants don't work. Yeah, but Manu. I could have given you one where none work and you'd be like, ah, fair point. Never, never, never happened. You know, you've never been in a relationship with anyone where they're like, you're 15 minutes late. I could have been half an hour late.

[Manu Meel]

Yeah, but.

[Chris Cuomo]

Right, and if you do that, it's like it doesn't work anywhere else but in our politics. Imagine if you to your heartbroken mom because you should be a doctor, you loser. And you had said to her, mom, I got a 78. And she was like, 78. Whoa.

[Manu Meel]

That happened more times than you think.

[Chris Cuomo]

What are we doing, Mom? I know a guy who got a 60. Oh, I had no idea. I had no idea.

[Manu Meel]

Tell me more.

[Chris Cuomo]

Here's a cookie. You know, it doesn't work anywhere else except in our politics. Why? The expectations and the framing. That's why you're right. Right? To condition the norms up top. The problem is, is that you're fighting the norms everywhere. Else, that's the problem. So, like, when I have Adam Mockler on to talk about his huge viral moment when for whatever reason, Andrew Colvett decided to not immediately condemn people who are talking about Hitler as a good guy in some stupid Republican leader chat. I don't know why he didn't jump there. No, on that. Like, as soon as you hear the word Nazi in any kind of question about preference, you usually default to no real fast. No reason to finish the question. I don't know why he didn't. He'll have to explain that. But so Mockler's living large right now. Where does that get you? Exactly. What's the best case scenario? So now your people feel convinced that Turning Point USA is a bunch of Nazis, right? I mean, that's the only reason to go down that road. So what does that get you? You know, you can't really believe it's true, but you're being rewarded for it exponentially. And that's why you did it, for the reward, not the righteousness of it. Now, he'll resist that, but I believe it's demonstrably false because I can't find you ever defending that they're not Nazis. Why? Nobody gives a shit about that. Nobody gives a shit about that. Nobody's given a shit about it since the last time it was rewarded, which was when the only time John McCain had a fighting chance against Obama before May he rest in peace, he blew it up himself by saying, I'm not an economy guy. I will keep you safe. And then all of a sudden, we had Bush's, you know, what wound up being the 2008 unwind. And McCain killed himself on that. And there were a lot of other factors to the shine and charisma of Obama, but the moment where the woman says, oh, Senator McCain, I'm so happy to vote for you, because this Barack Hussein Obama, he scares me because he's a Muslim. And McCain stops her and says, no, no, no, hold on, hold on. He is a good man. Okay, we disagree, but he's a good Christian.

[Manu Meel]

Why do you think people remember that video?

[Chris Cuomo]

I believe he did something even at the time, which was, you never stop someone from insulting your competition because that's how you win is by them being seen as worse. And John did it because.

[Manu Meel]

And. And it was countercultural.

[Chris Cuomo]

Yes.

[Manu Meel]

It was. No one expected.

[Chris Cuomo]

Yes.

[Manu Meel]

And. And that's. I mean, that's how I think we sell this thing. Is. Is. Is. How do you show. I call it outrageous bridge building. How do you show bridging in moments where no one expects it and then capture the content. The real challenge, Chris, is actually not getting those moments to happen. It's capturing it. Because the thing with when you have a debate is people are ready, right? They're ready, they want to fight, they're engaged, they're active, they're ready to be recorded. When someone's having a life changing conversation, they're not thinking about being recorded. And in fact the cameras squelch that. So if you're actually curious, like Manu, what keeps you up at night, One of those things is it's very hard to capture life changing moments on camera. Camera on a campus. The second challenge is scaling this where you have enough quality across these chapters. And the third challenge is that, I mean, I question all the time if I'm right. I mean, the amount of times that I've been called a fascist, right. By both the left and the right, it's I, I don't have enough fingers left, right? And, and now that, that was when I was 17, I am like the spitting opposite image of what a fascist looks like. I mean, you could have called me computer nerd a hundred times and that been would have have worked, right? The reason why is because, I mean, I do ask again, I'm glib about it, but people should know, like lives are on the line. I get it. World boundaries are on the line, borders are on the line. This American experiment is on the line. Thomas Paine called America humanity's last best hope. And I believe that to my core. That's why I spend whenever I need to go cry, I'll go to Monticello down the street and go think about what Thomas Jefferson be thinking at this time, you know, But I say all of that because it's about finding disruptive moments, capturing them, putting them in a bottle and shooting them out. And the only reason why people remember that McCain thing was because no one expected it in that moment. And that shit happens all the time in our lives. And it's like if Steve Jobs could figure out how to turn everybody into a photographer, including my mom, you know, with his phone, with, with the phone, we can figure out how to turn everybody into, into, into observant beings that can capture life changing moments and put them online. So it's not good news crap. It's none of that. And it's what you're saying, and the last thing I'll say is that the United States next year is going to be 250 years young. And one of the most inspiring things if I can share with you. Like when students, when, if you're wondering, like, how do you solve this apathy problem? Because that's another big challenge, right? The reason why people are apathetic in my generation, other than the fact that they grow up in one of the most tumultuous times in American history, is you think 250 years is a very long time and that we're, we're being, we're being given a pile of garbage when it's the exact opposite. The Roman Empire, Chris, lasts for 1500 years. Chinese dynasty lasts for 1800 years. Athenian democracy lasts for 400 years. The United States is not at the end of its story, it's in chapter one or two. And so when you're a student, when you're a young person and you've got that fire to build, but then you turn to destroying because you think it's all gone to shit it. We're just in the start. We're just in the start. And so when I say I've got nothing to lose, the reason I got nothing to lose is because it's only up from here. Not for me personally, from a financial standpoint. I mean that from the standpoint of where this country's headed. So I, I, I'm so proud of people like you because, I mean, I watched you when I was a kid. I watched you a couple years ago. Of course, you don't disagree on everything. I could find all the critiques, but that's irrelevant because you're someone that gave me courage to go do what I'm doing. And there's a lot of people like that on the right and left. Trust me, someone's gonna clip that and say, this guy's a Cuomo hack. Screw him. And I'm gonna say, great. Well, I'm gonna find you the clip where I said that to Don Lemon, and I'm gonna find you the clip where I said that. Tucker Carlson. I'm gonna find you the clip where I said that to Charlie three years ago. It takes one and no one. And the American people are ready. And the civic activism in this country, you can't rob it. Can't rob it. It's human. And no matter how fucked up the algorithms are, the fact is that McCain's clip goes viral every time we post it, and we post it 10 times. It's because people weren't expecting it, man. Everyone expects someone to shout in the street. No one expects someone to lift up a child because they're poor and they're starving. That's why that shit goes viral.

[Chris Cuomo]

Support comes from agz. Hey, my brothers and sisters at ag, you guys have a winner on your hands. My family likes the nighttime ritual of AGZ. I'm already out. I begin every day with one and done. A scoop of AG1 and a warm cup of water. I know that I've got science on my side, okay? And you've heard me pitch it many, many times and say, I wish I did more with these guys. Why? Because I like what they they're about. I like what they're about and I like the synergy of AG1 and AGZ. Why? Because the same way that AG1 gives me all of the things I need to give myself a chance to be healthy, right? You know, your vitamins, your minerals, your adaptogens, the right balance, the right mix so that there's the right absorption in my. In my body in the morning. And now I get to. To link it with what I do at night with a formula that has been scientifically tested to help me wind down and get ready to have restful sleep. I am not a great sleeper. AGZ is a melatonin free, clinically studied formula that has herbs, adaptogens, and minerals. If you're ready to turn down the stress and focus on the rest, head to drinkag1.com for the Chris Cuomo project and get a free frother, which you're going to want, especially with the AGZ. With your first purchase of AGZ where drinkag1.com CCP how do you resist the pressure of picking a side when your team comes to you or when students say, yeah, but there's a. This is just so wrong. We gotta jump on this and here's our disruptive moment. Manu. I mean, is that we gotta stand against this right now or we gotta be with this, or they've gone too far. I mean, we gotta just. How do you resist when that's what.

[Manu Meel]

It'S all about Right now, I am on a side. I'm absolutely on a side. I'm on the side of conversation over conflict, over dialogue, over discourse, court over humanization instead of dehumanization. I am on a side. And my argument is that the real political divide in this country, the real prerequisite issue to prevent another. Let's say someone says genocide to prevent. Let's say someone says unjust imprisonment to prevent, let's say censorship to prevent an illegal border crossing, to prevent the pile of that our politicians cook up every day is to resolve the underlying incentives that drive problem solving and So I am absolutely on a side. And I think that's actually what you have to flip is that when someone joins a BridgeUSA chapter, they are filled with ideological conviction. If you ever come to our summit, I mean, you got a standing invitation. Next July, we do a summit everywhere. We bring together all of our students from across the country that are incredibly engaged and powerful. You show up to this thing, they all are on sides, but they're on a side that is bigger than all those. And that's the side of how do you create change in this country. I am absolutely on a side. And I'm on the side of deliberative democracy and, and unruly Republicanism because that's what this country is built on. And you know what? I said this once and it did not clip well, Chris. But I'll say it again, because I believe it. If you are someone on Mars and you observe the American experiment in the context of human history, thousands of years where it's not self defense, it's. It's killing everybody around you, right? You would bet against this thing every time. And that's what gets me up in the morning. Because we are all underdogs. This is normal. It's, sadly, it's normal. The Constitution, you might know this better than I do, passed by three votes in New York, 30 to 27. It was the last Congress colony, the last big one to ratify it. It almost didn't pass. So when people realize that we're not hanging on by a thread because we've always been on a thread, we're playing with house money. And wouldn't it be awesome to be on the side of the people that are trying to pull off the greatest experiment in the history of humanity? Count me in. Mockler. I'll debate you every day. Because while you got your viral moment right now, we've got house money, baby. There's nothing wrong with that.

[Chris Cuomo]

Look, I love it and I'm with you and I think it really should be around the midterms. What I would like to do is get News Nation to allow me to commit to do a series of them with you in the. Oh, let's show in the states where the races are gonna matter more than others and get kids in those areas to discuss what it is that's gonna change that election where they're actually at. Okay, so let's say it's you, some branch campus of Ohio, because that seat can actually go either way. You know what I mean?

[Manu Meel]

Sure.

[Chris Cuomo]

And I'll get them to allow me to do like five or six of them in different states across the country, different races. That'll matter. That lines up with your membership.

[Manu Meel]

And what we can do, Chris, is if we do that well in advance, we can actually target those campuses and build up chapters where we might not have them. Right. So we have chapters in most battleground states. But if you're like, like, hey, this campus could be really interesting. Our team is amazing and these students are really hardworking. So we could set up something and you would have the most hope filled show in the most shit filled time and it would be led by young people. And that. That's new.

[Chris Cuomo]

Yeah, I think that's cool. The only thing I would want to flip, and again, you know, subject to your paradigm.

[Manu Meel]

Oh, please, push back.

[Chris Cuomo]

But like when the Jubilee people, you know what they're doing? They're. They're a debate syndicate also. I'm fine with competitive banter. Ish. I'm not that fine with it. I can do it. I actually wish I were not as I didn't have the facility in that area that I do, but I do. But I would like to reverse it. And I'm not gonna sit down and show you that you're wrong and we disagree and I'm better at it than you. I wanna flip it and sit down with someone who thinks we disagree and guarantee that we agree about more than we disagree. And I don't care where you're coming from, unless you're so fucking crazy, right, that you don't make any sense. You come from no constituency. Okay? Yeah, you will. Even if you are a defund the policer. Okay, I will guarantee you that I can sit across from you and we agree about more things when it comes to policing. Unless you're an anarchist. Okay. I'm saying if you believe fundamental in society, all right, if you don't, if you're a state of nature person, okay, then I get it. I believe in the collective. I would like to flip that dynamic. So I'm not gonna sit here and tell you why you're wrong. I'm gonna tell you why you're wrong. That we can't both be right and that we don't both want the same things. That is something that I think mechanism.

[Manu Meel]

That's like the McCain thing. It's actually like you're finding agreement in uncommon places. That's really interesting.

[Chris Cuomo]

Right? So that's what I'd like to do. But I'm open to anything. And I'm here because I know you're part of the solution I know conversation is the cure. Not just because it's alliterative, because it's literally all we have. And even back then, the reason we have the Bill of Rights is because the only way they could get the document to the states is with the addenda. So when they said, yeah, we approved it, but we want these. So they had a list of all these things that you had to include, and. And they didn't have the time, so they just added them all on at the end and called them amendments. You know, in any other contract, you'd be like, well, no, hold on. Most of these are material terms. You know, they're not just gonna be in some appendix. You know, like, this is a big thing. And people think the order was the order of importance. It's not that at all. With very few exceptions, it was just in the order that they could get them adopted and voted on that. Second time, more corporate quickly. That's all. The Second Amendment wasn't supposed to be second. It was a throwaway request of Washington, who was so pissed off that he could never have a standing militia because people didn't have weapons, didn't know how to use them, and weren't coming, trained in discipline. And he wanted a standing army, and they didn't want to give him a standing army then. So they were like, we'll give you the Second Amendment so that everybody knows you got to be able to keep. You got to have a rifle, you got to know how to use it, and you got to come with it and be ready to go with. We call you. That's what it was. That's why the jurisprudence of there never having been an individual right read into it until Scalia did in his now infamous or famous case, depending on where you are on the issue. That's why. So it's not about the history, as Cornel west always says to me. It's not about the history, brother. It's about the mystery. It's about what we'll do with it going forwards. And I'm here for. For that. And even though I live the frustration that you have also, which is, man, I know I could be so much more successful than I am right now if I decided to just pick a side and do what these guys are doing. But I just. I know it's the wrong thing.

[Manu Meel]

We've got conscience on us, Tyler.

[Chris Cuomo]

Yeah. And look, not that I'm any kind of. Because it's a function of my flaws. Nothing other than that. I know it's wrong because I've been wrong so often. But, Manu, I believe you're on the right side. Side, and I'm here to help. So thank you for joining me for the conversation.

[Manu Meel]

Thank you, Chris, and thanks for everybody listening.

[Chris Cuomo]

Look, now you know why I'm such a fan, not just of this guy, but of what he's trying to do with Bridge USA and why it has to be the antidote to the poison that we are being forced to take minute by minute in our politics today. Will it be work? I kind of think it has to. Right. I think it feels right. It is right, and we have to make it right. That's where I'm feeling about it now. We talked in the interview about James Talarico, and I understand that may be a little in the weeds for you guys. James Talarico is a state legislator in Texas, and he is now running for Senate. Now, I saw this guy on Instagram and I. I said, oh, this guy's a change agent. He's a disruptor. Not by being a dick, but by exposing that most people in the game are dicks and that he's actually a Christian. And as a Democrat and a Christian, he believes that the religion isn't about saying who's less holy than he is, but about loving mercy. And he's so cogent. He. He's like Pete Buttigieg. Right. In terms of kind of like that. Bookish. There's a sweetness to him, an integrity to him. A very deft debater. Okay. Very strong in confrontation, but with consideration. All right, so I compare him to Buttigieg, but Buttigieg doesn't lead. I would argue he leads with his intelligence, but also the card that he likes to flash is what? Military. Right. Talarico is that he's a real Christian. He's a preacher. He studied divinity, and he believes that people who are saying they're Christian are not really leading with their faith. So as expected by early noticers of him like me, he's now running for higher office Senate. Let's look at what the markets are saying on Kalshi. Why them? Well, because they're the largest US Prediction market. And I believe, believe that when people put money where their mouth is, it's worth looking at. Okay. Because it's not just some preference poll now. Right. They are trading on what they think will happen. All right? And you know what's interesting about it? You know, there's no insider trading on this. I wonder if my brother's on there talking about his own race, but I'll leave him alone for now money is on the line is a better way, I believe, to gauge sentiment than just some random preference poll. So if we look, look at where the markets are on the Senate race in Texas that Tellarico is getting into, we have to look at it right now on the primary side, which is again another gift from Kalsi because usually they're just measuring kind of metrics of general elections, but here we're looking at the primary. Here's what I don't like. It's hard to see when people are competing against one another to be in one of these two poison parties. I'm totally against our two party system, as you know by now, when reality really any of them would be better than what may come on the other side. So that's what this Democratic primary is shaping up for right now. And I wonder how much trouble this is going to be for Talarico because he's against two guys who check a lot of boxes. Okay? Now the guy he's got to look for is actually in second place Talarico right now. The smart money's on him. Why? Exposure. Exposure. People, I think have a tendency in an attention economy and an attention political economy economy to overvalue being known with being wanted. But we are where we are and the money is where it is. He's at 62%. I think his concern is number two, not number three. Why? Based on my theory, Beto O' Rourke should be the main guy. Why is he the last guy? He's been weighed and measured and found lacking more than once. He also doesn't show as well as the other two guys. I'm not anti Beto o'. Rourke. I've interviewed him plenty. I've been around him. Seems like a genuine guy and a real one in terms of a believer in what his political positions are. But I think that he's got a problem and I think the markets agree with me, which is why he's starting to tick up a little bit. But, you know, he's still not good money in this race. Colin Allred is a problem for Talarico. Why? He's testing, tested and he has won. Okay? He actually took out Pete Sessions and he is member of Congress, committee assignments, former NFL player, formidable guy, checks diversity boxes, presents well, talks the talk well. And he's gonna look at Talarico and says, you know, you haven't done this job at this level. And I have. I know what it's like in the federal level and it's very different than the state level. Now is Time to learn on the job. That's gonna be his argument. What's he up against? Talarico oozes authenticity of someone who seems to be different. And I think that's a word that you have to start introducing into your working lexicon, your toolbox of political analysis. Different. Like I believe I am different. What I'm doing with this podcast and on News Nation is different. And within that, there is a disruption and there will be an antagonism toward it. And you have to figure out how to make your. What makes you different and what may be in fact disruptive is not dangerous, and it's not something to be looked away from. So Talarico has that, I believe, going on his side. I think being a Democrat, Christian, not that that's a thing as a label, but I'm saying in Texas, I think that that is a big reason other than just the attention, why the markets have him up now bigly. Do I think it stays this way? No, not unless they get out. Not unless the party can chase them out. And in order for the party to chase them out, the best reason that they'll succeed is that All Red is already a seat. So he doesn't have to have it this time. Getting Beto out, I don't know. I don't know what his relationship is with the party, but if Talaricos can raise the money. They're both raising money right now, Allred and Talarico. Beto o' Rourke is struggling a little bit because why? Because everybody threw money at him against Ted Cruz. You remember that. And it didn't work out. So again, he's been weighed and measured and was found lacking. So, you know, that can be a problem. And you see, I tell you what I liked about Talarico's money best. It's not just what you see at the 62. It's the no. Of 43. People aren't putting money on him. No. The way they are. Beto o' Rourke and really even Colin Allred. Why? Well, I think that that is something that as I develop my understanding of these betting markets within this space within Kalshi, I believe that that is proof that. That I may wait and see, but I don't think he's going to lose. So I'm not betting. No. But I'll wait to bet. Yes. Even though there's risk with that. Why? Because you can get in now and wind up trading on your bet before it even comes to end. And if you're in the money, you can make money. So it's about what your betting strategy is, which I think is what's so interesting about what Kalsha is doing, is that it's kind of a melding of poker and politics, which is kind of cool. So right now, Talarico is the one to watch in this race, but it is also a race to watch if you are a Democrat, especially because it's happening in Texas. That's a very interesting laboratory for Democrats to see what they do in their own primary and what that means about the midterms in general. So I'm watching and I think you should be as well. Thank you very much for subscribing and following here at the Chris Cuomo Project, I believe conversation is the cure. I think disagree. Disagreement is what we're all about. But how we disagree has to become what we're about. That's the part we're getting wrong. Got no problem disagreeing with you. I got no problem with you disagreeing with me. But how we do it has to be geared to getting us to a better place. Right? It can't just be about which of us sucks worse. It's gotta be about which of us can actually make something better, don't you think? I'll see you on NewsNation, 8pm, 11p Eastern, every weekday night. And the free agent gears on coming. You got to get away from the parties. You got to let people know you're an independent. You're different. Okay? You're not a lemming. You're different. You're a free agent. You're a critical thinker. You're an independent. I dig that. So let's get after it.