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- [00:01]
Sarah Isker
When it comes to what your family eats and drinks, you know your choices matter. You're the expert because you know what fits your life. And getting it right starts with good information. That's why America's beverage companies are sharing more information about our ingredients@goodtokonowfacts.org no spin, no judgments, just the facts straight from the experts. For more than 140 beverage ingredients, visit goodtonofacts.org at first, I didn't think it was real.
- [00:32]
Steve Hayes
I woke up to this blinding light and I was transported to another place. Pluto tv. Then I heard a voice.
- [00:41]
Kevin Williamson
Come with me if you want to live.
- [00:43]
Steve Hayes
There were thousands of movies and shows and they were all free. Truth isn't it's just so Beautiful on Pluto TV. Free streaming of Terminator 2, Fringe, the 100 and the X Files may cause excitement, loss of sleep and sudden belief in extraterrestrials. No credit cards or alien encounters necessary. Pluto TV Stream now. Pay never foreign. Welcome to the Dispatch Podcast. I'm Steve Hayes. On today's roundtable, we'll look at the New York Times report on a series of damage control meetings held in the situation room of the White House regarding the release of the Epstein files and what it exposes about the dynamics within the Trump administration. Then we'll take a look at Graham Platner's unsurprising win in Maine's Democratic Senate primary and look at the Senate map around the country. I'm joined today by my dispatch colleagues Sarah Isker, Kevin Williamson and Mike Warren. Let's dive right in. Good morning, crew. I want to start today by talking about this major New York Times investigation on the White House and its handling of the Epstein files. This is a long piece published Wednesday morning, the New York Times. It's an excerpt from a forthcoming book called Regime Change by Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman, two of the newspaper's best reporters and incredibly well sourced. And I think that probably as much as anything comes through in this piece, in reading this piece, the piece is an in depth look at how the White House handled the Epstein files and lots of sort of in the room, Bob Woodward esque detail on debates that they were having, on meetings that they convened, on where they got together, on who was involved. We will put a gift link to the piece in the show notes so those of you who haven't read it can go and read it there. Set aside a good, I don't know what, half hour or 45 minutes. It was quite an excerpt, but let me start, Sarah, with you. I had about 50 different reactions as I read the piece and I'm wondering if you have a major takeaway. What did you think when you got to the end of that piece?
- [03:14]
Sarah Isker
I look forward to the Apple TV series based solely on this piece.
- [03:20]
Steve Hayes
Lots of drama.
- [03:21]
Sarah Isker
I also had several reactions to it though. Most of mine were pretty meta, like that one that. Congrats to Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman for the upcoming book that is just going to get optioned. Like each chapter will have a separate Hollywood option. My second reaction though was, huh. I wonder if people will realize that this is actually how government works at the highest levels Now. Forget that it's about Epstein in particular or you know, forget all the particulars. But even though you have really big important things going on, it will be these things that will convene the sort of most stressful, highest level meetings and that will be what consumes sort of, you know, in the box of important and urgent, you know, the quad box. Like these will be the unimportant, urgent things that take up the most amount of time in government. A lot of the time. And you know, there was this sort of throwaway line in it of like the Sit Room, the same place where Obama ordered, you know, the strike on Osama bin Laden. And I'm like, I promise you that the Obama administration had similar dumb, dumb meetings to this one. Because everyone in government has dum dum meetings like this. Because when it's about your own team, your own base, these sort of mini scandals that can consume a news day, there aren't a whole lot of people usually sitting in that room saying, you know, in five years, that's not what people are gonna even remember. So let's not worry about it because so much of government is winning the news day, the news cycle. So I don't know, I had this very like, meta, like, oh, I think people may think that this is like a Trump special and it's really not.
- [05:10]
Steve Hayes
I think that's a fair point. There are a lot of those kinds of meetings. I'm not sure anything quite like the Epstein files stuff, I don't know that Obama had. I mean, I think Obama had plenty of scandals, most of them having to do with governing. Fewer, obviously personal scandals.
- [05:23]
Sarah Isker
I promise they had crazy meltdown meetings about the Obamacare website. I bet they even had, you know, well, they obviously had meetings about Fast and Furious. Now you're right that these at least had some bearing on. Oh my God, do you know the number of dumb, dumb meetings they would have had on Benghazi and to be clear, I'm not saying Benghazi is dumb dumb. I'm talking about what was being discussed in the meetings and what they thought was the most important thing they had to do that day was dumb, dumb stuff, Right?
- [05:51]
Kevin Williamson
I wonder if there was a tan suit meeting.
- [05:53]
Sarah Isker
So, you know, that's what was almost coming out of my mouth. And then I was like, you know what? Probably not, actually. They probably knew that that was not worth a meeting.
- [06:01]
Steve Hayes
Kevin, when you read this piece, I'm just interested in your overall reaction.
- [06:07]
Kevin Williamson
Well, a couple of things. One is you really have to credit the cultural impact of the West Wing because you've got a whole generation of people who were too young to watch the West Wing who act and talk like their characters on the West Wing, which was pretty fun to read. And also, you know, all these guys talk about how much they hate the media and the media's crooked. And you can't trust the mainstream media, man. They love to talk to the New York Times. So when you're getting material about Dan Bongino's inner state, you know, he privately seethed about this, that or the other thing. Well, that means Dan Bongino talked to them for the story, right? Cause no one's reading his mind. They don't have the New York Times psychic out there.
- [06:46]
Steve Hayes
I would say it's fun just to jump in on that. Kevin. It's so fun to read stories like this, doing what we do, because I mean, you can read it as what it's presenting and the story itself. But the guessing game, I mean, it was interesting in our Slack message about this. I think the first comments were about who was the sourcing on this. How do we know? And you're exactly right. Inner thoughts of Dan Bongino or descriptions from three sources in a four person meeting. It's like, okay, I think I know who that might be.
- [07:15]
Kevin Williamson
Yeah. So J.D. vance had a busy day, I guess, apparently. And the Bongino stuff was especially fun for me just cause I've written about this guy and you can tell it was him because not only is he being presented as a complete douche, but the kind of douche that he wants to be perceived as being when he starts yelling about, I'll give you $100,000 if you can prove that I, you know, leaked this information, all that kind of stuff. So that part of it was fun. I don't know if any of you all have had this, but as I've gotten older, it takes a while for my eyes to wake up. So Sometimes my reading's a little blurry in the morning, and I wasn't really entirely sure I was seeing the words aggressive nipple fetish in a story about the White House in the New York Times. But as it turns out, I was. Which actually was the name of my band in high school, as I was sharing with you all earlier. But, yeah, what a crazy, crazy thing. I know Sarah's worked in government, of course, and so she's. I'll take her word for that. This is how government works. But it just seems. Gosh, how to put it. My experience with government, what I know of people in Washington, is that the United States government is largely made up of smart, capable, honest people who are doing the best they can. And that's the scary part, right? This is the best that they can do. This is the work of people not trying to undermine the country, not trying to, you know, enrich themselves necessarily or follow some sort of crooked private agenda. This is the work of the best people we have, doing the best that they can do. That's something we should keep in mind. And it kind of. That's what makes a libertarian out of you, right? We should have limits on what we expect from these folks. But this kind of play by play of these Ding Dongs just sitting around this table talking about the Epstein stuff was just. It makes me want to immigrate. But then a lot of things do.
- [08:54]
Steve Hayes
Mike, Kevin sort of dangled out that very interesting teaser, but it was a significant part of the story. Can you explain to us what was alternatively described as, quote, unquote, the nipple claims, or I think there were. There's another reference to nipple related materials. And I don't. I would rather have us not spend a lot of time on. On this part of the story. But the contrast was so striking. And, you know, they reported in the story that this was evident to people kind of in real time who are involved in these discussions, many of them in that Situation Room that. That Sarah mentioned. So what's up with nipples, Mike?
- [09:35]
Mike Warren
What did I do to you, Steve, that you had turned to me to explain all of this?
- [09:39]
Steve Hayes
Do you remember when you let Sarah ambush me? This is payback.
- [09:43]
Mike Warren
Oh, wow. This is it. I see.
- [09:45]
Steve Hayes
Well, Mike, please walk us through the nipple controversy.
- [09:48]
Mike Warren
Okay, so, long story short, so in these documents that were. In this tranche of documents that the debate was whether to release them or not, this is sort of the crux of what everybody is arguing about in this series of meetings that these Trump administration officials are having about the Epstein files. One of Them includes a claim from a woman in. It's hard to I'm trying to trace the exact origin of this. It's like from a legal case involving one of the women who had accused Jeffrey Epstein of things. There were claims from another woman in that case about a third woman who the claims were supposedly about Donald Trump having, you know, a sexual relationship with a woman and that this woman claimed, not with a whole lot of evidence, that Trump had abused. This is from the New York Times article, abused the nipples of this woman to the point where the woman Ransom, who was being quoted in this said that she remembers seeing them and they looked incredibly painful as they were red and swollen. I remember wincing when I looked at them. So it's like a pretty graphic and shocking kind of allegation made against Trump that this young woman, maybe even underage woman, I can't keep it all straight. Had made this claim to this woman who made this claim in a separate case involving involving a case against Jeffrey Epstein. So the debate within THE Situation Room is what to do about this claim. This is out there. If we release these documents, we will demonstrate that we had this claim in writing and what should we do about it? And actually this all is a run up to what I think is the most revealing paragraph of this story, which was in the midst of this debate. I'm going to start here. The vice president said, That's Vice President J.D. vance said he thought the president would be okay with releasing the nipple related documents arguing that Trump had been accused of worse quote, I think we should put it out. He said it would cause people to say we're going further than we need to. Wiles, that's Susie Wiles, the chief of staff quickly responded that the president would not, in fact be okay with was a point no one wanted to continue debating. And I actually think that like everything you need to know about the principles in the White House is maybe contained in that paragraph. Because my impression as I finished reading this, knowing that it's very clear that J.D. vance and Susie Wiles and a number of other people featured in this story or sources for the story is that Susie Wiles and actually Dan Bongino seemed to get it a little more about how the media response and particularly the kind of right wing base of the Republican Party would respond to withholding information or holding back certain information and not being forthright about it all, how they would respond. They were more correct and more astute than the vice President of the United States who really comes off here as out of his element and not really understanding, I think what we have seen in the subsequent months, which is just a lot of far right outrage about the Trump administration's handling of all this.
- [12:59]
Steve Hayes
Yeah, I mean, I would say out of his element and sort of ignorant or naive is the best possible framing for J.D. vance. I mean, if you wanted to look at this in more Machiavellian terms, you could say he was consistently pushing to release information that would damage Donald Trump.
- [13:12]
Mike Warren
That's fair.
- [13:13]
Steve Hayes
I don't know that that's the case. They don't give us much reporting. It's a fair theory, though, believe that that's the case. But you can certainly imagine that were Donald Trump to sit down for a half hour and read this piece of reporting, he might come to that conclusion. Why was JD Vance continually telling them to put out more information and put out more information. Sarah, I want to go back to you on. There are a number of things to talk about. I think among the many things that sort of struck me is you have all of this. I mean, this is the watching the duck glide across the pond, to use a bad analogy, where you don't see anything on top and all this stuff is happening underneath. Right. And the extent to which the New York Times headline describes this as a freakout, and I think that's an accurate description of what this was. The entire time the administration is putting forward a public face suggesting this is no big deal. We're not concerned. Trump's not really in it. It doesn't really matter. We're just trying to make good on promises that we made before the administration to go after these pedophiles and others who are guilty of these things. And it turns out that they were not only concerned about it, they were obsessed with it. And all of these meetings, again, not low level people. These are the people who in, you know, other situations might be thought to be running the country, involved in these kinds of conversations. And it unfolds over a time period where we're looking at major decisions on the economy, where we're watching inflation run up, where you're having the authorization of the extraction of Maduro in Venezuela, where there are strikes on the Iranian nuclear facilities, all of this stuff. There's such, to me, a dramatic contrast between what we're seeing in this story and the duty, the responsibility of these people that carry out their day to day responsibilities. You've been in government, you've been on the other side of this. In addition to just the time spent in the meetings, which is what most of this focused on it's how much time do you spend beyond that? I mean, it's not like you're just in the meetings and you're only thinking about this in the meetings. Is this the kind of thing that just overwhelms an administration, that engulfs it, that eats up? You know, they got into a little bit of the backbiting between Bongino and Cash Patel, the FBI director, and Pam Bondi. How much more are you focused on sort of positioning and who's on what side and who's the leaker and those things?
- [15:43]
Sarah Isker
So, boy, a lot there in government, there are things called principal meetings, basically. And what they're describing here would be sort of a version of a Principals Committee meeting. Normally that would be the heads of the departments necessary to make a decision. So you might have a principal committee with the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Treasury and the Attorney General. And if, for instance, you don't really need them all in a room because that can be very difficult scheduling wise, to get the principals in a room together. You have what's called a paper PC where everyone sort of circulates their views on paper, but still from the principal, like not just staff, et cetera. So, yeah, I mean, this is a principal's meeting. You don't see a lot of staff in this meeting, or at least they're not mentioned, which means that back home in your home department, you're having a meeting before the meeting. Usually you would never go into a Principals Committee meeting without having the staff meeting first to prepare the principal for the principal's committee meeting. Now, I say that because that's how it would normally work. This does feel like a bit of a. This part might be a Trump special, right? Because these people are, in a lot of ways not acting in their principal capacities. They're acting in their staffer capacities to the President. And the big problem here is that the President is on a significantly different page than his staff. And so you have a president who does not want to do this, does not want to engage in it, and has a very different view on the entire thing. And so think of Trump as the duck above the water and think of all these guys as the feet underneath in a lot of ways, because Trump knows he's in it. He knows exactly right what all is going to be relevant here. And as he said, he also knows his friends are in it. And if he suddenly is the one who outs his friends as these like, Epstein guys, I would think he has to be a little concerned what comes back at him that they're like, oh, yeah, well, guess who I was sitting next to? Like, if you're f me, no, f you. So Trump is just going to say no to all of this. And he wants to run his normal play, which is deny deflect. And he doesn't understand why his staff basically keeps having these meetings to engage. Now the staff is like, because deny deflect isn't working. But I don't know that they made the situation better rather than worse. This might have been a situation where Trump's play would have worked if the staff had backed his play. But these meetings are happening. You know, you made it sound, Steve, as if, like, they're the ones who are calling these meetings, but really they are responding to external events. Each time there is something else that has triggered this, that has caused them to all come into this room once again. And again. I'm not really engaging with the Epstein part of this because I think this does repeat itself so often in government. But in that sense, it's not that different than the Russia investigation stuff that I was involved in, where we were at the mercy of whatever leak or news story or, you know, something that someone found. And we'd all have to sit around and be like, okay, how are we going to respond to this? I mean, I remember one specific time where we got a call. I won't out the outlet because they didn't run it. It was so foundationless. And they were like, we have evidence that the Attorney General parked his car at the Russian Embassy, you know, three months ago, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, what? And so I had to call everyone together and be like, okay, we gotta go through all the calendars. We've gotta figure out, like, sir, is there anything near the Russian Embassy that you might have parked it, you know, there to get to a restaurant or whatever? And in the end, like, nobody could find anything. And I had to call back, but, like, it's my job to call that meeting for everyone to say, if this went forward, it would be so catastrophic and, like, knock us off everything else we're doing. We've got to address this, even though it's totally insane, it had never happened. And then, of course, the reporter was like, okay, I was just checking. I was like, what the. So, like, that reporter's never going to get their, you know, phone call returned again. Like, you just wasted the time of all of these principles when you said you had a source, and you don't have a source. You don't have the pictures you said you had like, give me a break, like you lied. So this is the sort of stuff that happens in government. That's what I mean. These dumb, dumb meetings happen all the time. And it's a comms person whose unfortunate job it is to say we've got to all sit around and deal with this now, even though, as you say, there's all this other stuff going on. Because it's very hard as a comms person to say let's just let this destroy the day and that somehow it will still be doing my job if I let that happen without telling everyone what's coming down the pike.
- [20:27]
Mike Warren
Can I say this, Steve? One thing that is different about what you've described in the General, Sarah, and what this story, you know, what was the origin of all of these dumb, dumb meetings about Epstein is how much it's driven by own goals, by the administration and that these sort of outside events were set in motion by the people who then have to deal with these things months down the road. I mean, the story does a very good job of retelling a story that we kind of already knew about. Pam Bondi, the Attorney General, delivering these binders that claim to be part one of the Epstein files to a group of conservative influencers. This was like back In February of 2025, these conservative online influencer chuds were all meeting folks at the White House and they got a briefing from Marco Rubio and I think they got a briefing from J.D. vance about what the administration was going to be doing so that they could go, you know, tell their followers how great the, this new administration was doing. And then Pam Bondi seemingly surprised everybody and delivered these binders claiming this is the first of our release of the Epstein files, which was something that many of the other principals, including Dan Bonino and Cash Patel, the number two and number one of the FBI were sort of involved with before they were in government saying, you know, when we get in, you know, that's going to be one of the first things we expose. So the, these principles kind of chum the waters for this sort of thing. And then they, when they tried to kind of partly deliver, they didn't deliver all the goods. And the conspiracy that again, you can go all the way up to Donald Trump sort of chumming the waters for conspiracy minded thinking in the general. And I would say specifically on, on Epstein, people in his orbit who were supporting him in 2024, being on stage in many ways at those campaign events
- [22:23]
Sarah Isker
and they, and then putting them in incredibly high level, like you Took the biggest Epstein conspiracy theorists and put them in the number one and number two spot at the FBI. And then you have them in these meetings saying, there's nothing there, guys. And I'm like, the one thing I missed out of the story was, wait a second, at what point? And did these guys ever believe in what they were saying about Epstein? Right. Bongino's bragging about making millions of dollars from chumming this Epstein conspiracy went before he goes into government. Then he's quoted in the story as saying, there's nothing there. There is no list. Why do you guys keep basically chumming the waters, as you say, Mike? And I'm like, so which was it? Do you now realize you were wrong, or did you never think you were right? And again, if you're the president who has a very different take on what to do about all the Epstein stuff, then why in God's green earth did you put someone who had made these promises, who, as he says, made millions of dollars from this specific conspiracy theory, and you put him in the position where he was going to have to do something on this specific conspiracy theory, the one that you, Donald Trump, don't want to talk about?
- [23:30]
Mike Warren
Yeah.
- [23:30]
Kevin Williamson
And then Bongino, by the way, very helpfully publicly explained this where he said, well, this is government now. I had to, like, pay attention to evidence and stuff.
- [23:38]
Steve Hayes
He literally said something. Yeah, very much along those lines.
- [23:41]
Mike Warren
Show business.
- [23:41]
Steve Hayes
That's a really important question, Sarah, because, I mean, this was again, another of these things that sort of leapt off the page as, as you're reading this. Did Donald Trump put Cash Patel and Dan Bongino, who the authors of this piece, the authors of the forthcoming book, portray as the most agitated about the absentee, the ones who really stirred the pot beforehand, had been focused on this, on their own podcasts beforehand, had been amplifying conspiracy theories about this for years. So does Trump put them into these positions because he has seen from his people over the years such undying loyalty that he's convinced that if it's about him, they're going to just lie it out and take it, or does he do it because in his mind, there's no there there. He is not implicated in any of these things. There isn't anything for them to really push on. And so they'll understand this and let this go? And it should be mentioned that the piece reports that the Times analysis of the documents, some 3 million pages of documents, that Trump or his family or Mar a Lago were mentioned 38,000 times. So whatever the Case Trump is in the middle of it. Whatever the truth is about what he may or may not have done, I
- [24:59]
Sarah Isker
don't think that Trump ever totally understood how much his base cared about it. I think he saw it just as a thing that they did to beat up on the left. And in that sense, this is a weird comparison, but it's kind of like the pro life community. You know, there's a very small number of people who are truly pro life, but the vast majority, you know, simply were using it as a way to justify hating the left, voting against the left, self sorting, tribalism. And so when he came into office, abortion didn't really matter that much. It didn't affect his base vote. Very different than what Donald Trump thinks about immigration. He thinks immigration actually is an animating political tool for his voters. He would never back down and be like, nevermind, we're just gonna keep the border open. Because he has this very good instinct. He was right that abortion was not a real issue for a lot of these voters, but immigration was. I think he thought that Epstein was not a real issue. It was just like abortion, a way to sort, you know, are you on my team or not? On my team, do you drink matcha lattes or drive a pickup truck? And in that sense, by the way, I'm not sure that he's wrong. I think his team is wrong. The one thing I kept coming back to reading this was like, why do we think these guys are right about any of this? Because as you said, Steve, they're the ones who keep screwing it up and keeping it in the news. They're the fluffers. And so I. What I don't understand is why Donald Trump didn't just fire the lot of them. I mean, Bondi looks like an idiot throughout this, but Cash, Patel and Bongino aren't covering themselves in glory. Frankly, Vance isn't either. Although you can't fire your vice president he's elected. Susie Wiles, not surprisingly, looks like the adult in the room. I mean, the thing that Mike read about, the nipple thing where Vance is like, I think Donald Trump would be totally fine with releasing this thing about his, you know, aggressive nipple fetish. And just the deadpan, you can just, you can see a woman like Susie Wiles saying it. No, in fact, he would not.
- [27:05]
Steve Hayes
And I don't think J.D. vance is not going to want to debate that from that point on.
- [27:11]
Mike Warren
We sure about that?
- [27:12]
Steve Hayes
And Sarah, just to clarify your pro life point, you mean the way that the Trump campaigns and the Trump and Trump world used a pro life movement. Not that pro lifers don't believe the things that they say or do you mean, because that's not my experience. I mean, I know a lot of pro lifers who believe very deeply.
- [27:29]
Sarah Isker
There are a number of people who work for and in the pro life actual movement who of course believe what they've been saying. But as it turns out, the vast majority of voters who identified as pro life clearly didn't care that much about it. It was like what was supposed to be the number one issue to determine whether you were a Republican or a Democrat did not matter to the vast majority of Republican voters the way that immigration actually does seem to yeah, yeah.
- [27:57]
Steve Hayes
All right, we're going to take a quick break, but we'll be back soon with more from the Dispatch podcast. Maybe it's just me, but it seems like the news lately has been full of stories about the untimely passing of people well before they might be expected to leave us. My thoughts turn immediately to the people they are leaving behind and the many challenges surviving family members face. Preventing those possibilities is one of the reasons I've had life insurance for many years now, to make sure that the people I love would still be supported if life took an unexpected turn. With Ethos, you can apply for life insurance fully online, with plans starting around $30 a month and coverage available up to $3 million. You can get a quote in seconds, complete the application in minutes, and may even qualify for same day coverage with no medical exam required and just a few health questions online. Take 10 minutes to get covered today with life insurance through Ethos. 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Support the show by mentioning us at checkout. Terms and conditions apply. And we're back. You're listening to the Dispatch podcast. Let's jump in. Kevin One of the other reactions that I had as I read this article was that nowhere in the I don't know how many words it was 5, 6, 7,000 words. Was there a moment? Were any of the people involved in these debates in how best to make this thing go away stopped and said, is this something we should be doing? Should we be making this go away? Is the president guilty of the things that are implied or people have accused him of? Is this something worth defending? Are the claims accurate now? Maybe that happened and the reporters just didn't get a lot of detail on it. I'm willing to believe that, but Dan Bongino seems to be the only one who quit over this. And at least the way that the story depicts that departure, it was much more about his wanting to get back to his very lucrative podcasting career and that he was. That he had been pushing this stuff hard on the outside and wasn't really doing anything on the inside. Do you imagine that these people, as they're figuring this out, stopped and said, what's right? Should we defend this? That's about the most loaded question I've ever asked you in the history of this podcast. I'm sorry, I don't expect you to say yes, Steve. I think they spent a lot of time.
- [33:19]
Sarah Isker
But look, that's not really what these meetings are about, right? That just to go. These are comms meetings. These are. How do you deal with the crisis that is happening in the next hour? Like, again, in all the dumb, dumb meetings. It's just not really anyone's job in that room to say, like, bigger picture, guys, what is our moral responsibility here? Like, that doesn't happen in dum dum meetings, Steve. Sorry.
- [33:38]
Mike Warren
Well, that seems like a big problem to me.
- [33:40]
Steve Hayes
Does it happen? Does it happen?
- [33:41]
Kevin Williamson
Does it happen somewhere? I've never seen Sarah speechless before. That was nice. That was a moment. That was. For those of you who aren't watching this on video, go watch the video. Sarah opened her mouth, and then nothing came out. And then she closed her mouth. And it was what I would have imagined we would have had if we'd asked David French if he were here to explain the nipple situation.
- [34:10]
Sarah Isker
I guess the question is just so big, like, when do you talk about the morality of policy proposals? That does happen, but not in comms crisis dum dum meetings.
- [34:22]
Steve Hayes
But these aren't policy proposals, right? This is just like basic humanity.
- [34:27]
Sarah Isker
I mean, but what's the humanity? Whether to, like, have no.
- [34:31]
Steve Hayes
Like these victims, the women.
- [34:33]
Kevin Williamson
Well, I think a lot of people looking at this will say that one of the big problems with Washington and with the way we do politics is that when there is a crisis, the people who get together together are the comms people. Right? The issue isn't how do we actually deal with this thing in a substantive kind of way. What are the real issues here? It's how do we talk about this stuff in a way that seems clever and minimizes, you know, criticism of us and makes us seem like we know what we're doing. And the problem is the centrality of these people to this whole process. Whereas, you know, one of my kind of long standing. Let me pick a fight with Sarah here. One of my longstanding criticisms of the way we do politics is the centrality of both comms people and lawyers to the process. No, I understand that there's a rule.
- [35:12]
Mike Warren
Double shot. Ow.
- [35:13]
Steve Hayes
Mike, Mike, let's. You know, we can go get a cup of coffee.
- [35:17]
Kevin Williamson
There's a place for. There's a place for all these people. And there are actually many places for some of these people. And some of them are jail cells, but that's another story. But, you know, the way in which they're just sort of right in the middle of everything, as though these were the big, compelling, controlling concerns. Now, obviously, what's legal and what's not legal is be a compelling, controlling concern for a lot of these things. But I think this story really confirms people's worst suspicions about how this stuff gets done and what the priorities actually are and who is in charge of these things and who is at the center of the conversation and what the conversation's actually about. So, yeah, if you want to have a conversation about how do we talk about this stuff, how do we handle our comms, and you get the comms people together, but the fact that that's the conversation you most want to have, and that's where you get the vice President and the chief of staff and everyone else to sit down and talk about this stuff, I think says something about the process that is not. That is not good.
- [36:07]
Sarah Isker
Here's my pushback. And like, I put that in quotes. Cause it's not really pushback. But I promise you, in the meeting about Hillary Clinton's testimony about Benghazi, that would have had a whole bunch of principles in it. There was no conversation about the families of those who died, for instance, because that's not what the meeting's about. And so, Steve, you're acting like they should be talking about the victims of Epstein, because nobody thinks that it's okay. Just like nobody thinks that the men in Benghazi should have died. So, like, no, that's not a topic of conversation because it's not relevant to the actual comms crisis.
- [36:41]
Steve Hayes
I guess the question isn't whether it was okay that they died or whether it's okay that these women were abused. But, you know, is it something that you're comfortable defending?
- [36:50]
Sarah Isker
But they're not defending Epstein, but they're
- [36:52]
Steve Hayes
defending the President's behavior in the context of Epstein and in Hillary Clinton.
- [36:55]
Kevin Williamson
And they are defending being Misleading and dishonest about their accounting of it.
- [36:59]
Sarah Isker
Yeah, fair enough.
- [37:00]
Kevin Williamson
Just like in the Benghazi situation, they were defending telling this BS story about what happened.
- [37:04]
Mike Warren
That's right.
- [37:05]
Steve Hayes
Yeah. It was all made up.
- [37:06]
Sarah Isker
Yeah. Yeah. But just to be clear, in what we see, at least they're not defending the president's behavior yet. I'm not saying they wouldn't.
- [37:14]
Steve Hayes
Right.
- [37:14]
Sarah Isker
They're talking about how to quell their base. Who wants this information when they know that there is negative stuff about the president in this information? And so how to balance transparency with protecting their boss, like that is what every single one of these meetings is about. It's not about all this other stuff that the Epstein stuff could be about. Just like Benghazi and Hillary's testimony is gonna be about, what can she say politically? Cause she's running for president and Obama is president and blah, blah, blah. It's not gonna be about what decisions they should have made that day. Like, that's not what the meeting's about.
- [37:52]
Kevin Williamson
It's a very, very commercial thing, by the way, to put that. How do we balance transparency with protecting the boss? We. Which is a nice way of saying, how do we go about not telling the truth about this situation or not sharing what we know?
- [38:03]
Sarah Isker
Except that the guys in that room desperately wanted to release the stuff. That's what makes it compelling.
- [38:08]
Kevin Williamson
Some of them did.
- [38:09]
Sarah Isker
Yeah. Yeah. That's what I mean. That, like, some of them did not want to protect the boss. They just wanted to get it out there for their own political bases. Right. Bongino has his own political base. Vance has his own political ambitions and his own political base. That's what makes this a compelling story, is that while they're trying to balance transparency and protecting their boss, some of them have no interest, actually, in protecting their boss. Susie Wiles is the only one representing Donald Trump in that room, which is fascinating.
- [38:39]
Steve Hayes
Yeah. I don't know. I think there were moments where the others were primarily interested in protecting their boss. I think the tricky question was for somebody like Dan Bonino or Cash Patel's, how do I protect the boss? I mean, they've shown themselves willing to say anything and everything to protect the boss, but in this case, they had a difficult time doing it because they themselves were the source of so much of what is at that point, causing him grief.
- [39:02]
Sarah Isker
I think you're wrong. Wait, Steve, you're wrong about this. Kash Patel and Dan Bongino have gone out and reversed themselves and tied themselves into pretzels on all sorts of other stuff. When it's to protect Donald Trump. They won't do it here on Epstein because they have their own political bases and concerns. That's what makes it different.
- [39:22]
Steve Hayes
Right. I'm not saying that they didn't do it. I'm saying that the way that they're wrestling with it is how to reconcile those two things. I mean, they've also gone out repeatedly and defended Donald Trump in the context of Epstein and exonerated him and said, there's nothing here and there's no big deal. But I think that the thing that they were wrestling with, which comes through in this reporting is, on the one hand, they themselves had made this such a big deal, and on the other hand, there's this impulse to just protect the boss. And that's what I think made it difficult. I think sometimes they did. Like Bongino, in effect, said, like, there's a story here, there's a problem here. I've got to get out of the administration because I've made this such a big deal. But I. And I think you're right, a lot of it is a hell of a
- [39:59]
Sarah Isker
principled stance, isn't it, Protecting him.
- [40:02]
Steve Hayes
Yeah. Based on what he had said. But I think. Just a moment. On your broader point, which I think is so interesting, and it's. To me. Yeah. I think sometimes when I'm doing reporting on things like this or other kinds of scandals, it's where the huge disconnect is for me. Me, because I don't understand somebody who could sit in a discussion about Benghazi and set aside the question that you say they set aside because they're just interested in figuring out, how do we get out of this thing? And to me, the thing is the thing, right. The big thing was that Hillary Clinton went out and said, this has nothing to do with Al Qaeda. This was a riot that went haywire. No big deal. Meanwhile, they were looking at evidence that made very clear that the opposite was true. And in particular, the individual people involved were, you know, had al Qaeda ties, were parts of these groups.
- [40:55]
Sarah Isker
Yeah. But by the time you're having this meeting, all that's already been done. Steve, we're not taking. You're not putting that horse back in the corral. So the meeting is there to solve a specific problem or else you wouldn't have the meeting. There aren't general meetings in government. That's a waste of everyone's time.
- [41:09]
Steve Hayes
But why isn't part. Why. So I take your point out of descriptive level, why isn't it ever the case that you stop and say, you know what? Probably the thing to do is to tell the truth.
- [41:18]
Sarah Isker
But Steve, like, that is part of the meeting. But again, it's about this congressional testimony. I'm sure someone in that room was like, okay, what if we try a mea culpa? Let's see what that sounds like. Someone write that out. Oh, okay, we don't like that. Let's try this other thing. Like, so in that sense, Steve, that does happen. But I guess what I'm saying is there isn't some, like, great, you know, moment where everyone sits around and rehashes something. That's not the question of the day.
- [41:42]
Steve Hayes
You know, I, I hear you. I find this so fascinating. I hear you. And I, I like, I think you're right about the way these conversations.
- [41:48]
Sarah Isker
I mean, any organization. This isn't just government. No, but I mean, any large organization has dumb, dumb meetings just like this.
- [41:56]
Steve Hayes
But at some point, it seems to me, in life outside of government and where you're concerned about things beyond just protecting the boss or telling the best story or spinning right the way that you spend. Not you, Sarah, but one spins, but also user. There is this sort of fundamental point where you're like, is it true? Is it not? Is it right? Is it wrong? And I just am sort of struck again and again how that's not sort of the central part of, like, that's where things would start and end with me.
- [42:22]
Sarah Isker
I've never been in a meeting where someone says, should we tell the truth or not the truth? That's never going to come up in a meeting. Everyone already agrees.
- [42:29]
Steve Hayes
I mean, if that's true, that's absolutely an amazing statement.
- [42:32]
Sarah Isker
No, no, no, but you're hearing me the wrong way. Nobody ever, like, because everyone presumes we're telling the truth. You're never going to sit there and say, should we tell the truth or lie?
- [42:40]
Steve Hayes
Except for when you come up with a strategy to lie. Right. Except if you're in. If you use the Hillary Clinton thing, you're saying, no, this was a riot that spun out of control. This had nothing to do with Al Qaeda or radical Islam.
- [42:50]
Sarah Isker
And you've got documents, Steve, different meeting. You're talking about what she originally said after Benghazi. I'm talking about the meeting where she's about to testify before Congress.
- [43:00]
Steve Hayes
And so at that point, your argument is they've already made their decision.
- [43:04]
Sarah Isker
Right, right. They're not. They can't go back and change what she said right afterward. That did not have a dumb, dumb meeting. It happened too quickly. Right. That's how she goes out and says something that's just.
- [43:14]
Steve Hayes
No, they went out and lied about it. They went out and lied about it. Right away. They knew right away that she was lying.
- [43:18]
Sarah Isker
Yeah, yeah. I'm saying there wasn't a dumb, dumb meeting about it because it moved too fast. So there was no meeting where everyone sat around and thought about what she should say. They just went out and did it. Right now we're talking about the meeting where she's gonna have to testify about that. Right now you're gonna have a whole lot of meetings about it. You can't go back and rehash what she should have said. That will be very unproductive. And you will be the most annoying person in the room. That's a waste of everyone's time. Cause you don't have a time machine. So now the question is, what is she going to say about the thing that she said that everyone agrees was not accurate? They're not gonna say she doesn't believe that she intentionally lied. So now they're going to have to come up with all the different ways that they can say why she said something that wasn't true but wasn't intentionally lying. No one in the room is going to say, why don't we lie some more? And no one else in the room is going to say, I think we should tell the truth. Like, that's not what's happening in these meetings. Everyone is talking about different versions of the truth that they can move forward with.
- [44:16]
Steve Hayes
Of the truth. That's not true, though. That's. I think my, my hang up. We don't need to. We don't need to go down.
- [44:22]
Kevin Williamson
Every. Every conspiracy theory is based on the idea of cui bono, Right. Like, who benefits? So I think what we have to conclude from this is that somehow Aziz Ansari is pulling the strings in Washington because this has been really, really good for his career because he gets to play Cash Patel on Saturday Night Live.
- [44:40]
Steve Hayes
And otherwise, there is a conspiracy we can at least laugh about. Doesn't have the serious implications. So I want to move quickly before we get to not worth your time today. I want to move quickly, quickly to politics. There were a number of events that took place this week, including the contest in which Graham Platner, the a guy who was a bartender at the Tunein in Washington, D.C. and later farmed some oysters, won the Democratic nomination in spite of a long history of inflammatory Reddit posts. This Nazi tattoo that he has on his chest. Janet Mills, the incumbent governor of Maine, who was in the race, suspended her campaign a little more than a month ago. She remained on the ballot, but was a non factor. She wasn't campaigning. She didn't run. And Democrats made this decision to put Graham Platner up as their nominee against Susan Collins in the general election in November. There were a number of other races and there are a number of other, I think, really interesting contests that aren't getting as much attention that we're looking ahead to in November. So I wanted to spend a moment on the politics of this. Sarah, I'll start with you. What's your reaction to the Democrats nominating Graham Platner?
- [45:50]
Sarah Isker
I mean, I don't think we can possibly be surprised. What's always frustrated me is Democrats who think that Donald Trump defeating the Republican Party was somehow unique to the Republican Party and that it could never happen to the Democratic Party. Democrats would never trade virtue for power, principles for access. And it's like, no, no, no. This is a human reaction in a hyper polarized, tribal moment in American politics. It is not one belonging to one tribe or the other. So here we are. And the Flight 93 metaphor is alive and well on the left. Right? It's this idea that this is an existential threat. The possibility, by the way, the existential threat is not the presidency, which is not an existential threat either, but at least that's a pretty important thing. This is for control of the Senate when you will not control the White House. Right. That's at their best. And so nevertheless, to defeat Susan Collins, who voted for Donald Trump's impeachment, but has voted a lot of the time with Republicans in the Senate, no question, to defeat Susan Collins, it doesn't matter. Many have said Satan himself I would vote for on the ballot in Maine if it meant control of the Senate. It's like that is fine. I mean, it's not fine, but yes, that makes perfect sense to me why you would say that? Because I've seen Republicans all say it. But please do not think that you are morally superior in any way to the Republicans that said it about Donald Trump in 2016, because they said it was an existential crisis if Hillary Clinton won the presidency, that she would come after their way of life, that America would be fundamentally changed and therefore they would vote for anyone to defeat Hillary Clinton. And they did. I mean, I quote, a man for all seasons too much it profit a man. Nothing to sell his soul for the whole world, but for the Maine Senate seat.
- [47:54]
Kevin Williamson
But Maine,
- [47:57]
Steve Hayes
Kevin, do you buy that advice? There's argument well, one thing I would
- [48:01]
Kevin Williamson
take a little bit of issue with, you said the people, the primary voters chose Platner in spite of these things, and I don't think necessarily in spite of was the right way of putting it. There are a lot of people who are very angry partisans who, setting aside the, you know, questions of his behavior toward women and allegations of abusive behavior.
- [48:20]
Sarah Isker
They like setting that aside.
- [48:22]
Kevin Williamson
Well, they like the Twitter trollery. They like this history of inflammatory statements.
- [48:27]
Sarah Isker
But part of the Twitter trollery is misogynistic stuff against women.
- [48:31]
Kevin Williamson
Yeah, I know, I know. I think that they draw a distinction probably between the stuff that is said and the stuff that has allegedly been done.
- [48:39]
Sarah Isker
Same thing Republicans did with Donald Trump. BT DUBS well, no, exactly.
- [48:43]
Kevin Williamson
So, you know, I thought in many ways just she's a similar candidate in some ways and obviously in terms of her personal life, not a similar candidate. But I thought that Crockett in Texas was probably actually the Democrats better choice as a candidate versus Talarico, this sort of nice guy, liberal Presbyterian seminarian, because this is a really good time to be an angry social media bomb thrower. It can get you elected president of the United States. And I think that if you'd had, I think if you had a version of Platner that had the online stuff but not the real life stuff, that he would have been a much. It would hardly even registered.
- [49:18]
Sarah Isker
I think it's a bundle of sticks. Of course, the online stuff comes with real life stuff. This is the Donald Trump point, right? You have the grab them by the whatever audio nipples, apparently. Yeah, I guess so. And that's like, well, well, that's locker room talk, right? And then people were like, yeah, but there's all this real life stuff. And they're like, well, I don't believe that. I, I'm fine with the talk and I don't believe the real life stuff. And that's exactly what the Democrats are saying about Graham Platner. I don't mind the talk. The online stuff is kind of a virtue. And I don't believe everything else that would fit with someone who talks that way, who would also act that way. It'd be very weird to have someone constantly talk about how terrible women are, how rape accusations aren't real, and then not ever act on that. That'd be stranger. It would mean he doesn't believe what he's saying.
- [50:07]
Steve Hayes
Right?
- [50:07]
Kevin Williamson
Yeah. And of course, politics is full of people who don't believe what they're saying. But it's the good stuff. They say they don't believe. Not the, not the awful stuff, apparently.
- [50:17]
Sarah Isker
Always.
- [50:17]
Kevin Williamson
I wasn't super surprised by any of this. And the fact that people are willing to say, well, okay, we're going to go along with this because the main Senate seat is so important or because these are special urgent existential times or whatever. It's just that's the tenor of the conversation we've been having for the last, you know, 12, 15 years. In some ways, more than that, I can, you know, I suspect that I'm not the only one here who can find a dozen quotations every four years from saying, this is the most consequential election of our lifetimes. Yes, because it's always the most consequential election of our lifetimes. And how this Republican candidate, just because I've come from the right and I've been paying attention to that sort of media bias, is the most radical and dangerous and extreme person who's ever been nominated for this office. Which they would say about Mitt Romney and George W. Bush. And of course, you know, with Donald Trump, it's probably right, but it's a boy who cried wolf sort of thing. And that's just how we talk about politics now. But worse, I think it's how we think about politics that people really do at some kind of, you know, ID emotional level, experience all of these elections as both national and personal crises that the world is about to change in some horrible, irrevocable way that is going to leave me alienated from my country and my society and put me in a position where I can't be a happy, normal, productive citizen of my country if the right people aren't in charge, or more specifically, if the wrong people are.
- [51:41]
Steve Hayes
Before we take an ad break, we're recording a special live episode of the Dispatch podcast on Tuesday, June 23rd in New York City. And you don't want to miss it. We're bringing the Roundtable together to discuss what's left of the right. Jonah and I will be joined by Dispatch contributors Megan McCardell and Chris Stirewalt in Manhattan to discuss the biggest news stories of the day and the evolving, evolving identity of conservatism in the Trump era and beyond. What does the war in Iran mean for Trump's coalition ahead of the midterm elections? Is MAGA still a conservative movement? Was MAGA ever a conservative movement? And who is the future of the Republican Party? The show starts at 7pm on June 23rd. Head to the events page at 92ny.org that's 92nd yes 92ny.org and purchase your tickets today. Okay. We'll be right back. Welcome back. Let's return to our discussion. I think we saw an example of this, Kevin, I'll come back to you on this this week not from a lifelong Democrat, but from a Republican or a former Republican. This week in Sarah Longwell at the Bulwark, who wrote Democrats are still a mostly healthy good faith political party made up of people who care about things like objective truth, you know, are uncomfortable at the prospect of supporting someone who evinces immoral or unethical behavior of the kind that Platner has been accused of. And her point is, hey, Republicans have no moral authority. They can't really even criticize Graham Platner here because they have supported people like Ken Paxton. I think there's a narrow point there. But the broader argument that's because Democrats are a party filled with virtue.
- [53:28]
Sarah Isker
As long as Democrats are uncomfortable with it, Steve, they can still vote for him. It's totally fine as long as you hold that discomfort in your heart.
- [53:38]
Steve Hayes
The follow up was about the commentariat where she says whereas many liberal and mainstream pundits are compelled to be intellectually consistent in their thinking, conservative commentariat's main incentive is to show religious devotion to the party line and to win at all costs by doing so. In other words, there's a hack gap. Now, I certainly agree with a lot of what she's saying about the conservative commentariat. We have made those points here again and again and again and again. I don't think that it's necessarily the case then that Democrats have this moral authority because they haven't gone as far as Republicans have gone on Donald Trump right now yet.
- [54:12]
Kevin Williamson
Well, I think it's, I think it's important that people be honest with themselves about what their thinking is and their motives. So I'm not with Longwell on this stuff exactly, but I can see and certainly sympathize with someone who would make the argument that the Republican Party at this moment is, to quote myself, dangerous and depraved and that you cannot support a Republican candidate, even someone like Susan Collins, who's a relatively moderate sort of nice sort of person, and therefore I will hold my nose and pull the lever for grand platter. I can see the argument and I think it's perfectly fine argument. The problem you run into then, of course, is that people, to revisit the you've all live end point that we've all repeated on here a million times, people have a hard time maintaining that level of cynicism. And so they have to tell themselves, well, either this thing isn't true, or it's actually good and virtuous in some way, or something like that. So, you know, I could see in 2016, I could certainly see someone saying, Donald Trump is a creep and a cretin and a weirdo, and I don't trust him, but I'm gonna pull the lever for him over Hillary Clinton. What I can't see and can't accept is someone saying, this guy is a good, heroic, patriotic sort of person who represents where the country really should be going. And if you're in this cycle saying that about Platner, that he's awful, but I'm still going to vote for him because I want to vote against the Republicans, it's perfectly fine argument to make. I think if you feel the need to go out there and lie to yourself or to others about what sort of person it is you're supporting, then that's a different sort of thing. But it's hard to. It's hard to avoid going down that road, I think. And you'll see the opposite in Texas, of course, with people who will make every excuse for Paxton that people are making for Platner on the same grounds. I wrote a piece earlier this week in which I wrote the Democrats argument about this Senate, and I copied it verbatim for the Republicans argument. Because it's the same argument, right?
- [55:56]
Steve Hayes
Yeah, it is.
- [55:57]
Sarah Isker
I think that Democrats, though, do not believe that there are Republicans who said what you just said, which plenty of Republicans did in 2016. I don't like Donald Trump. I'm deeply uncomfortable with him, but I'm going to vote for him anyway because this is an existential threat coming from Hillary Clinton. Democrats think that everyone who voted for Donald Trump, like, loved everything about him, so that they are somehow morally superior as long as they feel discomfort. I agree with you entirely that if I accept someone who says, I don't like anything about him, but I'm gonna vote for him anyway, at least you're being intellectually honest with yourself. But you're not being intellectually honest with yourself if you think that makes you special because your side is special, because you are able to believe that, but somehow the other side never is able to say that. There's plenty of people in Texas who think Kevin Ken Paxton is the worst, but they're gonna vote for him anyway.
- [56:51]
Kevin Williamson
I feel microaggressed against there.
- [56:53]
Steve Hayes
That's payback for your going after comms people and lawyers. Kevin Kevin, to be clear, I think
- [56:59]
Kevin Williamson
you could make that argument about Trump in 2016. I don't think you really could in good faith, through good conscience, make that argument about Trump in 2020 or 2024.
- [57:07]
Sarah Isker
I think it's different in 20 and 24. I totally acknowledge that. But if you're not willing to acknowledge it for 2016, then you're not having an intellectually honest conversation.
- [57:17]
Steve Hayes
Mike, big picture, we look at the Senate. I mean, one of the arguments you get for people who are getting comfortable or trying to get comfortable with voting for Graham Platner or Susan Collins, this is Trump rubber stamp, which is not actually true. If you look at the way that she's voted, particularly on things like Supreme Court nominations, is so important that Democrats take the Senate. Democrats are still presumed to be in a position to take the House despite this sort of some of these redistricting changes. And the question is, can Democrats take the Senate? The U.S. senate has 53 Republicans right now, 47 Democrats, two of whom are independents. There's 35 seats up in 2026. Special elections in Florida and Ohio. 22 of those seats are held by Republicans, which means Republicans are on the defensive in an area where they probably ought to be on the defensive. So Democrats have to pick up four seats. As you look at, do you think it's possible Democrats pick up four seats? I look at this and I see basically eight competitive Senate elections or potentially competitive Senate elections can, and Republicans are playing defense in six of them. Is possible that Democrats could take the Senate?
- [58:28]
Mike Warren
I think it's possible. Is it probable? Remains to be seen. I mean, look, the economy continues to be just kind of abysmal. If you look at inflation, which I think is the most relevant when, when it comes to how people feel about the economy, unemployment, those are important numbers. And things aren't as, as bad as they have been in the last several years. Stock market stabilized after some ups and downs over the last year and a half, but inflation remains a problem. And so at this point, it's like anything is possible. Almost anything is possible. The probability of it, I think, will depend on how people feel in a few months. But if you look at the map, it is difficult for Democrats to win the majority. But there are paths, and I think you can even sea paths without Maine. And I'm actually somebody who believes that Platner has a pretty good chance to win despite all of Susan Collins, you know, assets that I think are unique to her and to Maine. I would still put money. I'm not putting money on any of these races. But I would put money on Susan Collins.
- [59:31]
Steve Hayes
Please don't.
- [59:32]
Mike Warren
No, I won't. But what money, what money am I putting on any of these races? I've got three kids. But if you take that. So if you take Maine off the map, I still think you can look at several races, including some reach races that don't look so reach, don't look so reachy, don't look so sort of out of reach or barely in reach for Democrats when you look at some of the nominations. So for every Graham Platner, there is a Josh Turek in Iowa who was the Chuck Schumer choice. Chuck Schumer didn't get his choice in Maine with Janet Mills, but he got his choice in Iowa with Josh Turek, who is a Paralympian, is from a Republican. He's a, he's a state senator from a Republican district that Trump won and Turek also won. He defeated a more progressive and more stridently progressive person in that primary. And it is an open seat because Joni Ernst, the sitting Republican senator, is retiring. I think that's a, there's a good chance. There's a lot of dynamics going on in Iowa. Far the farmers are not happy with the tariffs and the costs of inputs into this upcoming ag season. There's lots of other problems. Iowa is just one example where you can see Democrats sort of, if not pulling off a win, sucking enough money into that race for it to be a problem in some of these other reach races. The big one that I think is the sort of the opposite of what we're seeing in Maine in terms of who the Democrats have nominated is in North Carolina. Tom Tillis, the Republican, is retiring at the end of this cycle. And what you have there is Roy Cooper, the former two term governor, Democrat who is the nominee. The Cook Political Report has just changed the rating for the North Carolina Senate race from toss up to lean Democrat, lean Democratic. Cooper has a, I think a pretty good shot of winning that race, a very good shot of winning that race against Michael Watley, who is the RNC chair, who is running in that seat. He's really, I think not a proven campaigner, does not really have a compelling story. Roy Cooper is a known quantity. I guess I should pronounce it Cupper, which is how Cooper says you should pronounce his last name, Roy Kupper. And North Carolina, I think has a very good shot of winning. You know who we never hear about is Roy Cooper. We never hear about anything regarding tattoos he may have or anything he said to women, and I'm not, you know,
- [61:44]
Kevin Williamson
saying that, could just see the Roy
- [61:46]
Steve Hayes
Cooper tramp stamp,
- [61:49]
Mike Warren
you know, why are you giving me this stuff, Steve? Why are you setting me up?
- [61:52]
Steve Hayes
I don't know what it would say.
- [61:53]
Mike Warren
Oh, it's the worst. But the point here is that you never hear about him because he's as convinced conventional and boring as a candidate can be. And he's likely to win because of that. Democrats love to fall in love with a guy like Graham Platner because he is he's got the Bernie Bro credibility. I think they even like all this bad stuff about him because it suggests to them that he's a real man and maybe we can win if we can put up a real man who's like a misogynist. Actually, that's not like a real man or it's certainly not my conception of what a real man is. But I think the future for a Democrat, you know, the hope for a Democratic majority in the Senate, which is still possible but not necessarily probable, is in more Roy Coopers and fewer Graham Platners.
- [62:39]
Steve Hayes
Yeah. And I'll just add to that. Surprising poll results from FOX News this past week found Sherrod Brown, former Democratic senator running for Senate in Ohio against John Husted, who was a priority appointed by Gov. Mike DeWine to replace J.D. vance, found Sherrod Brown up 5 points in a state that Donald Trump won by 11 points in 2024. It's an outlier. It's a, it shows Brown. It's the strongest poll for Brown that we've seen yet. Houston's winning in some of the other or was thought to be prevailing in some of the other polls, but certainly something that I think caught the eyes of, of Republicans and Democrats across the country. Finally, not worth your time. Sarah, it's very tempting to ask you if you've had any more broad offs, if there's any other food, things that we could talk about, but I won't do that. I'll spare you. And instead I want to ask you about your plans for tomorrow night. What are you going to be doing at 9 o' clock tomorrow night Eastern time?
- [63:43]
Sarah Isker
Well, my children will have just been locked into their rooms, whether they're asleep or not. And I will probably be out on my deck curled up in the fetal position, just exhausted from the week.
- [63:57]
Steve Hayes
I mean, I can identify with that in a number of ways. Mike, Kevin, do either of you have plans for 9 o' clock Friday night, June 12th?
- [64:06]
Kevin Williamson
I myself am normally in bed at that time.
- [64:08]
Mike Warren
I will Most likely be driving home an 11 year old from baseball practice. So that's what I'll be doing.
- [64:15]
Sarah Isker
Is this the UFC thing? Is that what's happening?
- [64:18]
Steve Hayes
No, that's on Flag Day.
- [64:19]
Kevin Williamson
Okay, that's on a Sunday, of course, isn't it?
- [64:22]
Steve Hayes
No, the thing that's happening Tomorrow night at 9pm is the U.S. men's National Team playing in the World cup against Paraguay. And I was going to ask you if you have plan, where are you going to be watching this? Are you gathering with friends? Are you bringing people in? Are you going to a huge watch party?
- [64:39]
Sarah Isker
Hate soccer?
- [64:40]
Steve Hayes
Why do you hate soccer?
- [64:42]
Sarah Isker
It is so boring to me. Look, I can acknowledge the enormous athleticism of the athletes. I want to be very clear about that. While finding the game dreadfully boring, it's like, I mean, you watch for like an hour, maybe nothing happens. You watch for two hours. You go to the bathroom and like that's the only score that happened. Like, no, no, no.
- [65:04]
Steve Hayes
So it has to be. There has to be real offense to compel you to watch.
- [65:09]
Sarah Isker
Well, like baseball, for instance, is a slow game, but you also know when to watch. Don't go to the bathroom for, you know, the top four at bats. That would be like a really bad idea probably.
- [65:19]
Steve Hayes
Kevin, when do you go to the bathroom when watching soccer?
- [65:24]
Kevin Williamson
You know, I don't really watch sports at all. And, well, we don't have television for one thing, so we don't watch a lot of sports. But I liked play in sports. I played high school football in Texas. I was a wrestler, all that stuff. I've always found watching sports almost always just dreadfully boring, except like, sort of very fun in person. Things like, I've gone to an NFL game and that's pretty fun. And I used to go see the Knicks play sometimes when I lived in New York, and that's pretty fun. But the idea of sitting, watching a football game on television is. I just don't understand why people do it.
- [65:58]
Steve Hayes
I think of it as something closer to heaven. Mike. A Sunday afternoon with a cold beer, maybe. I don't drink beer much anymore. I used to get a cooler, put it at my feet. Beers on ice, eating brats. We did come around back around to Bratz. That's the best relaxation family around. Sitting on the out, watching the outside television in a crisp fall day.
- [66:22]
Sarah Isker
Hey, Steve, you want me to really set you off? I used your Bratz suggestion, actually. I mean, Scott used the brat suggestion for last weekend. And so we had, you know, I forget exactly the order of operation, but we followed your exact order of operation to do the beer bath at the end, right?
- [66:36]
Steve Hayes
Yeah.
- [66:37]
Sarah Isker
And I thought my Hebrew National Quarter Pounder hot dog was better. It was just the best.
- [66:43]
Steve Hayes
And you didn't put that in the beer bath?
- [66:45]
Sarah Isker
No, just like. The point being that, like, my complaint with hot dogs is often just that they're. The ratio is wrong with the bunch of. But if you get the Hebrew National Quarter Pound hot dog, you are in great shape and it is cheaper, easier, funner, faster. Yellow mustard, life's greatest choice.
- [67:02]
Steve Hayes
We've got to go back and get the mustard rant and plug that back in here. Well, I guess this tells us everything we need to know about how people think. The question I was originally going to pose is, are you going to watch the World Cup? I think the fact that we're talking about hot dogs and mustard at the end of Not Worth youh Time suggests that you all are not. I will be watching the World cup with. Great.
- [67:22]
Sarah Isker
Yeah, we picked that up, Steve. We got it.
- [67:24]
Steve Hayes
I don't think the US Team will probably do very well, but Paraguay will be fun. Fun and compelling. And I can. If we're eliminated, I can always root for the Spanish team, which has a number of players from Atletico Madrid, which is my Spanish team.
- [67:38]
Sarah Isker
They'll be so grateful to have your support, Steve.
- [67:40]
Steve Hayes
They will be.
- [67:40]
Mike Warren
Can I say something about the World Cup, Steve? Because I also do not care for soccer. I have very good friends who are obsessed with it and one of my favorite pastimes is to mock them for their interest in soccer. And it's a whole lot of fun to just ask asinine questions about this game that they are obsessed with. But I will say this sounds like a blast.
- [67:59]
Kevin Williamson
Wow.
- [68:00]
Mike Warren
It's a lot of fun. But I will say that I am really enjoying the. On social media, there are several accounts and there's one in particular that I've been. That's been popping up international travelers to the United States for the matches that are happening here in the United States. So, you know, people are making vacations out of this. And there is one in particular, a German fan, which may be an op, by the way. Like, this may all like end up being a run up to some kind of advertisement, which will make me angry, but not that angry. But this is a German fan who, who is basing himself in Atlanta, which is the metro era where I'm from, and is ahead of the matches that are happening there, is going around and experiencing things that like, are sort of like uber American. He's going to Buc ee's.
- [68:46]
Sarah Isker
He is like, oh, I saw the Buc ee's thing. I didn't know that's what the guy's deal was. I saw the little German flag, and he's like, this is a gas station.
- [68:53]
Mike Warren
This is a gas station. Yes. He did some very specific things that, like, only somebody who grew up where I grew up would know. Like, he went tubing down the hooch, which is an experience where you go to a little fake alpine town in North Georgia called Helen, and you get in a tube. You may or may not have several beers in you when you do this, and you tube down the Chattahoochee river and. And have a grand old time. And he's posting, like, pictures of this and saying, this is amazing. This is America. And to me, this is the greatest thing about soccer, which is that when people come to watch it here in America, what they leave with is a better and richer understanding of what makes America such a great place. And it really has nothing to do with soccer.
- [69:36]
Kevin Williamson
You know, if you'd asked me what tubing down the hooch means, that wouldn't have been my guess.
- [69:40]
Steve Hayes
No shooting the hooch. I thought we were going to come back to the Epstein files.
- [69:44]
Sarah Isker
This is what I mean. Texas invented Buc EE's, but we also invented, like, tubing. That's like, all we do is sit in New Braunfels and get. You have a separate tube for your
- [69:53]
Mike Warren
beer, by the way. Yeah, totally.
- [69:55]
Kevin Williamson
Yes.
- [69:55]
Mike Warren
100%.
- [69:56]
Sarah Isker
Yeah. The beer goes in its own inner tube, and then you're in an inner tube, and you form a posse of inner tubes around your beer inner tube so the beer inner tube can't go faster than you go. And then you float. We call it floating, by the way, not tubing.
- [70:10]
Steve Hayes
I mean, again, I guess this is a commentary on our interest in the World cup that we keep finding. We're now on tubes. We are on beer. We went to brats who went to everything but soccer. I will be watching. I am not. I'm not a soccer chauvinist. I'm not a soccer partisan. I don't need to ram it down people's throats. But I don't understand people like you, Mike, who feel the need to pick at people who like soccer. Like, what's the point? Get a life. We just like to watch soccer. It's not that big a deal.
- [70:40]
Mike Warren
Yeah, no, it is. It's. There's a little bit of shogunism among most soccer fans. They can't believe. They can't believe how backward. It's the beautiful game who don't like it. Yeah, kill me now. Kill me now.
- [70:52]
Steve Hayes
All right, thank you all. Appreciate this fine conversation and we will see you next time. Finally, if you like what we're doing here, you can rate, review and subscribe to the show on your podcast player of choice to help new listeners find us. As always, if you've got questions, comments, concerns or corrections, you can email us@roundtabledispatch.com we read everything, even the ones from people who are soccer haters. We got a lot of good emails about our tipping discussion last week, so please keep them coming. That's going to do it for today's show. Thanks so much for tuning in. And thank you to the folks behind the scenes who made this episode possible. Noah Hickey and Peter Bonavetcher. Thanks again for listening. Please join us next time.