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The Ezra Klein Show
Does Trump Want to Lose the Midterms?
01:14:55
President Trump doesn’t seem to care that much about winning the midterms. He’s more unpopular at this point in his second term than basically any of his modern predecessors. Democrats seem poised to retake the House and have a real chance of retaking the Senate. You might expect a president in that position to pivot to the center, to focus on voters’ top concerns and try to boost the strongest Republicans in key races. Trump isn’t doing any of that. Instead, he announced a $1.8 billion slush fund to pay out “victims of lawfare,” he threatened to re-escalate the Iran war, and he intervened in Republican primaries in ways that are gifts to Democrats, like endorsing the scandal-plagued Ken Paxton over the incumbent, John Cornyn, in Texas’ Senate race. Why doesn’t Trump seem to care more about winning? Liam Donovan is a Republican strategist and a president at Targeted Victory, a Washington public affairs and digital marketing firm. He has worked on the National Republican Senatori...
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- [00:00]
A
Sometimes you just need a fresh start. And nothing feels fresher than four new tires right now. Buy three select tires and get one for a dollar during the Cadillac Certified Service Fresh Start Tire event. Tap now or visit cadillac.comserviceoffers to learn. My pet theory right now is that Donald Trump is not trying to win the midterm election. I'm not saying he's trying to lose him exactly. I just don't think he can cares. What he cares about is controlling the Republican Party. The Republican Party is his power base. The Republican Party is his protection. The Republican Party is how he can wield power far into the future, long after his presidency. And so control of it is what he's prioritizing. I call this a theory, but it's more like a hypothesis. It has predictions. You can test them. Trump is more unpopular at this point in his second term than basically any of his modern predecessors. The midterm elections, they're less than six months away. He could easily lose the House. He could actually lose the Senate now. So what is he doing? Well, if he wanted to win the midterms, he'd be moving to the center. He'd be focusing on the things that Americans are angry about, disappointed in him about. He'd be supporting the strongest Republicans in contested races and doing everything he possibly could to bolster Republicans in vulnerable states and districts. He's not doing even a little bit of that. Not even a bit. Instead, he's doing the opposite. He's announcing a $1.8 billion slush fund that appears designed to pay out to January 6th rioters. He endorsed the scandal plagued, very controversial Ken Paxton over John Cornyn in Texas, giving Democrats a real chance at winning a seat that should be way out of reach for them. He helped primary Thomas Massie, the House Republican who released the Epstein files. He defeated Bill Cassidy, the Louisiana Senator who voted to impeach him in his first he is attacking Brian Fitzpatrick, one of the very, very, very few House Republicans representing a district that voted for Kamala Harris. He's threatening to escalate the Iran war. And when asked whether he is worried about Americans finances, about their pocketbooks, about their cost of living, here is what he said.
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B
Mr. President, to what extent are Americans financial situations motivating you to make it?
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A
Neal?
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B
Not even a little bit.
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A
It's the only thing that matters when
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B
I'm talking about Iran. They can't have a nuclear weapon. I don't think about American's financial situation. I don't think about anybody.
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A
I think about one thing.
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B
We Cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon. That's all.
- [03:08]
A
What a gift to Democratic ad makers that clip is. Donald Trump cares about control of his party, not of Congress. If he can win the election in a way that tightens his control of Republicans, like the redistricting, he'll take that. If not, he's busy. He's got other things to do. I'm not saying he wants Democrats to win, but I don't think he minds it if they do. A Democratic Congress gives him an enemy to fight. I think he gets a little lost without an enemy. It frees him from the tedious work of trying to pass legislation. It puts him back in the place he's most comfortable, which is not wielding power, it's claiming persecution. While Trump would mind, when he does fear is a Republican Party with a spine. He fears a Republican Party where members of Congress begin to participate in the investigations of his scandals, or they abandon him as his fortunes fall. And so he's made his choice. He is showing them that to oppose him, even from the right, is to light your political future on fire. The point isn't just to defeat Massie or Cassidy or Cornyn or any of them. It's to scare every Republican left in Congress, to make sure they know that Donald Trump would gladly destroy each and every one of them personally, that he would gladly burn the entire Republican Party to the ground if that's what it took to save himself. I thought it would be interesting to hear how this looks to someone whose business has been winning elections for the Republican Party, particularly Senate elections. Liam Donovan is a Republican strategist and a president at Targeted Victory, a Washington public affairs and digital marketing firm. He's worked on the National Republican Senatorial Committee and also for Texas Senator John Cornyn. And his political commentaries appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and other publications. As always, my email, ezra kleinshow@nytimes.com. Liam Donovan, welcome to the show.
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B
Good to be here. Thanks for having me.
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A
So we're here. Trump is now under 40% in a bunch of different polls, more unpopular at this point in his term than basically any of his modern predecessors. Let's start with him. Why is he down there?
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B
I think if you think about the mood of the country that produced the comeback of Donald Trump, putting together the coalition that he did that was predicated on a rejection of the status quo and the bet that Donald Trump will be able to return us to the economy and maybe the vibes of pre Covid 2020. Of course, that's much harder to do than it is to talk about. And I think this is fundamentally about frustrations of how difficult some of these problems are to tackle an electorate that is not really looking to be told that everything is going well. And then when you compound that with some of the policy choices that have been made that I think might prove to be wise in the longer run. But there are legacy minded moves, not immediate term electoral plays.
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A
Was it so much harder? I always feel like you could imagine a Trump administration second term that sealed the border but didn't do the aggressive internal ICE and CBP enforcement. So you didn't have things like the Battle of Minnesota that did not say go to war in Iran, that did not do the tariffs and you know, could then draft on what was a fairly strong and certainly well recovering economy coming out of Biden and was getting a bunch of AI investment and doesn't make a bunch of what seemed to me to be errors. And maybe he's in a really different place.
- [06:49]
B
I think the way you have to think about this is the mythology of the Trump first term as understood by Donald Trump versus as it was understood by other the electorate included Trump. Looking back, the reason he lost, the reason he wasn't as successful as he might have been, was that he was held back from his impulses and his policy preferences by the deep state, by never Trumpers, by the sort of Bush era Republicans that don't reflect or respect his version of how the country should look. You know, at some level you could argue he was saved politically by that layer of insulation. And if you think about what's changed, it's that he is absolutely installed loyalists. There is a threshold question of are you absolutely committed to this project? And I think therefore he's feeling for the first time what it looks like to get what you're asking for. And the electorate, they reelected him just wanted to go back to the way it was. So I do think there's a disconnect there. But to your point, there's an easy mode that he might have done, but it wouldn't have necessarily been his vision for what America first or MAGA looks like.
- [08:05]
A
Yeah, this was very striking to me when I looked at the poll numbers on it. So at this point in his first term he had a plus 10 net disapproval. He's now at plus 21. So he is more than twice as unpopular at this point in the second term as in his first. But it all goes to this question, I think, which is whether or not you understand the sort of weakened political state he's in as a function of the mood of the country or actually as a function of the country's reactions to Donald Trump's policies. Is it just dyspeptic or does it not want this?
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B
I think there are layers to it. I mean, you have to think about there's now ceiling in a way that there didn't used to be. But I think we've seen this over the last 20 years, maybe since the Obama era, since our coalitions have shifted, the parties and countries polarized. It's very, very difficult to imagine a president getting above, say, 48%, something like that, the coalition that got him there. So in that sense, it's, it's a hard cap. And so like, you need to almost grade on a little bit of a curve in terms of where these things are. That said, the president's approval rating, I don't care which party you're from, wants to be above 40. You know, it wants to be at 42, 43. That is your firm base. What we're seeing here is that there are elements of the Republican coalition that consider themselves Republican who are disillusioned for one reason or another. Either they are anti war or skeptical of foreign entanglements. Maybe they are simply upset about the cost of living. They don't like tariffs, what have you. They just don't like the way things are going. I think that is the layer that is the easiest to imagine getting back. And if we're looking forward to okay, how does this get back to a place where Republicans stand to have an okay or like just a par midterm? It's that he floats back up above 40 because that's kind of where these people want to be. They want to be given a reason to like Donald Trump. They want to be given a reason to vote for Republicans.
- [10:09]
A
So why doesn't Donald Trump want to give them that reason? This is where I wanted to get us to this question of agency, because he could get some of them back. And I always took Trump as somebody who cared on some level about his popularity and who has a real sensitivity to the whims and wins of public opinion. But as his numbers have fallen in the second term, he seems to me to be going on to tilt. He's doing this $1.8 billion slush fund to hand out to people convicted around January 6th or who he feels were the victim of Biden era lawfare. He is talking about re escalating the Iran war. He is intervening in a bunch of Republican primaries to purge people who opposed him in One way or another. He's not doing the things that you might imagine a president worried about losing a midterm would do. He's not doing a big pivot to the center. He's not trying avoid certain kinds of controversy. He seems like he doesn't care. Why do you think that is?
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B
Well, I think we got to step back for a minute and think about how he got here. How did Donald Trump get the nomination in the first place? And it was, in a sense, running against the institutional Republican Party, running against the establishment. The fact that he doesn't find himself aligned with the broader fortunes of the party and that that's not his primary objective. He's not of the party. That's not what drives him. That's not his imperative. That's different than any president I think we've ever seen, maybe in both parties, but certainly in the Republican Party. And we saw it in 2018. I mean, I think he went on a victory lap the day after the election, even though it was rough dunking on members that didn't stay closer to him. So I think flash forward, and I think that lesson's been learned. I think people realize you have the R next to your name. You're going to kind of, by and large, own what the president is doing. So you need to make the best of that. And going against him, picking fights with him, except in very rare exceptions, does not redound to your electoral benefit.
- [12:08]
A
So that's true, but it doesn't necessarily answer the question of Trump himself. So, as you mentioned, and I think this is an important point to expand on a little bit, there's A history here, 2018, Republicans under Trump do terribly in the midterms, but Trump comes out the next day and is excited about some of the ones who opposed him who lost 2022. Donald Trump is not in office anymore, but he exerts a lot of control over Republican primaries. And you end up candidates like Blake Masters and Dr. Oz and Kerry Lake, and Republicans lose a bunch of very big and very winnable races. Right now, you see Trump intervening in places like Texas with Ken Paxton in ways that at the very least create the possibility that Republicans will lose some key races that they could have otherwise won. So I take your point that Donald Trump does not come from the institutional Republican Party, but he seems to me to care more about the control he has over Republicans than the control Republicans under him have over Washington. He is running a risk here of losing the Senate, but with, I guess, more control over the rump Republican senators. When he could be trying to win the Senate, but have a couple of people who might be more willing to oppose him. Does he want to control Congress or control the Republican Party?
- [13:32]
B
I think there's something to the point. I do think he's more committed to and sensitive to the risk of not having control than he was four years ago, eight years ago, whatever. Time has no meaning anymore. I think that's where the project, and we can get into this, of the kind of structural gambit of trying to create a more resilient map for Republicans redistricting efforts. That doesn't happen if the President doesn't care. That doesn't happen if the President doesn't believe that a Democratic majority could do him damage. Like, let's think about Indiana, where it's like those guys. What was their sin? Their sin was, well, one, not listening to the White House and doing what they said to do.
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A
But two, on not doing the redistricting.
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B
But what's the interest of the redistricting? The interest of the redistricting is maintaining congressional majority. So, like in that case, his priority was trying to win more seats. Is that self interested?
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A
Sure.
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B
But it wasn't punishing them for going against him. It was punishing them for going against what he saw as the interests of the party. So I think that's your signal right there in the Senate. I'd actually, actually push back and say this is something the Republican Party has had to learn a number of times over. If you think back, I mean, my, my time at the Republican Senate committee was 2010, when it was a great cycle. But they left a great deal on the table because of the Tea Party, bad candidates, not coordinating. And it took them again. They did it again in 2012. It wasn't until 2014 that they kind of figured out a path forward of how to find suitable candidates that could pleased the broader coalition and had a level of coordination that led to a great cycle. Donald Trump comes in and actually doesn't even have a consistent set of preferences. And so he just kind of mashed buttons. I think 22 is the example, kind of like 2012, where we realized this is unsustainable. Republicans have to do something about this. They figured that out, I think, in, in 2024, in both directions. Both the, the party and its leaders figured out how to work with Trump in his political operation, and Trump figured out where he can be effective. I'd argue that Trump and his political operation have done quite a good job this time, directing traffic in a way that they hadn't previously it's what makes instances like Texas, to a lesser degree, Georgia notable. So I actually think they've done a pretty good job there. But it makes the exceptions that much more so.
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A
Your argument is that unlike in, say, 2022, if you look at most of the competitive races, the Trump oper has cohered around a candidate that doesn't look wildly out of step with the state, but that there is then this separate thing that happens of Trump going to punish and purge specific candidates who he feels were disloyal to him. And so it's more notable, but it's not the macro story.
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B
I think that's right. Each state, there's an interesting story we can get into. In Louisiana, most obvious, but the fact that he is understanding that in Maine, Susan Collins is the only Republican can win there and should win there, and he's not mucking around there right in the way that he is in, say, Louisiana. Texas, I think, is a unique one in that it became a bargaining chip. And in some ways, Senator Cornyn became collateral in this broader kind of tug of war.
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A
You know that one? Well, you used to work for Cornyn.
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B
I did.
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A
What happened there between Trump and Cornyn?
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B
I think in the White House's ideal timeline, Ken Paxton doesn't get in. I don't think there were entreaties from the White House or from the Trump operation to get him in to challenge Cornyn. The problem is that he did it anyway, and it created a really difficult dynamic.
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A
Why'd it create a difficult dynamic? Why doesn't Trump just say, cornyn's our guy? What are you doing here?
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B
Because Paxton was his guy, too. So he's got people competing for his infections in a way that the president obviously likes a great deal.
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A
And maybe it's worth it for people maybe don't know that much about Paxton for you to describe a bit who he is in Texas politics. So who is Paxton, and why did Trump decide in the final moments of that primary to endorse him over John Cornyn, possibly risking that seat?
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B
So Ken Paxton is the sitting Attorney General of Texas. He's been elected statewide a number of times. So it's important to get out there. It's not the Senate, it's not the governor, but he has been statewide elected, and he has been statewide elected since carrying some of the political baggage that he does. To the extent that he's known, it's largely because he has gotten into hot water a number of different times. There was actually an impeachment effort, but there have been efforts at the state level to be rid of him, he has prevailed. He has prevailed in part by aligning himself with Donald Trump, being a leader on a number of the initiatives that the president cares a lot about from the 2020 election standpoint and otherwise. So he has boosted his brand by wrapping himself in MAGA and donning the hat. He threw himself into this race. You have to think John Cornyn, who I adore is a longtime incumbent, is very much of the flavor of the George W. Bush, Rick Perry era Texas Republican Party, which is not necessarily the vanguard here. He spent a decade plus in Senate leadership in ways that tie into the national party in ways that can be complicated in these sorts of primary efforts. Why does Donald Trump get involved? Look, like I said, I think Cornyn became a bargaining chip for Trump with John Thune at a time when he wanted the Senate to do certain things in the Senate. At that point, there was this big push to get the Save America act across, to nuke the filibuster to do so, all these complicated things. When that didn't happen, it became clear that there did not seem to be an inclination from the president to. To back Cornyn. When I heard that he was going to endorse, that gave me a bad feeling, the bit of my stomach, because I had a feeling that wasn't going to be for Cornyn. I question the idea that Paxton loses this seat. I think the real problem for Republicans is, I mean, twofold. Number one, it's always easier, cheaper, more straightforward to get an incumbent reelected than it is to have an open seat. The more complicated the candidate is, the more expensive it is. I think that's the real problem is this is. This is a massive state with a huge number of expensive media markets. The amount of resources that will be expended here and the marginal, it was going to be expensive for corn, and it's going to be insanely expensive for
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A
Paxo has raised an insane money, and
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B
I think that will be costly.
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A
So I feel at this point, you still haven't quite answered my question about Donald Trump, which is, look, he did not have to come in and endorse Paxton. Cornyn was not an anti Trump Republican. If you look at polymarket, the odds of Republicans holding the seat have gone from 75% in January to 55% now. So they're favored. And I think you have to still see Ken Paxton as a favorite, but it's more narrow. It could look something more like the Doug Jones victory in Alabama over a very, very, very flawed candidate a couple Years back. I take your point that there are places where they didn't do a bunch of stupid things, but there's a world where they wake up after the election and James Talarico won in Texas, and that made Chuck Schumer majority leader. And that's purely on Donald Trump's table. Like, he chose that outcome. Are they mad about that, or does he actually, on some level, not care that much? Because fighting with a Democratic Congress is in some ways a pleasure for him?
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B
I don't think that's what it is. I think a couple things. Number one, you asked the question of why did he choose Paxton, why didn't he choose Cornyn? I think this is a bet of being for what's gonna happen. If you thought in a vacuum that Paxton probably wins and you're Donald Trump thinking, I wanna flex my muscles and look like I'm the reason, that is a, to me, the logic of that. Kind of a pick at a time when, again, this has become a proxy match with the Senate Republican establishment. I'd also suggest to you, I don't see a universe where Texas goes blue. And it does, and it stops there. Right. Like, I don't think Texas is the marginal fourth seat where Democrats get to 51, and that's it. So it's much more likely to me that on a night where Talarico wins, it's just lights out because it was such a bad night. I don't think it's gonna be scrappy and clawing to 51, and it's Talrico that puts them over the top.
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A
And you think that's how Trump thinks about it?
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B
Oh, no, that's just how Liam thinks about it.
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A
Okay, but I'm asking you how Trump thinks about it. Yeah, like, go a little bit further, because I think the question. I like the big question. I am struggling with Donald Trump as I struggle with many questions about him. So what does this guy want? What is his actual play here? And maybe it's not that strategic, but to me, I think there is a strategy here, which is. I think he wants control of the Republican Party. I think he cares about that more than he cares about control of Congress. I mean, his fury at Thomas Massie was obviously part of this. He took out Bill Cassidy, which is not, I think, the Louisiana senator, which is not, I think, a seat Democrats have any chance of picking up. But I see something that is consistent here and goes a ways back, which is that Donald Trump sees his power base as a Republican Party itself. I think that he is less worried about a world where Democrats have power than he is about a world where as his numbers go down, as he is a lame duck, Republicans feel empowered to oppose him, to join in investigations of him. And the danger is not that Democrats lose elections, it's that Republicans ever feel empowered to abandon him. And that's also Donald Trump maybe controls the Republican Party into the future. I'm not a person who believes he's going to run for a third term, but could he continue to exert enormous power over the Republican Party by continuing to intervene in primaries all over the country? I think he absolutely could. And you can be the kingmaker even when you're not the king. But I'm curious if you disagree with it.
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B
Well, I think if we agree on the predicate that he doesn't generally, in general, the future fortunes, the present and future fortunes of the Republican Party in and of themselves are not significant concern, then the next layer below that is, well, what does he care about? I think he certainly cares about, you know, the fealty to him. Just his impulses are to flex his muscles and have Republicans do what he wants. And as it looks less likely that the House stays or whatever, then, yes, you begin to start thinking about, okay, well, if I can't have that, what can I have? And I think there's kind of, you know, sort of a decision tree there. But I just think once we establish does he care about doing the sorts of things that make it easier for people to win elections when he's not on the ballot, he cares a little bit. But when that's in tension with his control over the party, I certainly think that that shapes his decision making.
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A
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B
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A
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B
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A
Chevrolet Together let's drive. Let's zoom out a little bit here just to the midterm. Broadly, you've been involved in Senate elections on the Republican side. I want to talk about some of the individual elections that are coming. But first is how do you understand the environment itself, the macro environment for Republicans right now?
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B
Best barometer we have is presidential approval generic ballot. And those indicators are rough. I mean it's, you know, Donald Trump has 58% disapproval. I think in RCP average it was higher on November, in November of 2025. And that was bad enough. And so certainly like that's a dipstick. I also think that the thing that's difficult to read about the elections that have happened in the meantime, they've obviously been very favorable for Democrats. Like there's a built in asymmetry based on the makeup of the coalitions now where every Democrat is crawling over broken glass to go vote for Democrats for dog catcher if it means sticking it to Donald Trump generic ballots. Another one where I think maybe that might be the interesting delta there is Democrats only get 48% on the generic ballot, which is of course a good number. It's significantly higher than what Republicans have. But there's a delta there of about 10% of voters who say they disapprove of the job Donald Trump is doing, but they're not yet willing to say, I would prefer a generic Democrat in the vote for Congress. And so I think that's the big question over the next six months is what's more likely does Donald Trump's approval rebound such that those people go and vote Republican? Do they stay home altogether or do they just say this is I'm not voting for this. I want to check and end up saying, yes, I will vote for that.
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A
Well, you could also think about the 2022 scenario here, which is, you know, Joe Biden's approval rating was not quite as bad as Donald Trump's, but it was bad. And Democrats were pretty freaked out about a red wave going into the midterm election. And was it, it didn't really end up coming to pass that Biden's approval rating was not that correlated with Democratic performance. Do you think there's a possibility that happens here that's the best case scenario?
- [28:48]
B
I mean, I think the factor that 2022 kind of rhymes with is that was the first time we were in this particular map. And of course there have been changes at the margins with this mid decade redistricting. But what we found in 2022, 2024, and we'll see about 2026 is this is a really resilient map. There's not as much, you know, pool of competitive seats. And so even on a really good night, I mean, 2022 is instructive. Republicans won the popular House vote by a significant margin and yet only netted something like 10 seats because we redistricted
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A
districts out of competition.
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B
That's right.
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A
What a wonderful way to run a democracy.
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B
And I think the other piece is what Democrats were successful in doing and Republicans failed in doing was putting up the sorts of candidates that could win. And you with messy primaries that produce suboptimal candidates that came out of those primaries with a party that was divided and, you know, expending a lot of resources. And in the meantime, Democrats were able to otherize these candidates, make them weird. I mean. Right. Like the Blake Masters.
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A
Some of them were pretty weird, man.
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B
Well, but I guess, but I say that because you're going to be watching this, like this is precisely what's going to happen. And whether successful is an open question. We're already seeing this with Tao, Rico Gallery.
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A
Go and Paxton are going to try to otherize each other. Something's a little off.
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B
Grant Platner, look, that guy's weird. That's going to be. And whether it's effective, I think that's an open question.
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A
Let's walk through the Senate elections sort of one by one here. If you're, if you're sitting there, you know, you're war gaming this out with, you know, Republicans. Like, what are the states you understand to be competitive? Yeah. And how would you rate the way the races are shaping up in them?
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B
Yep. The first one's pretty obvious. North Carolina is a seat that's been Just right on the cusp for so many seats. Barack Obama was able to break through in 2008. That, in fact was the last time that Democrats won a Senate seat there. It's been a very expensive, very close seat in the Senate since then. But Democrats haven't been able to get over the, over the hump. In this case, it's their single best candidate in the former Governor Roy Cooper. They got him straight away. He's raising gobs of money. And just in, in a, an environment that stands to be quite good for Democrats. That's a place where the open seat created by the retirement of Thom Tillis, who at some level was kind of run out by the president and his relationship with the president, that is a prime pickup opportunity. Open seat, good candidate, big resource advantage, which isn't the case also, in my view.
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A
Another example where Donald Trump was not trying to protect and make life easier for a plausibly vulnerable Senate Republican, which is one reason Tillis seems to have decided to retire.
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B
I think that's right. I could argue with a straight face that all things equal, you'd rather have an incumbent than an open seat. The way things were, like the dynamics with Till, like, he probably would have gotten a primary, it would have gotten ugly. So I actually think coalescing behind Michael Whatley, the then RNC chair, somebody that has access to national fundraising possibilities, I mean, it has gone as well as it could go, but it's still a lopsided situation. All things equal on a Democratic night, that's the first one, one to flip. I don't think it's gone. You know, I think there hasn't been, you know, too, too much polling on this and we're certainly not into the end game. But that's the obvious first pickup. If you're Democrats, that's the one that has to fall. I think it gets interesting after that because there is a significant drop off. There's only one state on this map that does not match the, the, the lean of the state at the presidential level, and that's Maine with Susan Collins. She is a survivor. I think she confounded expectations in 2020, Trump on the ballot, when she was given no chance of winning that race.
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A
Way behind in the polls.
- [32:41]
B
Way behind in the polls. That is the one where I think irrespective of who Democrats had put up there, there's just this unknowable binary. Either Maine is still the kind of state that rewards independent known quantities like Susan Collins, or it's not. And we just don't know. Six Years later. Has that changed? I do think they've done her a favor at some level in you can more obviously see the permission structure for. Why would a Harris voting Democrat vote for a Republican for Senate? Well, because Graham Platner is a different kind of Democrat. They might have voted for Janet Mills, but they wouldn't vote for Graham Platner. So I think that's one. I wouldn't say it's number two, but it's the most obvious.
- [33:32]
A
What do you make of the polling has kind of consistently shown Platner as or more competitive against Collins compared to Mills?
- [33:41]
B
Yeah, I mean I think this is, I don't have a good answer on the, on the point. I think the value of Platner is he's the high variance candidate at a time when having lost with a Serie Gideon type variance is your friend. So that's the logic of a platinum pick. I'm not quite sure what's happening in the point except that Janet Mills ran kind of a somnambulant campaign. It was just she didn't seem to want to.
- [34:07]
A
She's 77. And by the way, I think this is relevant on Collins too. Collins is a lot older and seems it in a way that I think is more difficult for her as a campaigner.
- [34:17]
B
I would argue as a, as a Susan Collins. I've been around her for 20 years. Like I think she's sharper than, or as sharp as ever. I don't want to over, I don't want to, to turn into Joe Biden stuff. But like, no, I actually think that she's, she's strong and sharp and whether her brand is still what the people of Maine want. I mean, I hope they do, but, but we'll have to see. It's a stark contrast there. But I think the, the dynamic of Platner vs Mills. One of these guys has energy. One of the guys out there, you know, doing things that's at least interesting. You might not like him, but at least it's interesting. She seemed to have to be pulled into the race. She got in late. Um, so like that differential, I guess at some level makes sense to me. I don't think that's the same question as when we go through a general campaign. Do they perform the same way on election night? And we'll have to see. But this is really, this becomes a strong question of is it just shirts and skins, is it just D versus R? And are people willing to say, okay, an independent minded Republican that, that took big stands against Donald Trump but has enough respect from this White House that she's not getting torpedoed for it. Do people still want that? And I think it remains.
- [35:32]
A
And I think the hope among certainly Platinum's fans is that he brings in voters who don't normally like Democrats. And I think Democrats continuously have this question of if we ran people more in the Bernie Sanders mold. If you ran people who did not seem like they came out of the same institutions, can you pick up some of these people who liked Trump because he's an outsider? Not people. Not people who, you know, will naturally always vote for Democrats?
- [35:59]
B
Well, I'd say a couple things. Number one, I think there's something to that in that you want to serve up something that's differentiated. But I think the flavor that makes the most sense to me, I don't need to be giving advice to the Democratic Party of Maine, but to me that looks like a Jared Golden. Right.
- [36:14]
A
Instead, who's the House member who represents the reddest district of any Democrat. And for a bunch of reasons. But also he's getting primaried by another Democrat. He's now retiring, which I think is a real loss for Democrats.
- [36:26]
B
Right. And I think he succeeds potentially in cutting a different image. He manages to check some. He's a, he's a combat vet, Marine, you know, but he's not a. He's not associated himself with Bernie. Right. Like I raise that only to say I think that the problem for Platner may not prove to be a problem, but the risk for Platner is. Oh, I mean, it's a fascinating interview with your New York Times colleagues. I found that very interesting when they probed some of, like how much of this is superficial, how much of that, you know, that blue collar affect is real and legitimate. And I mean, there's some holes that can be poked in here that are, that do not hold up to scrutiny. This is still a fascinating state with two districts, one of which is the conservative sort of, you know, up in Aroostook and Presque is. And then there's the coast. And I think for however many voters that Platner can get from the Golden District, how many is he turning off on the coast, notwithstanding his Oysterman background, is that going to hold up with some of the people that actually know and have liked Susan Collins in the past?
- [37:41]
A
So I hear all that. But for Democrats, have any chance here, they're going to need North Carolina, they're going to need Maine than what I
- [37:49]
B
think Maine's the easiest kind of threshold quote. Like I think there is A path independent in Maine, but that just tells you, okay, there's the one state where she's still got it right. But after those first two, it gets really difficult. And there is a leap to, I mean, you can take your pick, but I think the Ohio race is probably where Democrats have the best shot. You know, Sherrod Brown is somebody who lost in the previous election to Bernie Moreno, who I don't think Democrats expected to lose. For Sherrod Brown to lose to, he'd been in elective office for the previous 50 years or so. He's coming back, he's able to raise a lot of money. But I think it's hard to put Humpty Dumpty back together again. When you are an incumbent and your strength is predicated on being the guy who can win and then you're trying to pull yourself off the mat, it's a little bit tougher. You have an incumbent, but an appointed incumbent. In John Husted, you know, the ticket there with him and Vivek has been, the polling has been okay, but Vivek
- [39:00]
A
Ramaswamy is running for governor.
- [39:02]
B
Vivek Ramaswamy, Houston's not done anything particularly offensive. He's gonna have the resources there on a night where Sherrod Brown beats John Husted and withstands the, I mean, the, the amount of money that's going to come into that race from the outside, particularly from like the crypto minded groups and that kind of thing, it's going to be astonishing if that happens. It was a really, really good night for Democrats.
- [39:28]
A
So let's put actually numbers on that. So if I am remembering this right, I think that Brown, who was a very strong candidate, lost that election by three and a half points.
- [39:38]
B
That's right.
- [39:39]
A
So in, you know, you're saying about Bernie Moreno, who I think was in many ways a weak candidate, a sort of car dealer who had settled all his wage theft lawsuits. And people talk about populism, but was not obviously a great icon of populism. But Sherrod Brown lost to Donald Trump and he lost to the Democratic Party's reputation in Ohio. Right. He could not over, he overperformed Kamala Harris by quite a bit.
- [40:03]
B
I think it's the last part that matters. Yes, Donald Trump was on the ticket, but when. And we've keep doing this right. I think we had the same argument when it was Tim Ryan against JD Vance. Like at a certain point when you're saying there's special pleading of like, oh, these are bad candidates. Well, when you say these are bad I would argue.
- [40:18]
A
I'm not saying Sherrod Brown's a bad candidate. No, no, no.
- [40:20]
B
Not Cher Brown. Oh no, no, no. I'm saying Bernie Moreno. Yeah.
- [40:23]
A
I'm just saying. Right. I think that in a. Yes. I'm saying I think that candidate quality wise and you could disagree with me if you want, but I think Sherrod Brown is a better candidate quality wise than Bernie Moreno is. But Democratic parties brand in Ohio is such trash that he could not overcome that as Tim Ryan couldn't overcome it as basically no Democrats in Ohio can now overcome it. So the question with Sherrod Brown it seems to me is let's say 2024 is an environment where Democrats are minus two or three. Right. It's a little bit of a better environment for Republicans if this is a plus 6 or plus 7 democratic environment. Maybe that overwhelms the problems of the Democratic Party, Brandon. And Brown can win if it's not. If it's plus two, if it's plus three, then probably Brown can't win. It really seems to me there you're looking at a pretty straightforward how big is the Democratic wave? How much has Trumpism cost Republicans in this year?
- [41:23]
B
I totally agree with that. On the Ohio front I do think there's been a tendency to underrate the Republican candidate in this case again, like however you thought of Vance or Moreno. Husted is completely in offense. He was a lieutenant governor. I just think that matchup is worse for Brown. But if you're trying to count to three like that probably should be the third and it's not going to get any easier in terms of the different states like the pool of states that we're talking about. We talked enough about Texas but I put that in that tier where to your point about how good is the environment for Democrats? It needs to be Dem +6 or 7 to even be in the conversation
- [42:07]
A
because what beta lost by three, three and a half there in an 18
- [42:11]
B
when it was a very in 2018
- [42:12]
A
and then Allred lost by I think it was six, something like that in 2024. So again you're looking at a. You need something where the year looks like a Democrat got plus six, plus eight. They've gotten that lift. That's right. And then maybe you have a tall Rico. But do you want to talk about that race for a minute? Because on the one hand Democrats are very, very excited about James Talarico. Republicans I think see him as having more attack surface than Democrats quite realize now it'll be Paxton who also has a lot of attack surface. As somebody who actually knows Texas politics fairly well, how do you think about that, that race individually?
- [42:51]
B
I, I would just say Texas is so expensive, there are so many markets that it is going to be just a, an absolute resource suck. And I think because of that, I think smart Democratic strategists like they will, they will play that one out and I think they, they have high hopes. But if you're really looking to move the needle and, and make something happen, you're probably more apt to look at, at Alaska, you're probably more apt to look at Iowa. I don't know that they'll necessarily have more success and in similar ways. You still need to have that D +7 D +8 night to break through in those states. But it's much easier to move the needle and to differentiate your race from the other things going on on the ballot in those states, those smaller markets and smaller electorates where just in terms of raw vote totals, a relatively minor shift in Alaska or Iowa is going to go so much farther than in Texas where you're just trying to boil the ocean.
- [44:13]
A
The Ezra Klein show is supported by
- [44:15]
B
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A
magazine of culture and ideas, which offers an in depth, depth international perspective on everything from Archimedes to who owns the Arctic. And you can get a six month print and digital trial of the London Review of books for just $12. Magazines are printed in the U.S. subscribe now at LRB Me Ezra and we'll throw in a free LRB tote bag.
- [44:39]
B
That's LRB Me Ezra. This wildfire season, Smokey Bear has a reminder for all of us.
- [44:47]
A
Only you can prevent wildfires.
- [44:50]
B
For more than 80 years he's taught us how to prevent unwanted wildfires through his tips. Like using the drown stir drown feel method for putting out campfires.
- [45:01]
A
Every responsible action makes a difference.
- [45:04]
B
Learn wildfire prevention tips@smokeybear.com brought to you by the USDA Forest Service, your state
- [45:10]
A
forester and the Ad Council. Hotels.com is the place you go to book hundreds of thousands of hotels. It's exactly what it sounds like. Just like save your way from hotels.com is exactly what it sounds like. Choose to save now with an instant discount or bank that discount as rewards for later your trip. Your call Save your way exclusively@hotels.com it's all in the name. Well, let's talk about those two races. So Alaska, they got Mary Patola, former House members there.
- [45:38]
B
Yep.
- [45:39]
A
How do you see that one?
- [45:40]
B
So I think Alaska's been another one where, like, I've seen this movie before. I mean, there was a bit on, on Twitter and whatever, 2022, like, don't sleep. Don't sleep on Alaska. It's always the one that it's a, it's a different state, it's a differentiated state where, you know, it's a relatively small electorate, interesting demographics. There's a, there's a blue collar, you know, piece to it and they've shown a propensity to, you know, support Democrats. Whether that's Mark Begich. We can go back to Tony Knowles, Peltola herself in that, in that House race. So there's enough variance there that there's opportunity. I'd argue Dan Sullivan is a squeaky clean incumbent Marine vet. To the extent that he had any challenges, it was probably met at the original threshold when he beat mark Begich in 14. Um, it's hard to beat an incumbent, period. I think the hopes that Democrats have are based on the fact that, well, Peltol won in whatever was in the special election, then she won again in 22. So that she's got this edge in ranked choice voting. I think that's another thing that Democrats need to think about. There's this notion that ranked choice voting inherently benefits Democrats. And there might be cases where that's the case. It certainly was the case with Peltol in the first place. But why was that? It's because Democrat or Republicans were divided. You had two flavors of Republicanism in literally. Sarah Palin against.
- [47:14]
A
Why do you say the name of the president?
- [47:15]
B
It's against.
- [47:15]
A
But we should just mention as a background here, Alaska's a weird system where four people advance.
- [47:21]
B
Yep.
- [47:21]
A
And so then you have ranked choice voting in the general against four candidates. It's not the way people normally think these elections where there's really just two candidates. That's right.
- [47:30]
B
And there's a baggage scion. So just like these names kind of weave in and out of Alaska politics. But the first time he ran, it was against Sarah Palin. And in the immediate context of ranked choice voting and those preferences, there were enough divisions on the Republican side that Peltull was able to sort of triangulate and become the moderate middle of two Republicans ends up winning that and then holding it in that next general election when it was a straight up race against Begich. When he came back, she lost. So I don't wanna say she's not the absolute strongest candidate Democrats could have put up. She absolutely is. I just don't think the conditions Are there from the standpoint of Republican divisions or there's not really blood in the water in the way there might have been. The reason Texas is attractive is, well, you've got some issues with the candidate. You've got some divisions within the party that doesn't exist in Alaska.
- [48:28]
A
Yeah. The situation there is the Democratic hope is partially just that demoralized Republicans just don't come out. Donald Trump's not on the ballot. They're not happy with how things are going under Donald Trump. They stay home and Paltola wins because Democrats. She's both a strong candidate and Democrats are highly motivated in this environment to come out.
- [48:44]
B
That's right. And I also think in terms of the Anchorage market, you just go buy it out for cheaper than you could coming into San Antonio or something. So I think in terms of the kind of alpha there in terms of resource allocation, it makes a lot of sense. And similarly, Iowa, where you have again, going back to this question of incumbent versus open seat, if it was Joni Ernst, it would be a different proposition. But an open seat is more expensive for the party in power to hold and creates opportunity rolls. Have a great candidate there. Nashley Henson, sitting House member, very dynamic, telegenic. So I think they'll be okay there. But this is a time when the Midwest is not loving life. You know, the ag community is getting hit hard by the tariffs. There is enough going on there on that ticket. I mean, there's a competitive governor's race.
- [49:42]
A
Yeah. Rob sand, the Democratic candidate for governor there, is very strong.
- [49:44]
B
That's right. And I'd be more scared if Rob sand was running for Senate. But it does tell you that there are things happening at the state level that you can't take for granted. And if I'm Republicans, I'm leaning into that one and making sure that we don't, we don't get caught.
- [49:59]
A
What do you think about Michigan? So I know Republicans who seem to be getting more excited about the possibility of a pickup in Michigan where Gary Peters is retiring because they think Democrats will nominate Abdullah Sayed, who's like the more Bernie candidate who campaigned with Hassan Piker and is now sort of leading the Democratic primary there. And Democrats have not really been thinking about what happens if they lose a seat. But do you think that's becoming a pickup opportunity or not really in this environment?
- [50:25]
B
Well, look, it should be a pickup opportunity anyway. This is a state that Donald Trump won. He's won it twice. Mike Rogers was a strong candidate who came up just shy last time. So just all things equal, it should be top of the list. As you say, environment makes it more of a challenge. But to your point, the fascinating stuff going on in the Democratic primary there, it's uncanny. As somebody that's worked in Republican politics, particularly Senate politics, long enough, it's the first time in a while I've seen just an eerily similar situation to what Republicans have lived for, you know, decade and a half, this experience of Democrats putting up candidates that could, that are, that are probably objectively weaker and more susceptible to lose. I don't know that it will come back to bite them. But it's so clear that if you put up somebody that's not fit for the state that you. And remember, this is something that Democrats have used their benefit in Arizona. I think back to Arizona, where like both Kyrsten Sinema in one instance and then Mark Kelly in the other, they just got to wait around, had to field themselves stockpiling cash while Republicans spent money and beat each other up and divided the party. The longer this goes in Michigan, the
- [51:43]
A
more divided August primary is not happening for a little while. So just for people who don't know, there's a primary there in the Democratic side between Abdullah Sayyad, who's a more progressive candidate, then Mallory McMorrow and Haley Stevens, who are sort of both more, you know, McMorra a little bit between the two. Stephen's definitely more the establishment Democratic candidate, and they seem to be splitting a vote between them. And also El Said has like, wrapped them around the axle of Gaza, which has become a, like a pretty potent issue in Democratic Party politics. And neither of them have been able to navigate in an effective way.
- [52:18]
B
So I think that's one is a fascinating race. I absolutely think. And this is another case in point where the White House actually did a really good job of rallying behind Mike Rogers early cleared that field in a way that I think there's an opportunity to sneak a seat right there on a night where all these things that we're talking about are in play. Republicans have no business winning in Michigan, but we're actually looking at a situation where this race will be on the board unless something changes. Because even if Haley Stevens ekes it out, this is not the kind of primary that yields a candidate with the resources and unity that puts the race away. I think it'll be competitive heading into election night.
- [53:06]
A
So something you see in Michigan and I think you also just saw in the Kentucky House primary where Thomas Massie lost, is a way that views about Israel, views about Palestinians, views about the war in Iran are actually splitting both parties in complicated ways. So Massie, of course, was a big Trump critic, although didn't used to be, but was key in the Epstein files coming out. And he was defeated. But he was a favorite of Candace Owens and Tucker Carlson. In his concession speech, he said, I would have come out sooner, but I had to call my opponent and concede. And it took a while to find Ed Gallrain, who beat him intelligently. Tel Aviv AIPAC spent a lot of money against Massie. Massey said that he thinks he would have won if not for the sort of fights over Israel. And Massey, by the way, did much, much, much better among young Republicans than among older ones. There's a huge generational divide in that primary. So something is happening here that I think is going to really flower or fracture, I should say, maybe More precisely in 2028 for both sides, which is that I think that Israel, Iran, Gaza have become very, very difficult for both parties to navigate, that their bases are internally split on these issues.
- [54:22]
B
Yeah, I think the Massie one is really interesting because he's been a gadfly throughout his career. That's been his old brand all along. And actually it reminded me on primary night, he had one of the best quotes I've heard of the Trump era. I think it was a 2017 interview that he had with the Washington Examiner. I think his line was, you know, for the longest time, I thought they were voting for me and for Ron Paul and for Rand Paul, because we were the most conservative. Or maybe he said libertarian. And he said, and then Donald Trump comes along, and I realize they're just voting for the craziest son of a bitch in the race. And Donald Trump was first in class. It's just a great kind of summation of all these things, but it gives you a sense of flavor for, like, who Massie is. And I do think he was a. A thorn in the side of this White House and of the party for the longest time. But I think, to your point, he was able to take issues that get a particular premium online, if you can. If you can take some of these polemical issues that get a lot of, you know, engagement and make that your issue. Like, that's not really what we were talking about. But he was able to wrap himself in it in a way that I think got a lot of attention and was able to. To, in some ways, benefit him. He was able to fight a pretty close race, and I think that is a valuable way of getting attention if you are a candidate particularly an insurgent candidate. If you try to make races about these issues, you can find an audience for it. And whether or not it pays electoral dividends, I think that's something to watch.
- [55:54]
A
For one thing, we're seeing in a bunch of different places is a schism maybe between what I would think of as the Fox News Republicans and the YouTube to Republicans he sees in the Florida gubernatorial primaries on the right, where you have a very, very radical and I would say quite anti semitic candidate, but who's been very popular among young Republicans in that state. And Trump has kind of been on both sides of this spine. He's sort of united at least in the 2024 election, like the podcast Republican World and the Fox News Republican World. But those feel to me like they're splitting apart. I mean, you could call it like the Tucker Carlson Ben Shapiro split it. Right. You see it over and over and over again. Obviously Democrats have their own fractures around these issues. But I'm curious in a broad way how you see the, it seemed to be very different politics among young Republicans than among old Republicans right now.
- [56:49]
B
I think that's right. I think it's much easier to synthesize. Who knows where it goes. But I think Republicans have an easier time containing this and sorting it out. I'm watching Vice President Vance as the one who is kind of the, he, he has spoken up on this and I think is, is trying to sort that out because it's, there is, there is a generational divide. There's, there's certain politics that have been imprinted.
- [57:13]
A
What makes it easier to sort it out on the Republican side?
- [57:16]
B
I don't think, like, how are you
- [57:17]
A
going to hold Ben Shapiro and Tucker Carlson together in one party?
- [57:20]
B
Well, I don't think, I don't think Tucker Carlson wants to be involved in any party. Right.
- [57:23]
A
I mean, he endorses Republicans. He was spoke at the RNC in
- [57:27]
B
2024 and less than until Tucker Carlson runs in, in 2028. Like I, I, he is, he has deliberately marginalized himself in a way that has, I think, been very successful in getting a grip around a certain audience.
- [57:42]
A
Let me push you on this because I'm really curious to hear you say this because what it looks to me like is happening is that Carlson is making a bet. I'm not saying it's not sincere. It might be sincere for him, but that the Republican Party is moving that in the same way that that Donald Trump once was a strange, eccentric, vanity candidate but is now the dominant figure in Republican Party politics. What Carlson sees and is maybe also helping to shape is that young Republicans have very, very different views on a bunch of these issues. We live in a very, very attentionally thick society now. And yes, him, Candace Owens, I'm not saying that they are donating to the Republican Senate Campaign Committee, but they're on the right. I mean, I don't think that is arguable. They're endorsing candidates in Republican primaries. They both endorse Massie, for instance. And yeah, maybe they're losing some of the fights now, but I think their view is that the only thing holding this together is Donald Trump himself and that JD Vance can't hold it together, Marco Rubio can't hold it together. And so they're betting that after Donald Trump doesn't have an iron gripper on the Republican Party that what's going to be growing is their side of it. And in fact, picking some of these losing battles is good for them right now.
- [59:01]
B
Well, I think what's good for Don, this is the attention economy, right? What's good for Tucker is getting attention however he can, including right now picking fights with Donald Trump because there is an appetite for that in a way that there wasn't a couple years ago. But I don't know that that's his project. I don't know that his is an electoral proposition. I think he's trying to build his own platform. He's trying to build his own audience. And I think he genuinely has a lot of these positions that he's sorting out in real time. But I think the lay to this, I mean, the question of why do I think it's easier for Republicans? Well, I think for Democrats, this is like literally like a litmus test issue in a way that is going to be on full display in 2028, to the point where like literally like the most obviously talented politician in the race, like, I don't even know if I mean, I'd love to know, like Josh Shapiro, does he have any chance of it just seems like the kind of issue, just proximity to it that would be be the sort of thing that will color the market for a Josh Shapiro candidate. And they boxed him out on this issue even in the veep stakes in 2024. So I just think it's so facially front and center that makes it difficult. Whereas this is underneath a lot of things in the Republican Party. And I think a lot of it relates to generationally. You have a generation, a Fox News generation, kind of a boomer generation that's imprinted with the sort of more idealistic politics of the shared affinity of the state of Israel, the, you know, sort of Christian imperative, the sort of Huckabee approach toward these things versus a younger Republican Party and a party that shifted over time to be the low trust party that is skeptical of institutions, that doesn't want to hear in the same way that, like Trump exploited skepticism of the neoconservative project and the idealism of it to something much more kind of skeptical and perhaps cynical. I think you have to sell the Republican alignment with the cause and state of Israel on its own terms in terms of like an America first, like, why does this benefit America? And I think that's what Vance is exploring in terms of explaining support for Israel in all its forms in a way that is much more of like a transactional like this is good for.
- [61:31]
A
But Kenny, I'm actually I wonder if he can hold that together, because I think I maybe see this one differently than you do. It seems to me the Democrats have, I don't want to say a consensus forming because I think there's going to be a lot of debate. But Chris Van Hollen, who's a very establishment Democratic senator from Maryland, he has, but has been, I think, a leader on some of these issues around Israel, he basically says, look, we need a new we. The Democrats need a new consensus on this. And you see it forming around, for instance, Rahm Emanuel and Chris Van Hollen and aoc. I think that's going to be when you say there's going to be a litmus test, I think the kind of straightforward one is going to be something like that. And you see the even more moderate or at least Normie figures in the Democratic Party embracing that. Meanwhile, the schism on the Republican side, it seems like it's going to be harder because you really do have this kind of Christian Zionism side, this war in Iran side versus the Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens side. I mean, you've mentioned Huckabee, but the Tucker Huckabee interview, I think is a very good example of how far those things are. You're not going to have a pro war in Iran faction in the Democratic primary. That's just not going to happen. And Shapiro's view, which is that Netanyahu is a disaster, is also going to be Newsom's view is also going to be Pete Buttigieg's view is also going to be AOC's view. And then they're going to kind of have to figure out how they instantiate that into proposed policies. The Republican Party feels to me like when you look at the young versus you look at the again, Fox News versus YouTube, what's popular in one and what's popular in another. They feel kind of irreconcilable. They actually have have not. The question Democrats are going to have to ask of how far do you start moving in pressuring Israel to not be an apartheid state, but on the Republican side? Do you think Israel is great or do you think it has led us into a disastrous war in Iran and is distorting our foreign policy? I'm very worried about the ways that will shade into anti Semitism and other things, but it feels very hard for Republicans to reconcile. And in some ways Massie, with that final line, I had trouble reaching my opponent because he was in Tel Aviv. That struck me as a signal of things possibly going in pretty ugly directions over there.
- [63:48]
B
I mean, the ugliness is going to happen. But I think that's also as you're looking at what Massie's doing, Marjorie Taylor Greene is doing, even what Tucker's doing. These aren't necessarily electoral plays. I think the political economy that exists now is you can have your career as a podcaster as just a general media gadfly on YouTube or otherwise. And I think that in a weird way, whereas your backbench house gadfly might have aspired to higher office or other things, you know, in cycles past, now you're what you're off ramp is probably just keeping a hold on this audience.
- [64:23]
A
Okay, but we used to say attentional plays were an electoral plays. Is that still true? Because if I look at the big lessons right now, one thing I just see happening is you can win through dominating attention. And Trump was probably the first figure who did this in a way you couldn't before. But you look at at Mamdani defeating Cuomo and Lander and a full field of Democrats, you look at Graham Platner. He destroyed Janet Mills through dominating attention. Does Spencer Pratt have a chance in Los Angeles? It doesn't seem entirely impossible to me that he does. James Talarico came out of nowhere because he became a huge figure on TikTok and ended up on Joe Rogan's show. I mean, one of the things to me that is significant about this era is it attention, like the attention economy is eating the political economy. And incumbents who were tuned for this older form of more institutionally gatekept attention went over the newspaper editorial board in your state or in your city are getting defeated by candidates who know how to win attention online I think we
- [65:28]
B
totally agree on that. But I would say if you look at the individual personalities and habits of these folks in particular like Marjorie Taylor Greene, when she broke with Donald Trump, that was not a bid for you know, like because she thought that was going to benefit her. That that was, that's that there's an oppositional element to that. There's a, you know, there are, there are personal circumstances around that. Massey if you know Thomas Massie and I do and, and, and like him at some level like he wants to stir up trouble. Like he's not he, he does not want to turn this into a movement. I think, I think there's this goes back to the Tucker thing. Like I'm sure Tucker has lots of interesting ambitions and wants to have max optionality. But I don't know that this is about like a broader you know, I think he'd be formidable and would do
- [66:12]
A
you think he'll run for president?
- [66:13]
B
I don't expect him to and I don't know what would ha like that would be chaos and I don't know the train wreck would be would be interesting. I don't get the sense that that's what he's doing. I think he's playing with a lot of things that could build that speculation and I think that benefits him and it benefits his enterprise right now. But I don't know that that's what's I think I genuinely think he is in real time toying with all kinds of things that have been, you know, floating around in his head for a long time.
- [66:42]
A
I mean that's basically my gut on him too. But I guess the point you make on Marjorie Taylor Green and some of these others. Massey I think the question may be that that opens up Trump is the thing that is standing between the kinds of politics that they seem to think are more authentic and more viable. Certainly what is happening in attention right now on the right the thing standing the way that is Donald Trump himself quite elderly second term president. And so I agree that right now in the Republican Party decide to pivot towards the more chaotic Carlson Owens populist online, Epstein files, et cetera. Energy that Trump harnessed a fair amount of in 2024 and now is doing a bunch of things people from that part of the coalition didn't expect him to do. You still can't beat Trump when he says I am maga he is right. But Donald Trump won't be there forever and so can JD Vance put these things back in the bottle? Can he resist them or is Massie just early. Are these the people who are telling you where the ball is going? And once it's not Donald Trump and he is the single dimensional litmus test of the entire Republican Party, it's all going to fracture into. Into chaos. And these things that seem to have the energy right now, but that he can put a stop to. Well, there's gonna be nobody to put a stop to them.
- [68:24]
B
Yeah, I think he's been able to, through sheer force of nature, kind of hold together some of these contradictions within the party. But I think so much of it is attitudinal. Right. It's not even necessarily about what the issue is. It's not necessarily about what the policies are. And his gift was being able to be all things to all people and being a walking contradiction in ways that kind of worked. I think that's really tough for anyone to do in either party. But just like anything else, and the Democrats are running into this too, at the end of the day, you can have these conversations, but you need a vehicle and a vessel to harness all these things and resolve them in a way that at least, least get you over the hump to 48, 49% of the vote that is able to overcome the other side. So I think, Ken, whether it's JD or whether it's somebody else, I think a lot of that will be this ramp toward 2028. What does the president choose to do? He obviously has a ton of power institutionally, and to me, it obviously seems like the orderly path is to hand it off to his vice president and successor. Or, you know, I do think that whatever happens next, it's going to be based on how to. How Republicans deal with the fact that the, the old version of the party is not what the voters wanted, it's not coming back, and it may not be in the form that we currently see it, but you need to find something that appeals to your voters and that does not get stuck trying to solve the problems of the 80s and 90s, because that seems to be the tendency. We've had the tug of war between Donald Trump or Nikki Haley. It just can't be that. There has to be something different, and there has to be something that acknowledges Trump's appeal and what he's figured out, while also making it less personality based. And I think that's going to be the challenge for anybody, whether it's JD or anybody else.
- [70:35]
A
Are there Republicans, and I don't mean here, just people who might compete in 2028, but just Republicans who are elected and are coming up in the party who you think represent or trying to fashion interesting versions of that future. I think Democrats have an idea of who they're sort of young bench is, but Trump is such a huge figure. And then you have obviously the sort of Rubio, JD Vance expected succession, race. But as somebody who watches the Republican Party more closely, who do you watch in it as bellwethers or signals of where it's going?
- [71:12]
B
It's a great question. I mean, I worry about being generals fighting the last war. I think people have been trying to figure out what Trumpism without Trump looks like for the past, you know, really the past decade because there was an expectation that he'd be a flash in the pan and so you'd have to figure out how to take the good and jettison the rest. You know, I think that the different flavors have certainly been there's, I mean Rubio's, I think Rubio's transformation has been fascinating and quite effective in a lot of ways, I think. I mean that's too easy. You know, JD Came by this, this has kind of been his, his vision of things since he entered entered politics. But the ones that have been playing with at the congressional level, like Josh Hawley, I don't think he's necessarily the guy. But watching him, Jim Banks similarly like these guys are all like the entrepreneurship happening, trying to feel out like let me see what I can do that can, whether, whether it's harness attention or whether that's something that the White House picks up in ways that don't fit the orthodoxy of the old party. I think those guys have been really interesting. But I think at the end of the day, the insight of Trump is like so much of this isn't about policy, it's about attitude. It's about how you position yourself against the left. And I've yet see somebody that has figured that aspect of it out. I think there's a tendency to over index to interesting political ideas that excite you or me. And that's not necessarily what excites a primary electorate in 2027 and 2028.
- [72:58]
A
If you're advising Republican candidates in some of these states we've talked about, there's obviously the specific qualities of the Democratic candidate they're running against. But broadly speaking, how would you tell them to run against the Democratic Party right now?
- [73:13]
B
I think you do need to tie your candidate, whatever their ex interests are, to the national party, which is seen even by Democrats as weak and feckless and in some ways tied to unpopular positions. I Do think there is a body of evidence for anyone that was in politics in the the 2020-2022 moment, there's deep trove of hits that are in there. We're starting to see that with Talarico. But I think that exists for most people. Put them on the defensive and make them account for the things that they said and did way back when. Cause I think under the light of day, six years later, it looks and sounds like dispatched from another planet. And I think seeing where they were on Hera, seeing where they were on, on Biden, trying to tie them back to, you know, places where there's already been a verdict rendered. But I mean it's just like good old fashioned opposition research, good old fashioned message and ad making. And going back to that point about attention, like finding ways for this to break through and to almost muify them and otherize them. Like going back to Blake Masters being a weirdo like figure. You got to figure that out and crack that because some people, people, maybe they'll grok it just because it's so obvious. But like you need to paint a picture that's compelling. I mean, I don't know, maybe Spencer Pratt's the Future. I don't know, maybe we're going to get some good AI video content, but I think that's the sort of thing that needs to break through in this kind of attention economy.
- [74:47]
A
So that's our final question. What are three books you recommend to the audience?
- [74:50]
B
Three books to your audience? I'm thinking of one that probably hasn't been read by most of your audience, but I think should be. Matt Cottoneni wrote a history of the right called the Right.
- [75:01]
A
He's been here for the show, man.
- [75:03]
B
Well, he didn't recommend his own book, but I really think it did the best job that I've seen of reminding us that not only did history not start in 2016, it didn't start in 1980 either. The iterations and evolutions of the Republican Party over 100 years I think are important and instructive in terms of, of the current moment and how it maps onto the playing.
- [75:29]
A
There's always been this populist, anti establishment, often more conspiratorial way in interesting ways,
- [75:33]
B
kind of full circle. But yes, I think it's the fact of how fluid some of these things are I think is just, it's worth, for the perspective of where this all came from. And obviously there's other layers that are complicated. But I think it's a really good book and a good read another one that I think, especially in this moment, has a new significance now that we're talking about AI and all data centers and all these things. Patrick McGee's Apple in China I found just very interesting from an industrial policy standpoint, from a foreign policy standpoint, from national security standpoint. Really, really good and worth reading for your audience. I'll go, I'll go. Abundance I think the Frackers is really interesting for understanding our energy dominance, evolution and revolution. I think watching us go from a scarcity mindset in the 2000s, when I started my career, to being the Saudi Arabia of natural gas, it's not something that the elite saw coming. It's not something that really smart people saw coming. It's not what we index our our policy and our politics too. And I think it still hasn't fully set in how revolutionary that it was. I think it's a important one for for your folks to to read.
- [77:01]
A
Liam Donovan, thank you very much.
- [77:02]
B
Thanks, Ezra.
- [77:15]
A
This episode of the israel client show is produced by jack mccordick. Fact checking by michelle harris, julie beer and mary marge locker. Our senior audio engineer is jeff geld. Our recording engineer is johnny simon. Our executive producer is claire gordon. The show's production team also includes marie cassione, annie galvin, roland hu, kristin lin, emma kelbeck, marina king and yan. Original music by aman sahota and pat mccusker. Audience strategy by shannon busta. The director of new york times pinning audio is annie rose strasser.
- [77:59]
B
This wildfire season, Smokey Bear has a reminder for all of us.
- [78:04]
A
Only you can prevent wildfires.
- [78:07]
B
For more than 80 years, he's taught us how to prevent unwanted wildfires through his tips, like using the Drown Stir Drown feel method for putting out campfires.
- [78:18]
A
Every responsible action makes a difference.
- [78:20]
B
Learn wildfire prevention tips@smokeybear.com brought to you by the USDA Forest Service, your state
- [78:27]
A
forester and the Ad Council.