NJ Gov.-Elect Mikie Sherrill (Extended)

Summary

The Late Show Pod Show with Stephen Colbert

Episode: NJ Gov.-Elect Mikie Sherrill (Extended)
Date: December 6, 2025

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Overview

In this insightful and dynamic episode, Stephen Colbert welcomes New Jersey's Governor-elect Mikie Sherrill for an extended conversation. The discussion ranges from her recent landslide election win and vision for the state, to reflections on military ethics and a harrowing (but hilarious) personal story about delivering her own baby in a New York City cab. Sherrill draws upon her experience as a Navy helicopter pilot and Congresswoman to share candid takes on public service, leadership, and confronting federal policy challenges.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Mikie Sherrill's Election Win

• The Road to Victory
  • Stephen Colbert notes Sherrill’s steady polling but emphasizes the impressive margin of her win:

    “You won by 56.9% to 42.5%, which is 14.4 points, which… political experts call a curb stomping.” (05:11)

  • Sherrill attributes the win to hard work, listening to constituents, and offering “a different vision than what is being presented by the president in Washington” (05:44).
  • She emphasizes the importance of fighting for people, especially in “scary times,” and the need for “real leadership" (06:02).

Resisting Federal Policies

• Standing Up to Washington
  • Colbert asks how her stance against Trump-era policies will evolve as governor.
    Sherrill responds:

    “There are areas where I really need the federal government to start performing better... But that doesn’t mean in any way, shape or form hiding or ducking or not standing up against those things that are so wrong." (06:20)

  • She highlights New Jersey’s significant financial contribution to the federal government ($70 billion surplus sent) and frustration over federal underperformance in areas like SNAP, healthcare, and education (07:37).
• On Withholding Federal Taxes
  • Responding to a Jon Stewart interview, Sherrill discusses the idea—though legally challenging—of withholding federal taxes if benefits to New Jersey are cut:

    “We are going to work incredibly hard to test that and to take them to court if they’re not running these programs… to claw back as much federal money as possible...” (08:22)

  • She is adamant about prioritizing New Jersey’s interests above political convenience.

Military Ethics & Leadership

• The Caribbean Bombings
  • Colbert brings up current controversies surrounding US military action in the Caribbean and the need for Congressional oversight (08:59).
  • Sherrill is blunt:

    "As you see the second bombing that took place when people were in the water struggling, not a threat, that would be a war crime. It looks like it's a war crime to me as somebody who served.” (09:24)

  • She calls such actions “a stain on our honor” and discusses the burden it places on U.S. military personnel to uphold the Constitution, even at risk of career consequences (09:56–10:52).
• Training to Refuse Illegal Orders
  • Colbert raises the difficult question of how soldiers discern legal from illegal orders. Sherrill details her own training at the Naval Academy, referencing the My Lai massacre, and underscores the expectation that “following orders” is not a shield against war crimes (12:02–12:23).
  • She criticizes current attacks on constitutional training in the military, particularly from Republicans (12:02).

Memorable Personal Moment: Delivering a Baby in a Cab

• Delivering Her Own Baby
  • Colbert sets up the story as “even more badass” than Sherrill’s piloting exploits (13:23).
  • Sherrill recounts, with humor and humility, how she made fun of the chapter “How to Deliver Your Own Baby” in a pregnancy book—only to find herself doing just that on the way to Mount Sinai hospital (13:47–14:05).
  • She describes the cab ride through Central Park, her husband’s attempts to help, and ultimately a stranger from a bus stop assisting with the delivery (15:53–16:54).
    Notable exchange:

    “So, a lady who was at the bus stop… said, you know, can I help? And I’m like, sure, you know, catch. So I have this baby.” (16:54)

  • When her husband returns, bemused that she hadn’t followed his advice not to push:

    “[He] looks down and he looks at me again and he goes, I thought I told you not to push.” (17:37)

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Notable Quotes

• On Election Approach:

  “I think fighting hard for people, listening to people on the ground, and delivering on a different vision than what is being presented by the president in Washington…”
  — Mikie Sherrill (05:44)

• On Standing Up to Federal Neglect:

  “We send $70 billion more to the federal government than we get back... My job is to fight for New Jersey. And that’s exactly what I’m going to do as governor.”
  — Mikie Sherrill (07:37–08:59)

• On Military Ethics:

  “…that would be a war crime. It looks like it's a war crime to me as somebody who served. And what's problematic about that is… this country… is operating in this way. It's a stain on our honor.”
  — Mikie Sherrill (09:24)

• On Refusing Illegal Orders:

  “The excuse was I was following orders. And that’s not an excuse for committing war crimes… That’s the demand of anyone who puts on the uniform.”
  — Mikie Sherrill (12:23)

• On Childbirth in a Cab:

  “So, a lady who was at the bus stop… said, can I help? And I’m like, sure, you know, catch. So I have this baby."
  — Mikie Sherrill (16:54)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [04:23] Mikie Sherrill joins Stephen Colbert
• [05:01] Discussion on election victory and strategy
• [06:20] Approach to governing and standing up to the federal government
• [07:37] New Jersey's federal contributions and federal program frustrations
• [08:22] Withholding federal taxes and legal challenges
• [09:15] Oversight of US military actions in the Caribbean
• [12:02] Soldier training on legal versus illegal orders
• [13:23] The “badass” baby-delivery story begins
• [15:53] Water breaks, cab drama, and delivering the baby
• [17:37] Humorous conclusion to the baby story and wrap-up

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Tone and Style

The episode maintains Stephen Colbert’s signature blend of wit and sincerity, providing both sharp political critiques and lighthearted personal storytelling. Sherrill responds with a mix of earnestness, humor, and deep conviction, offering thoughtful analysis alongside memorable personal anecdotes.

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This conversation is a must-listen for those interested in politics, public service, military ethics, and—unexpectedly—adventurous parenting.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

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[A]

Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Late show. Ladies and gentlemen. My next guest is a veteran Navy pilot and former member of the United States. Congressman, she was just elected governor of the great state of New Jersey. Please welcome Governor elect Mikey Sherrill.

Well, Governor elect Sherrill, nice to have you on the show.

[D]

Nice to be here.

[A]

You are.

You are presently between gigs, as we say in my business.

[D]

Uh huh.

[A]

You resigned from Congress how long ago?

[D]

About a week and a half ago.

[A]

A week and a half ago you heard the Marjorie Taylor Greene was leaving. You're like, I'm out of here if she's leaving.

[D]

Right.

[A]

It's the use of staying here anymore. Let's talk about your victory. Okay. It was, I mean you, I think you were the front runner for most of the race, but not by a ton. You know, the polls were like four, three or four points toward the end, something like that.

[D]

Am I right? Right. Right. And I think that that might have been like a generic ballot.

[A]

Sure.

[D]

But we were Working incredibly hard to build.

[A]

Well, you sure did, because you won by 56.9% to 42.5%, which is 14.4 points, which.

Which, which like it. Which political experts call. Have a term for it. It's called a curb stomping. November 4th was big for you. Abigail Spamberger and Zoran Mamdani here in the city. What ideas? What do you think? Do you think there's a commonality between.

[D]

Yeah, I think fighting hard for people, listening to people on the ground and delivering on a different vision than what is being presented by the president in Washington and people. I think right now these are scary times.

And to navigate these is going to take some real leadership.

[A]

Donald Trump was one of the reasons why you ran for Congress.

You know, you saw the crisis of the moment. And what does resisting his agenda look like to you now that you be a governor of a state?

[D]

So, obviously, there are areas where I really need the federal government to start performing better when it comes to infrastructure, when it comes to snap, schools, medical care, et cetera, et cetera. So we're going to fight that and work with, with anybody in the administration who we can to deliver on those promises. But that doesn't mean in any way, shape or form hiding or ducking or not standing up against those things that are going on that are so wrong. I mean, you know, I'm glad you're sitting down. You might not know this. Some people are losing their jobs because they're speaking out against the President of the United States.

[A]

What.

Are you talking about? Horrible. I hope you got something to back that up with.

You were recently talking to my buddy Jon Stewart on his podcast, and you seemed open to the idea of New Jersey withholding our federal taxes if the federal government cuts the benefits to New Jersey. Yeah, I'm not.

I'm not a lawyer. Is that.

Legal?

[D]

So it's a great idea. Hard to execute, right? Like, when he asked the question, he said, you know, do you ever think about withholding taxes? I'm like, I think about it all the time. I mean, we are a state in New Jersey. We send $70 billion more to the federal government than we get back in federal taxes. And now we have a federal government that is refusing to run the school programs they're on the hook for, or the medical programs or the health care programs or, you know, SNAP funding. I mean, the list goes on and on and on. So we're sending all this money for them to run the fda and they're getting information off TikTok. I mean, we could do better right, in New Jersey. And so.

And so we, you know, we are going to work incredibly hard to test that and to take them to court if they're not running these programs, to claw back as much federal money as possible, to withhold as much money as possible. But it is very difficult. But I do think when you are looking at a federal government, that basically the only person that seems to be doing really well under this government is Donald Trump and members of his family. And so if that's the case, my job is to fight for New Jersey. And that's exactly what I'm going to do as governor.

[A]

As I said before, you were a Navy helicopter pilot. You were on the Armed Services Committee. Can you explain what's happening in the Caribbean right now? I mean, as members of Congress, do you get updates to what the administration is doing and any evidence they present?

[D]

Well, in its oversight responsibilities, Congress should get just that. I've sat on the House Armed Services Committee and.

The chair of the committee, Republican and the ranking member Democrat, have both stated that, you know, the administration owes them evidence and a hearing so that they can understand what evidence the administration's using on this bombing. And now certainly, as you see the second bombing that took place when people were in the water struggling, not a threat, that would be a war crime. It looks like it's a war crime to me as somebody who served. And what's problematic about that.

Is the fact that this country that I've spent my life serving is operating in this way. It's a stain on our honor. It's horrible, it's illegal, it's awful. But it's also now taking every single member of the armed forces and making them once again, as they do in many cases almost every day, stop and say, what is my job here is I'm trying to serve the Constitution. You know, every member of our military takes an oath to the Constitution to protect and defend it. And so they are all weighing right now, do I stay and stand in the breach and try to protect against these types of actions, or am I complicit? And where is the line? And that I hear all the time from so many people serving in federal government, what is my responsibility here? And so many people are trying to hold the line. But this.

Type of incompetence, of disrespect for the military, of disrespect for our troops of self serving, and it is just so offensive to me as a veteran and as somebody who cares so deeply about service to this country and the troops who serve this country.

[A]

This seems like.

I see you.

This seems like very much that's the sort of thing that Mark Kelly and other people who put out the video saying, reminding people that the Uniform Code of Military justice says you actually can refuse an illegal order. It seems like that's exactly what they were talking about. Donald Trump's not going to be in trouble for this cuz he can't be prosecuted for anything. You know, he's going to pardon his buddies. It's the people who are actually, it's the soldiers who are serving who would probably see the brunt of any prosecution here.

When what. How does a soldier make that determination, or a sailor or any serviceman make that determination about whether a order is a legal or an illegal one. What training do you receive?

[D]

Well, we've seen attacks on that type of training for some time now in the House Armed Services Committee. Some of the training that goes on and that we really pushed under the Democratic administration, under Biden's administration, we were really pushing in some constitutional training. And oddly, I think very oddly, Republicans were often fighting that. But.

The training I received at the Naval Academy was along the lines of, you know, seeing what happened in the My Lai massacre with Lieutenant Calley, where they went into a village in Vietnam and they killed women and children and villagers. And it was horrible and horrific. The war crimes that were committed. And the excuse was I was following orders. And that's not an excuse for committing war crimes. So you, you undergo training like that and it's hard. It's not, you know, I remember thinking to myself, oh, would I, would I be able to discern in the moment what's, you know, what I'm doing and when would I know and how would I stop other people from committing more crimes? It's hard. It's not easy. But that's the demand of anyone who puts on the uniform. And you're exactly right to see that Hegseth is now sort of suggesting that he didn't order the second strike, which I don't find credible, puts it on the backs of those who serve and puts them at risk of prosecution.

[A]

Well.

As you know, as I was saying, you're a Navy helicopter pilot. That's kind of badass thing to have done. You wanted to be a pilot when you were younger, but I understand that you actually did something even more badass not far from this theater over on the east side here. Can you tell everybody the. Well, you were definitely in it. Tell people what happened.

[D]

Okay. I just want to, in my Defense. I just want to say a couple things. No one's attacking you. Wait till they hear the story. No. So there is a book when women are pregnant that they often read. Maybe you and Evie know it. It's called what to expect when you're expecting.

[E]

Sure, of course.

[D]

So I had thumb through that. And there is a chapter called how to deliver your own baby, which I had made a lot of fun of. You know, for the women on the go, who doesn't have time to go, you know, the hospital, you know, just, here's a do it yourself life hack. So I'd been making a lot of fun of this chapter. So, you know, my suggestion is, karma's tough. Don't do that to people who are pregnant. And then I also there my sister at the time, it was her first pregnancy and my second, and she was very stressed about the whole thing. But, you know, I wasn't like a normal pregnant lady. I was a cool pregnant lady, right? So, you know, I was going to handle this. So my husband calls and he says, you know, how's it going? I said, I think today's the day. He said, I'll come home. Comes home. He's like, how's it going? I said, it's fine. I said, my mom wants me to stop and get her a cup of coffee. I said, go ahead. Right? You know, cool pregnant lady, sure. So he stops at the bodega. I'm on the upper west side at this point. Point comes in. We're on a third floor, walk up. He comes in, and I'm having some contraction. He goes, how far apart are those? I'm like, you know, I don't know. He goes, let me time him. He goes, okay, 45 seconds. He goes, you should call the doctor. We should call the doctor. And I said, okay. So we call the doctor. And she goes, yeah, you should, you know, come in. You don't sound that stressed, but, you know, come in. I'm gonna have you go to the hospital. I said, okay. So we're on the third floor, walk up. So we go down, and we're on 95th. And if you're going to cross Central park, which is, and this is relevant, only half a mile wide, we basically just had to get to the other side of the park to Mount Sinai. So I walk up to 96, Jason hails a cab. We get in. We get halfway across the park, and my water breaks. And I'm like, I'm having this baby in the cab. And Jason, my husband, goes, don't push.

[A]

Is he here right now?

[D]

He's not here.

[B]

He's not here.

[D]

He is not here, unfortunately. He's traveling maybe, you know, smartly. So, yeah, he says, don't push for anyone. And I can tell from the audience's response, for anyone who's have a baby, that's not really an option. Right. That's not something on the table. And I just looked at him and so we get to the end of the park and the light turns red. And so we're sitting there and then the light turns green and then it turns red again and we're not going anywhere. And Jason's like, buddy, you gotta make this light. So we finally, the guy kind of pulls some maneuvers. We get to 97th and it's just still really jammed up. So he pulls over and Jason said, I'm going to go get help, which I have later called pulling a runner on me.

And so I'm like, ok, well, I'm.

[A]

Out for a pack of smokes. I'll be right back.

[D]

An Irish goodbye, right? So I'm like, ok, ok. So I'm sitting there and I'm, you know, luckily I've read the chapter, so I know exactly what I'm doing here. Delivering my own baby.

[A]

Not as funny this time, Right?

[D]

Right. And of course, the cab driver's like, white knuckling. He never looks back. He's just white knuckling the steering wheel, like, oh, my gosh. So a lady who was at the bus stop, it turns out she'd worked to the hospital, said, you know, can I help? And I'm like, sure, you know, catch. So I have this baby. And so, so then I'm holding this baby and I'm like, oh, my gosh, have the little baby. And Jason comes running back at this point and he looks at me and I'm holding our son, and he looks down and he looks at me again and he goes, I thought I told you not to push.

[A]

And you obviously apologize.

Well, Governor elect, thank you so much for being here. Governor elect Mikey Sherrill, everybody.

Thank you for listening to the Late Show POD show with Stephen Colbert. Just one more thing. If you want to see more of me, come to The Late Show YouTube channel for more clips and exclusives.

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