JVL (5:38)

You know, that's what he does. Sorry.

Sarah Longwell (5:42)

So anyway, but what do you think the vibe shifts about?

JVL (5:45)

I think it's about the swing state polling. Yeah. And that she's moving backwards a tiny bit. Right. I mean, it's all basically still in the margin of error.

Sarah Longwell (5:53)

You're just not seeing the same like Wisconsin plus six, Michigan plus five that you were seeing. She's kind of holding the same in Pennsylvania. But it's, it's Michigan and Wisconsin have kind of come back down to earth. And Tammy Baldwin's race is tightening in Wisconsin.

JVL (6:08)

Yeah.

Sarah Longwell (6:09)

I'm doing a Michigan, Wisconsin focus group pod on Saturday. And I had local reporters, we split it into two halves and I had two guys named Craig. They were both named Craig. One the, both writers for their, the biggest papers and the political reporters. Now, I would say both of them, though, did feel that Kamala had a much stronger ground game. I had, you know, I was talking to the Michigan guy and he was just like, you know, Whitmer won by double digits and the Republican Party in the state has basically fallen apart. Remember, they had that. Yeah, super weirdo whose name is escaping me, but, you know, trust me, super weirdo, corrupt.

JVL (6:54)

And. Yeah, yeah. They, I, I mean, I, I look at it and this is, this is what leads me into. So I have gotten some pushback on my piece yesterday. For anybody who didn't read it, maybe even including you, my thesis was just that we've got two cycles of data, both national and statewide on Trump, and his numbers were remarkably similar, despite the fact that those two elections could hardly have been more dissimilar. Right. So we had an open seat election in 2016 in which everything was basically normal and he was running against a woman. And then we had him as an incumbent president running against a man with total national calamity and economic, massive economic dislocation and a historic rise in turnout. And his vote share percentage are the same. And, and so what I say is, like the poll, and in both cases, his polling under his final poll numbers undercounted his final vote share by about 2%. Now, what people don't understand is the polling also undercount. Final polling also undercounted Hillary Clinton's vote Share like her vote share went up from final polling as well. It wasn't. But my point is that. So the polls now have him right at his ceiling, both in most of the states, not quite in Arizona and Georgia, but very close in Arizona and Georgia and everywhere else. He's at that ceiling already. So one of two things is going on. Either polls have accurately figured out how to capture his real level of support because they've found ways to get to his coalition, or he's going to blow the doors off and wind up at like 49% in the national vote or something. And I. Look, anything's possible, man. But I just think against. I mean, Kamala Harris is a good candidate running a very good and smart campaign with a ton of money in a good economic. I'm sorry, it is a good economic environment. I understand people don't feel that way while they're putting out their $430 foot tall skeletons in their yards to decorate for Halloween. But it just is regardless of their feelings and they're not all one person.

Sarah Longwell (9:29)

All the voters are not one person with the same economic situation.

JVL (9:32)

But that's true of every election.

Sarah Longwell (9:34)

People who put the skeletons out in their front yard own a house, which is different from a lot of these voters who do not own houses.

JVL (9:40)

But that's true in every election, right? In every single election. You know, even the ones where we say, well, things were really good. Like, they. Things were never really good for everybody at the same time.

Sarah Longwell (9:49)

Can I not to. Not to reengage you in this economic thing, but can I just. I'm going to take your argument, actually, which I thought was such a good one, about how difficult it is to pull an electorate that has been changing as much as it has over the last eight or nine years. Like, we are seeing wholesale shifts in who votes for whom, which I think is. It is totally valid to be like, I don't know if polling can capture, with their like, waiting methods and whatever, like, all right, so there's all this shifting going on and also, like, people are moving. So I'm just in Nevada and I'm doing these focus groups and the number one reason and the reason I'm worried about Nevada and I think the time. Santa Polt just had one with Trump +6 in Nevada. And I think that's obviously overstated, but not. I was pretty worried after Nevada. And the reason was this. So many people from California have moved into Nevada since the pandemic in search of, I think, cheaper housing. And in doing so, they've driven the housing prices up. And so a lot of people in the focus groups are talking about paying California prices but living on Nevada jobs. Right. So you've got a retail sector, you've got a hospitality sector, but these are basically like tourism, but they're basically service sector jobs. It's the reason no tax on tips is so important. So if they're environment, and it's not like a big new sector moved in, like new tech or something else that's sort of supplying incomes that then sort of follow the broader economy, that's not what happens. It's that a lot of Californians move in, they pay cash for houses, they drive the housing prices up. Like, I just think there's different things that people are responding to. And I felt it, man. And I haven't heard a group talk about COVID as much as I heard the Nevada groups, because they're still just reeling from the repercussions of COVID And so I just, you know, these regional differences and people moving around, like Arizona, it's got, it's, it's, it's, it's how close they are to the border is what has them. You know, they are so mad about the three years of Joe Biden. And so I guess I just, There's a lot of moving around and a lot of regional perspectives. It's why I continue to think that the sort of white, older voters of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin and Nebraska, too, are sort of bizarrely still her best bet.

JVL (12:28)

Yeah, I think that's right. But here's, so here's the pushback I've gotten. And this is, this is a world so dark that like, even I have trouble countenancing it. Bill, Bill, Bill texted us and he had a conversation with a Democratic pollster, slash strategist, type, not for attribution or anything, in which this guy had read my piece and said, no, no, I understand what JVL was saying. But, you know, he asked the question, is it really possible that after January 6th and the felony convictions and, you know, the cat, all of the things, that Trump's total vote share ceiling could rise? He goes, and J.B. hall's answer is, I don't see how that's possible. And my answer is, of course it could. Yeah, but that is a, that is an, that is an U.S. issue. And that's the one thing that I will. And God help me, I can't believe. I would be surprised by this. I would be surprised, I think, if Trump's vote share suddenly broke out of 47% and jumped to, like, 48.5 or 49. Like, you know what I'm saying? I can see him winning with 47.5. If he's at 47.5 or even 46.8, he can win this election if she doesn't consolidate votes and, you know, and too many people drift. Drift out to Jill Stein or whatever. And that would not surprise me at all. It would surprise me if the way he wins is by getting a, you know, a noticeably higher vote share than he has historically gotten. Because that is something that I. That is a view of our fellow citizens that I have not been able to fully internalize since Biden left the race. Because I thought, okay, well, everybody just said the problem was that Biden was old. And so now we have the. Now we have the candidate who's younger, which everybody historically loves. She's actually a quite good candidate. She's performing well. She's raising tons of money. She's well resourced. Like, we have all the things.

Sarah Longwell (14:48)

I think it's so funny. You think the big problem here is that you're underestimating the darkness of voters.

JVL (14:54)

Yeah, no, but I think it's possible. I am underestimating the darkness of voters. Right. Do you think it's possible is a strong word. Anything is possible. But in what is a stable environment, what would be the level of surprise to you if Trump's vote share ceiling is appreciably higher than it was in 2020?

Sarah Longwell (15:22)

It would surprise me, and in part because if I had to stake my. I don't know, my vibes, me being able to take in all the vibes from the focus groups on something, and this is something that I thought was in your newsletter, which we've not talked about that much, and I. I felt like you and I agreed more than you might think, which is. The enthusiasm in 2020 for Joe Biden was minimal. It was just that people thought he could beat Trump. Right. It was you. Yeah. There was never a lot of enthusiasm.

JVL (16:02)

I was with the big foam finger. Yeah, this guy's gonna be great.

Sarah Longwell (16:06)

And you also didn't see, like, tons of evidence that Joe Biden was blowing the doors off things. You know, if you were doing a let's go look for yard signs and.

JVL (16:14)

Yeah, no, right.

Sarah Longwell (16:15)

But the polling was.

JVL (16:16)

Right, the polling was incredibly strong.

Sarah Longwell (16:18)

His polling was strong. And so you got the sense. It's true, actually. I guess I would stake my vibe sense on Kamala Harris overperforming Joe Biden with affirmative enthusiasm. I think that ultimately, when it comes to Turnout, she could do better in part because there are people out there who are actually for her in a way that is unique. So I think that the combined enthusiasm for her with what I think is a muted but still real antipathy toward Trump, like I think people are. This is my, my sense is that people still hate Trump, but they've lost the vigor to hate him with the same types of enthusiasm they were hating him in 2020, at least outward enthusiasm. Like people don't have the energy to express it again, but that it's still there. Like, my belief is that under the surface you have increased enthusiasm for her and stable hatred of him that can combine. I mean, when, you know, it's funny that the vibes are so bad because that New York Times Sienna poll where she's winning 9% of Republican voters, that sounds right to me. That sounds right to me. And obviously I focus on that. So that's why it sounds right to me. But, and so maybe I'm willing to believe it. But yeah, I still think when push comes to shove, we see more enthusiasm for her. And so vote share is about turnout, right? Like, or it. They're both, right?

JVL (18:04)

It's about both.

Sarah Longwell (18:05)

That's right.

JVL (18:05)

Coalition composition and.

Sarah Longwell (18:06)

But you only talk about vote share in the context of turnout. Right. It has to live in the context of how many people turned out. And I think that Covid had the hot, you know, in 2020, we had like the highest turnout ever in any election. And I think that part of the visa is like, is that going to happen this time? People don't, it doesn't feel the same. People don't feel as like agitated as well. Maybe that's because we were in a once in a lifetime pandemic. We were all trapped in houses and now we continue to be in some kind of a hungover state from that, but we haven't changed that much. So I don't know, I guess if I had to stay, when people ask me and they asked me in playbook to say, what, what do you think? I still think she's going to win. I don't like the fact that she's losing roughly two people in every swing voting group. But there's also all these groups that I do have two time Trump voters who were out on Trump after January 6th that are also real that, that depress that where they either just aren't going to vote for him or they're going to vote for her. And so like the idea that she could pick up new voters and then like if, if as he. As Trump is, he's staking his election on the young men of the manosphere and their explosive turnout. I don't know, man. Maybe they ate a gummy that day and they didn't really feel like voting or like, you know, the new. The new Fortnite. I don't know. What's the name of a video game? The new video game, Call of Duty. Yeah, whatever.

JVL (19:35)

The thing is, I mean, I just. Yeah, I am not optimistic by nature, but the late break should be towards her.

Sarah Longwell (19:45)

It should.

JVL (19:46)

And the reason I say should is I just mean as a matter of blocking and tackling in physics, because Donald Trump has been a candidate for four. Four years already. People have had all of their time to decide to get to him. If they haven't gotten to him by three weeks out. She's been a candidate for, like, seven weeks, right? Eight weeks. And so it makes sense that there, you know, people are people who haven't gotten there on her. There. There's a universe of people who will be able to get there on her because she just has only been working on them for eight weeks. Right. Donald Trump has been president. He's not new. She is a new political figure. Right. In what is a change election. Now, you can say, like, oh, well, he's tying her to bide, but that, you know, like, he can try to do that, but the fact is that he was president. And so if the late break typically goes to the challenger and she's. She's only been doing this for, like, seven weeks. It just. The late break should go to her. And I would be really surprised if it doesn't, you know, if voters who made up their minds in the final 10 days or 14 days wind up breaking for him, that would surprise me. Yeah. This isn't to say she will win again, but I think she's. It's, you know, it's like 55, 45 in terms of percentage play, which. Which is the same thing as flipping a coin. It's terrible. It shouldn't be like this. All right, well, that's all. That's all good. Did you have any other. Before we move on to St. Larry, did you have any. Anything else on my. My really good newsletters this week? My newsletters just killed it this week.

Sarah Longwell (21:31)

I don't know if, you know, people want the Hopium, man. They want. They want the Hopium in the analysis.

JVL (21:36)

You know, it's weird because I, again, and I don't like doing. I don't like Hopium. Nothing at Simon. I mean, I Say Hopium. I don't mean Simon Rosenberg. I'm just. He's like, he's branded it, like, so it's like Xerox. I don't like that stuff. In my, in every part of my life, my immediate knee jerk reaction to anything that feels good or that agrees with my own priors is, well, that can't be true. Right? So it's like, you know, I really had to be convinced of this stuff by looking at numbers and thinking about it. And I don't know, people like it. I guess they shouldn't. You shouldn't like it. You should only like the things that contradict your priors.

Sarah Longwell (22:22)

Don't worry, guys. He'll write a newsletter next week about how Kamala has no chance.

JVL (22:26)

No chance.

Sarah Longwell (22:28)

One of the ways JVL is always right is that JVL knows how to take all the positions. And then when whatever outcome happens is he can be like, see, here's my newsletter saying this would happen.

JVL (22:38)

Look, this is the problem with writing 7,000 words a week.

Sarah Longwell (22:43)

That is true. You gotta write every day.

JVL (22:45)

I mean, it's easier. It's easier to not take all the positions if you write once a month, then you can really pick your spots. Yeah. Can we. Before we get to St. Larry, can I, right here, live on our podcast, try to guilt you into writing something? Did you see me in Slack yesterday in the, in our, in our broad general broadcast? I was, I was passive aggressively trying to ask you to write a piece.

Sarah Longwell (23:13)

I didn't see it. What was it? All right, you expect me to read your newsletters and Slack and do my job?

JVL (23:22)

So I was just looking at that former Trump people event in Philly this week, which was like, Alyssa Farrah Griffin, Liz Cheney, Cassidy Hutchinson and somebody else. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, ma'am.

Sarah Longwell (23:36)

Sarah Matthews.

JVL (23:37)

Her. Her.

Sarah Longwell (23:38)

Yeah, you should. You should know her. She's coming to our thing in Philly, so.

JVL (23:43)

Oh, yeah. The great Sarah Matthews. Oh, yeah. You're good friends. Yeah, we're really. It's.

Sarah Longwell (23:48)

She'll be there on stage with us. Oh, by the way, we're coming to Philly, guys, next Thursday, and then we're going to be in Pittsburgh on Friday, and then we're going to be in Detroit on Saturday. And let me tell you what, Tickets are almost sold out, so if you want them, go get them. JBL is going to be there. He's going to hug you.

JVL (24:06)

That is at the end. Okay, we'll talk about this at the end. So I was thinking. I was just Sort of struck by these women. And I started thinking to myself, huh, what would the male version of this group look like? And it would be Adam Kin.

Sarah Longwell (24:21)

Adam Kinner. By himself. Jeff.

JVL (24:24)

Who else? Yeah, but Jeff, Jeff Flake was. I mean, Jeff flake is an OG, never Trumper. I'm talking about like people who after January 6th were like, no, this is dangerous and wrong. And Jeff Flake, to his internal credit, was like, out on Trump from the very beginning.

Sarah Longwell (24:41)

You know, it's a great question. Oh, now I do know the part that you were asking me to. I do remember this. Baiting me.

JVL (24:49)

And so it's. But it's not just at the elite level. And by the way, like Olivia Troy. Right, Olivia, Another one of our friends there, there are a number of women who have been willing to stand up on this stuff and there have not. I mean, unless maybe I'm, maybe I'm just blanking on it and this is me not seeing reality, in which case I'd love to hear it. But I don't think the number of men who have done this is like, it's. The gender imbalance on this question is striking at both the elite level and then at the voter level, which is the stuff you see. Right. So it's both among women who worked for Trump and then among just women voters, but women Republican voters generally who are willing to say no and men aren't. And I think that's an enormous piece like that. That's like a 4,000 word piece. And I think the person in America to write it is you. And I would really love to read that piece by you in the Atlantic next month.

Sarah Longwell (26:01)

Okay, let me take a quick, just swing for my gut level reaction, which is there are men who have opposed Trump in ways that are meaningful. Mike, your hero, Mike Pence. Mike Pence, Mitt Romney. But here's how they look different from the women. Liz Cheney says the thing that I always say, which is that, like, the Mitt Romney position is genuinely insane. Like, and we love Mint. No, no, no, no.

JVL (26:34)

Yeah.

Sarah Longwell (26:35)

Like, I love him so much. But as Andrew Egger pointed out in our newsletter, and he's completely right to be like, well, I've got to. I can't come out and endorse Kamala Harris because I have to maintain some juice to help rebuild the Republican Party.

JVL (26:53)

No, sir, I am sorry, but there is 0% chance that you are going to have any juice to rebuild the Republican. That should be. Somebody else is going to have to do that work. You are not going to be able to do it. The work you can do is stopping Trump now.

Sarah Longwell (27:08)

Yeah, that's right. And Pence would never come close to endorsing Kamala Harris. And, like, I guess maybe I. I actually. I still don't understand it. I get it. He's so pro life and he's an evangelical, and so it's hard for him. But, like, Mitt Romney's a Mormon, and we still expect it of him. And I think the reason that, you know, Mike Pence, it's just this idea of, you saw the most dangerous thing happen up close. He didn't care if you died. He said that. He said when he was told that they're coming to kill your vice president, his response in Jack Smith's court thing was, who? Oh, no. So what?

JVL (27:51)

So what?

Sarah Longwell (27:52)

So what? Okay, if you can't, in the face of that, endorse your endorse Kamala Harris, like, I don't know what to do about that. But I will say, like, Liz Cheney and these women, Cassidy and Sarah and Alyssa have, like, Olivia, what have you. They've got this extra layer of moral clarity, which is to say, like, yeah, so obviously I'm gonna vote for the opponent. And obviously. And I don't. I don't know what it. The part of the reason I can't write the piece is that I don't have a gendered insight for what, like, Bill Kristol loves to kind of do. Like, I'm a feminist now. The future is female. Let me tell you what.

JVL (28:35)

I go back and read Antigone, and.

Sarah Longwell (28:39)

Women have always had this special thing. I think. I don't know. Why is it? I. I sometimes think, like, maybe they're less narcissistic and, like, they're un. So they see, like, Mitt Romney or Mike Pence might have this thing. I mean, there's something implicit in Mitt Romney's idea of that he could save the Republican Party in a post game. That I'm like, is delusional. But you know what? Nikki Haley shares that delusion. So I. I don't. What? I don't know.

JVL (29:12)

Not all men.

Sarah Longwell (29:13)

So that's my thing, right?

JVL (29:14)

Hashtag, not all women.

Sarah Longwell (29:15)

Hashtag not all women. Hashtag not all men. I don't know that there's a gendered reason, but I do know. I do know that right now it is notable that the people. But the people from the administration are.

JVL (29:33)

Winning from the administration. And then at the voter level, right. Republican women voters are a big part of who's leaving Trump.

Sarah Longwell (29:42)

They're the ones who defected first in.

JVL (29:44)

Right? They went, they went and they.

Sarah Longwell (29:46)

In 2018, that was like the first wave of kind of Red Dog Dems to go.

JVL (29:52)

And what is this about? I mean, it predates Dobbs, so it's not, you know, abortion may be driving a big part of it. You know what?

Sarah Longwell (29:59)

Actually now I can answer this. I can answer this. Trump hates women. Trump hates them and has been clear about hating them. And then he picked JD Vance to hate on them. Yeah, that's true. But not all men.

JVL (30:12)

Romney.

Sarah Longwell (30:12)

Yeah, but he hates them. Specifically, he hates women, like, as a category and is very clear about that. Like, it's infused through his entire campaign. This is like, literally what I'm talking about on Playbook is the extent to which Donald Trump repels women by all. And like, like he doesn't care. Like, that's what's been interesting about his campaign this time around is at least in 2020, it felt like they understood they were losing suburban women and they needed to figure out how to get them back. Whereas now they're just like, we got to drive up the numbers with men. Like, we got to get into the manosphere. We got to pick JD Vance. We got to just run up the tech bro numbers, the barstool sports bro numbers, the Vaughn numbers, Joe Rogan number. Like, that seems to be where they're trying to find these low propensity voters and they're just abdicating women. They're just like, we're not going to get any, any woman who's kind of out on this. And so I think that's it. I think for. If you're Liz Cheney or some of these young women. Right. You've heard Trump say things about women that have created for you a sense of like maybe just like a higher level of loathing.

JVL (31:24)

Maybe, or maybe it's bravery. I don't. I don't know.

Sarah Longwell (31:27)

Yeah, I don't know.

JVL (31:28)

It's a mystery. This is why I don't want to write the piece, because I don't have the answers. But I do. I do know the one person in America I would trust most to write this piece, and it's you.

Sarah Longwell (31:37)

Well, you just heard me not have a real. I don't have a piece.

JVL (31:40)

Because you've only thought about it for 30 seconds. You know, live with this for a week or two and.

Sarah Longwell (31:45)

Yeah, okay, I'll think about it.

JVL (31:46)

See what you think. It'd be a great piece for the Atlantic. You know, on this men thing, there's. I read a piece in Slate today, there are a couple guys who have set up a pack who are running anti Trump ads on porn sites. And they, they are targeting swing states. And so they, they thought these anti Trump guys were like, there's a huge problem with these tech bros and like barstool sports guys who are voting for Trump because the other side of Trump's coalition, like, they want to ban pornography. And they want all these guys married by age 22 and having 10 kids. And there's even like a page about banning pornography and Project 2025. And so these guys, like, found an ad network that'll run ads on porn video websites and lets them geotarget to the swing states. And so they're running a whole mess of ads in the final month saying, hey, Trump wants to ban porn. It's right here in Project 2025. 2025. So enjoy it while you can. I thought that was clever.

Sarah Longwell (32:56)

That is, that is funny, you know, but can I. This going back to the women versus men, because I'm going to segue into your next thing and let you beat me up a little bit is on Larry Hogan. Like, Larry Hogan is another good example of somebody who is anti Trump but unwilling to sort of go take the, do the full enchilada. You know, we're, we're, we're, we're so against him. We're actually going to vote for his opponent, which is literally the only logical position one can have. Uh, the rest of it is illogical, and I, I do think narcissistic in this way of. Well, I have to maintain this little whatever. Uh, and they try to like, quote Solzhenitsyn at us about like, let evil enter the world, but not through me. And I'm like, that's ridiculous. Like, Kamala Harris is not, you know. Well, she's not gonna like, lock you in the gulag. Yeah. So silly stuff. Okay, so go ahead, hit me with your Larry's thing.

JVL (33:57)

So Larry Hogan and Angela also Brooks have a debate and she, she makes a case that is so perfect that I can't believe it never occurred to me to put it this way. Hey, again, it's jvl. The conversation goes on from there. If you want to hear the rest of the show, head over to Bulwark plus and subscribe. There's one month left until the election. Come ride with us.