This Is It

Summary

The Next Level Podcast Summary: "This Is It"

Release Date: October 30, 2024
Hosted by Sarah Longwell, Tim Miller, and Jonathan V. Last of The Bulwark

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1. Introduction and Episode Overview

In the final pre-election episode of "The Next Level," host Jonathan V. Last (JVL) along with Sarah Longwell and Tim Miller engage in their characteristic blend of political analysis and candid banter. The episode navigates through the culminating moments of the election cycle, focusing on pivotal campaign events, key speeches, and the broader political landscape shaping up as Election Day looms.

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2. The Tale of Two Rallies

Trump’s Madison Square Rally vs. Harris’s Ellipse Speech

The hosts begin by dissecting the contrasting performances of Donald Trump and Kamala Harris in their recent campaign events.

• Donald Trump's Rally:

  • Location: Madison Square, adjacent to Madison Square Garden.
  • Attendance: Approximately 20,000 primarily middle-aged, middle-class white males.
  • Tone: The rally was described as aggressive and exclusionary. Jonathan V. Last remarked, “[Trump] was basically the national version of Kerry Lakes telling the McCain voters to go fuck themselves” (00:31).
  • Impact: The event was perceived as lacking outreach, relying instead on a fervent but narrow base.

• Kamala Harris’s Ellipse Speech:

  • Location: The Ellipse outside the White House.
  • Attendance: A substantial crowd of around 75,000, significantly larger than her previous speeches.
  • Tone: Poised and unifying, with an emphasis on policy and vision.
  • Notable Moment: Sarah highlighted the peaceful dispersal of the crowd post-speech and the absence of disturbances, stating, “Is it really an ellipse speech if all the cops are okay and treated nicely?” (02:57).
  • LGBTQ Representation: Tim observed a strong LGBTQ presence, especially during mentions of Stonewall, adding, “A lot of gays out there. A lot of the loudest people in that crowd were either gay or gay or allies” (04:04).

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3. Analyzing Kamala Harris’s Speech

Strengths and Strategy

The hosts delve into the effectiveness of Harris's closing argument.

• Visual and Strategic Execution:

  • Jonathan praised the visual impact and strategic messaging, noting, “She just looked and sounded like a president” (11:17).
  • Tim echoed this sentiment, commenting on the strategic use to reclaim media attention from Trump, despite some pre-scripted elements diminishing the speech’s emotional resonance.

• Policy Highlights:

  • Emphasized commitments to child tax credit, housing development, and insulin price caps.
  • Sarah admired Harris’s determination to stay focused despite potential disruptions, stating, “something about it made me be like, yeah, you’re not getting distracted” (06:19).

Criticisms and Concerns

• Message Testing Industrial Complex:

  • Tim expressed apprehension that policy-driven speeches might lose the emotional “magic” seen in previous administrations, potentially making Harris’s message less stirring (08:46).

• Joe Biden’s Interference:

  • The discussion shifted to Biden’s overshadowing presence, with Sarah expressing frustration: “Stop it. What are you thinking?” (12:19).

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4. The Role of Republican Figures

J.D. Vance and Steve Bannon

The conversation transitions to influential Republican figures and their impact on the political climate.

• J.D. Vance:

  • Critiqued as a "flip-flopper," Sarah lambasted his inconsistent stances, particularly regarding offensive remarks, dubbing him “the worst flopper of all floppers” (17:42).

• Steve Bannon:

  • Tim provided an in-depth analysis of Bannon’s recent activities, portraying him as a destabilizing force:
    • Described Bannon’s press conference demeanor as reminiscent of “a Russian block press conference” (27:35).
    • Highlighted alarming rhetoric encouraging supporters to “be prepared to go to jail for your country,” raising concerns about potential extremist actions (30:05).

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5. Media and Endorsements: The Washington Post Decision

The hosts address Jeff Bezos’ decision for The Washington Post not to endorse a presidential candidate, examining its implications.

• Subscriber Impact:

  • Jonathan pointed out the catastrophic nature of a 10% subscriber loss within 36 hours, emphasizing the financial strain on journalistic institutions (38:48).

• Trust and Capitulation:

  • Sarah criticized Bezos’ rationale, stating, “Don’t lie to me, don’t act like I’m an idiot. We know exactly what you’re doing” (40:55).

• Broader Implications:

  • Discussion on how elite capitulation, especially from billionaires like Bezos, erodes democratic accountability and undermines rule of law (36:32).

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6. The Judiciary and Accountability for Trump

A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to the pursuit of accountability against Donald Trump.

• Legal Proceedings:

  • Jonathan reflects on the importance of maximum accountability, citing the Alvin Bragg case as crucial despite perceptions of its strength (51:19).

• Potential Effects of Convictions:

  • Debated whether convictions would influence Trump’s voter base, with Sarah noting minimal impact on voting behaviors but agreeing on the importance of legal accountability (52:09).

• Role of Kamala Harris:

  • The necessity for Harris to continue maximum accountability measures is emphasized to prevent elite capitulation (45:46).

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7. Polling and Final Election Forecasts

As the episode nears its conclusion, the hosts analyze the latest polling data and discuss final election outcomes.

• Current Polls:

  • Tim shared recent CNN poll numbers indicating Harris leads Trump in key battleground states:
    • Michigan: Harris 48%, Trump 43% (53:56)
    • Wisconsin: Harris 51%, Trump 45%
    • Pennsylvania: Harris 48%, Trump 48%

• State-Specific Insights:

  • North Carolina and Nevada: Recognized as competitive with potential for Harris to secure victories.
  • Georgia: Optimistic about efficient vote counting, Tim believes a close race could favor Harris if she maintains suburban support.

• Independent Voters:

  • Sarah posits that independents are likely to break in favor of Harris, citing her stronger recent performances and Trump's diluted messaging (55:04).

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8. Closing Remarks and Future Plans

In their final moments, the hosts reflect on the episode’s discussions and future initiatives.

• Nighttime Check-Ins:

  • Plans to continue providing updates and support through potential nighttime check-ins were briefly mentioned, highlighting their commitment to keeping listeners informed during pivotal election nights.

• Final Thoughts:

  • Jonathan V. Last encapsulates the intensity and uncertainty of the election night ahead, wishing listeners good luck as America approaches a decisive moment (59:02).

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Notable Quotes

• Jonathan V. Last: “She just looked and sounded like a president.” (11:17)
• Sarah Longwell: “What a punishment.” (25:33)
• Tim Miller: “These conservatives are the worst...you cannot be overjoyed and offended simultaneously.” (20:36)
• Sarah Longwell: “The entire system is failing us because of Trump's transactionalism.” (46:18)

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Conclusion

"This Is It" serves as a comprehensive wrap-up of the 2024 election cycle, offering in-depth analysis of campaign strategies, key political figures, media influence, and the broader implications for American democracy. The Bulwark’s hosts provide a critical lens on the unfolding political drama, balancing optimism for Harris’s campaign with concerns over Republican strategies and media capitulation. As Election Day approaches, their insights aim to equip listeners with a nuanced understanding of the high-stakes battle shaping the nation’s future.

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Timestamp Reference:
Timestamps are indicative and correspond to the moments in the transcript where specific topics or quotes are discussed.

Transcript

[JVL]

Hello everyone. Welcome to the next level. I'm JVL here with my best friends Sarah Longwell and Tim Miller of the Bulwark. Guys. This is it. This is our last pre election next level. And it was my idea that we gate this episode only for subscribers. But then Sarah told me that that would be inhuman and a horrible thing to do to love you guys too.

[Tim Miller]

Much for that, okay? But you should be a fucking subscriber.

[Sarah Longwell]

Be a subscriber if you're a next.

[Tim Miller]

Level listener and you're not a subscriber. Come on guys, come on, give us a break. TheBullwark.com subscribe Hop on.

[JVL]

Now here's a question. I figured, why not ask this now? Should we be doing just a little for the next few days? Like an evening next level? Check in with the three of us for like 20 minutes every night, like 8:30pm in the evenings?

[Sarah Longwell]

I'd certainly do it. I hung out with our subscribers last night and did the pre and what was an impromptu accidental post show after Kamala's speech. And it's great. Hanging out with our subscribers is the best way to get through this moment.

[JVL]

All right, well listen, hop into the comments and the chat and if you want us to do a little sort of nightly next level over the next few days, hop in and tell us. Hop in and tell us.

[Tim Miller]

Next level is another option. Timo's got things to do. Maybe a weekend next level. We'll do the best we can.

[JVL]

All right, so we have the tale of two rallies. Our two campaigns have given us their closing arguments. We had Tim, you there on the ground in Madison Square, next to Madison, adjacent to Madison Square Garden for Donald Trump's triumph of the will, in which he, as far as I can tell, made zero outreach. He was basically the national version of Kerry Lakes tell the McCain voters to go fuck themselves. Right? I mean he was saying basically, you know, if you're not with us, we don't want you. We're just going to turn out all of our incels and we'll swamp you guys. And he got 20,000 middle aged middle class white guys to show up for that. And then Kamala Harris went down to the ellipse outside of the White House last night and brought out 75,000 people. Feels like a lot of amazing.

[Tim Miller]

Sarah talked biggest ellipse speech ever.

[JVL]

Bigger than the ellipse. There was, I mean there was a very large Ellipse speech four years ago, roughly not quite four years ago, but that was still 50% smaller than this, thank God. So you know, it was. It was this. It wasn't this.

[Tim Miller]

It was this.

[Sarah Longwell]

You know what's crazy to me is how when she got done with the speech, people dispersed peacefully. They didn't go down to the Capitol and try to ransack it.

[JVL]

They didn't try to take their country back with strength.

[Sarah Longwell]

No. They didn't smear feces on the wall or put on weird swords last night. I don't think a single one. Which. I mean, is it really an ellipse speech if all the cops are okay and treated. Treated nicely?

[Tim Miller]

People seem very happy. I don't know if you saw the YouTube video that Sam and producer Sebastian were out there, and they were Pete Bulwark fans shouting at them. And everybody in the video in the background, everyone seems very jubilant. One thing I noticed that maybe explains a lot of this is it felt like there were a lot of gays there, because during the part of Kamala Harris speech where she's like, we didn't do. We didn't live through Selma and we didn't live through the Battle of Gettysburg, and she's like, listing all these historical things that we didn't live through to hand over to a petty tyrant. And then she goes, we didn't live through Stonewall. And the crowd's like, yeah, Stonewall. And I was like, a lot of gays out there. A lot of the loudest people in that crowd were either gay or gay or allies, which we. And we appreciate all of our allies, but Stonewall. Big cheer for Stonewall.

[Sarah Longwell]

I also noticed the big cheer for Stonewall because I was like, how many normies sitting at home? They're all like, stone.

[Tim Miller]

What.

[Sarah Longwell]

What happened at Stonewall? Is that a famous general from the.

[Tim Miller]

Civil War, Stonewall Jackson?

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, that's right.

[JVL]

I mean, I. I could be wrong, but I think Stonewall is kind of just part of the American Lexus.

[Tim Miller]

It's mainstream now.

[JVL]

Yeah, I think it's totally, you know, like, 20 years ago, 25 years ago, you had to really, really be into gay rights to know what Stonewall was. But I think it's now just part of the furniture.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, we've totally. The gay agenda has achieved flying colors.

[JVL]

Sorry. Is that good? Does that make you happy or sad? Like, it's like your favorite thing Happy?

[Tim Miller]

Yeah. There's some gays who like to do, though. I was here first, and I want Pride to be, you know, a counterculture again, and I want to be able to whatever, like, have pups running around and, you know, all kinds of jockstraps And I'm like, I love gay. I love Target pride. It's great. Let us. Let us take over full dominance. You know, nothing like, what was the Raytheon Pride float? Nothing makes me feel happier as an American than the Raytheon Pride float.

[Sarah Longwell]

I haven't been to a pride parade in a long time, but it's pretty much just like banks and the military, industrial complex contractors. They're handing out little, you know, little bombs that say. With rainbows on them. It's great.

[Tim Miller]

You can tell we're all just super anxious about the actual election results. And this, this seminal podcast, the final podcast for the election that we're just kind of, you know, going to.

[Sarah Longwell]

Should have made people pay for this content. What should have happened? All right, so what can I.

[JVL]

Because I got to tell you, I am feeling kind of hopeful today.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, I mean, look, I did. I did the live stream last night, and so I watched it with our people, and I was sitting there, you know, doing this, I would say, if I had to. I've been thinking about the speech. That's me pumping my arms. Like I was pumped.

[Tim Miller]

Raise the roof. Raise the roof.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah. And, you know, sometimes when I get excited, I like, you've seen me, I gesticulate. I can't, like, sit still.

[JVL]

And I was like, you're like Alex Jones.

[Sarah Longwell]

She was moving me in that way where I was like, yes, yes. He's got an enemies list and you've got a to do list. Give me that. I will say the speech was.

[JVL]

I'm sorry, I have an enemies list, too.

[Sarah Longwell]

I know you do. I know. And anybody who isn't us is an enemy. And I respect the straightforwardness of your priorities, but I would say it was like a little bit like a smile in its. If you're thinking about it, like a line where there were these extremely high points at the beginning where she drew the, like the. Why are we here? Why is this relevant? Why is this? What's the symbolism of this night? There was an annoying siren going off while that was happening for part of it. I think someone was trying to disrupt it. And I'll just say that watching her just like, mow through it and not even. I loved that. Something about it made me be like, yeah, you're not getting distracted. You are to hit this mark. And she did. Then she, like, to me, they had clearly been like, look, it's our last chance. We're going to do it all in this speech. Right? So we're going to hit. We're going to make sure. That people know child tax credit and we're going to build housing and we're going to cap insulin prices, although I kind of thought they already did that. But maybe I don't have my policy as correct. But here was the thing about the cheering that I loved, speaking of Stonewall. But also, I think it's amazing when you get 75,000, presumably libs on the ellipse. And she's like, we're going to have the most lethal fighting force. And people are like, yeah. And she's like, and we're going to secure the border. And people are like, yeah. And I was just like, this is. And she said, you know, we are going to. We are going to be leaders in the world and we're not going to let these guys just around. I was like, man, man, the world's really changed.

[JVL]

Did the neocons just take over the Democratic Party?

[Tim Miller]

Don't say that.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, don't say it. I. But I will say she, she. She is. Look, man, she's leaning into. I'm going mainstream. And, you know, whenever she does, there's a couple, you know, price gouging or whatever, I'm like, boo. But like, I also just. Whatever. The, the, the overall speech I thought was there was a bunch of new stuff in there. There was some stump stuff in there, but I thought it was an excellent closing argument and I thought the visuals were magnificent. She looked great. Like, she looked. She looked ready to do it. She looked like she meant it. I was like, you know, it was like the DNC speech where I felt like, okay, you're getting me. I'm in. I'm roped in. What'd you guys think?

[Tim Miller]

Visuals was great. Strategy was great to do it to get attention, to steal the attention back from Trump. Any of the. Whatever Naval gazey stuff about. Should she talk more about it? Like, all that was stupid. Obviously, she was capable of discussing Donald Trump, the threat from looming fascism, and discussing issues that are important to people, that resonate with people. This is not an either or equation. I agree with Sarah about the smile of the speech. Thought that the first three minutes were really great. Last minute or two was really great. The rest of it was a little. I'm a little bit nervous, I guess I will say one of the things that has me a little nervous is that I think that the Democrats, the Harris camp, and I think part of the reason is they had to do this because of the nature of such a short campaign. And I'd rather this than the alternative, but they might be A little bit prisoner of the message testing complex and the message testing industrial complex. To me, I just think that the ads and her speeches, at times, it's just like I can tell you exact, I've read that line in the blueprint message testing memo or one of the other fucking groups, the message testing memos that I've read. And you lose a little bit of the magic. You lose a little bit of the things that Obama could hit at times, the levels that he could hit at times where you're really stirring the soul. I think that there was a lot of times where souls weren't stirred, but like, she wasn't out there to stir my soul, really. Right. Like she's out there doing a job. This was, this was a tactic. It was to get attention back. It's to have good visuals, it's to have video they could use for the final weekend of ads to draw a contrast with Donald Trump on his worst day.

[JVL]

She did all of that and she looked stronger. She did, I think, right. I mean, standing in front of the White House with 75,000 people and hitting. I mean, you know, the entire speech was the length of a single Trump digression. Right. I mean, you. Trump's windmill, you know, shtick, when he like goes off script, that was basically the length of this speech. It was like 28 minutes, I think 29 minutes. Yeah, she moved because you can do all that, right? This is, you don't need more than that. And no, I could have cut it down even more.

[Tim Miller]

I could have got 22 minutes out of that bad boy, I think, and been happy.

[JVL]

But she, you know, she looked. I, Maybe I'm wrong, maybe visuals, maybe people were really are discerning and they aren't strictly ruled by visuals. But in the Trump lizard brain, which is like everything is central casting. Last night was like one of those 90s movies in which Morgan Freeman is the president. You know, like he just looks and sounds like the president. Everybody can buy it because, like, she just looked and sounded like a president. Right. Standing there in front of that many people wearing that black ensemble with like the white kerchief. Like, everything just felt central casting for what president is. And I think this is what I'm writing in my newsletter today. I think that Trump probably shat himself last night looking at that, because that's a language that he understands.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, I mean, maybe Trump shat himself, but then he changed his underwear and Joe Biden went and shat himself. So I just, you know, I gotta tell you, talk to me, talk to.

[JVL]

Me about our greatest.

[Sarah Longwell]

I don't want to spend a lot of time. I don't want to spend a lot of time on this because I will then be doing the thing that I don't want people to do, which is let Joe Biden's gaffe, whatever you want to call it, overshadow what was a very strong closing argument. But I can't not comment on the fact that Joe Biden should go away for a second, like, go do whatever you need to do to president, please. But why are you sitting on like a zoom as the President of the United States just like opining on whatever. Stop it. What are you thinking? And I don't care. Watching people watching last night as her speech got overshadowed by a bunch of people parsing an apostrophe on whether he misspoke or whether he meant it. I wanted to do. Well, I can't. I was very angry. You had rage. I had the white rage. The white hot rage that brings my whole body sneeze.

[Tim Miller]

You should get a punching bag in the house, like in the basement to just kind of let it out or like one of those big.

[JVL]

One of those big bags, counterpoint the Biden. There's no counterpoint allowed. There to be an extra layer of drama, another hook for people to talk about and for her to unequivocally distance herself from Biden, which.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, I love this 90 chess take. I really do. Yes. Joe Biden did this last night.

[JVL]

I'm not saying he planned it. I'm not saying he planned it, But I'm just saying, like, when you look.

[Sarah Longwell]

Back, I don't know. I do think. Look, I. First of all, she should throw him under the bus. You want to know what I think her closing argument should be? She'd be like that old guy I took. No, I know, Tim. Whatever. This is just.

[JVL]

This is.

[Sarah Longwell]

This will close me. This will close me as I want to see her be like I. And she did. She was out there this morning saying, I don't think we should ever call anybody in this country garbage.

[JVL]

No matter strong disagree for from me on that. And I have to say, I not surprised you run the first time that Kamala Harris has really lost me during this campaign. Like, I can abide the price controls. Like, you know, I disagree. And so. But where I hop off the bus is that we can't call people in this country garbage because, you know, what.

[Sarah Longwell]

Is this America or what?

[JVL]

I mean, we've seen the people. I watched the video from Madison Square Garden. I'm sorry. Some people are garbage.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I will. I gave a. I did a full monologue on this at the end of the podcast today so I could get off my chest with Sarah just did. So people can go over there if they want my extended. My extended remarks, which include, I'm so sick of fucking flopping social, like, people pretending to be offended by things like. That's another thing I'm just so sick of. And everybody does this, by the way. Libs do this too. But conservatives are the worst. Like, their entire, like the Daily Wire's whole existence is like faking, pretending to be outraged about something they're not outraged about. Like, and just as a rule of thumb, if you see a person talking and they say something and you get super happy that you're going to be able to use that thing against them, then you're not actually offended. Actually, you weren't actually offended. You're happy, you're overjoyed. You cannot be overjoyed and offended simultaneously. So talk about that a little bit. And I also talk about Biden's fifi's, which I just, I cannot do another second of anybody on background to Politico or the New York Times talking about how Joe Biden's like, whatever feelings or legacy are hurt by whatever she's doing. And it's like, the whole thing is insane and we all need to be grown ups and whatever, whatever it takes for Kamala Harris to win, we all should do, including him with nobody's feelings attached to it at all. And especially not the feelings of the President of the United States who is going to have a wonderful legacy and statue and birthday honoring. We don't need to. Okay. We don't need to get all like, ooh, I don't know, we got to walk on eggshells around. So no. Winning is the objective here.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah. Especially. Sorry, jbl, you gotta hear a little bit more of this because I will say, watching him do that thing last night, I was reanimated in my rage for the people who also were like, obviously he can be president for another four years. Obviously we should. I swear to God, even if she loses, if one person says to me, if it had been Joe Biden, I will lose my ever loving mind.

[JVL]

Like, stay off threads.

[Tim Miller]

We'll have more.

[JVL]

Make sure you don't come to threads.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, don't go to threads. We'll have more acute concerns at that time. So other than that, actually so good. I've got good news for you. You'll have other things to be mad about, but yeah.

[Sarah Longwell]

So two quick. Just Koda points on this. Four more points.

[Tim Miller]

And one more. And one more after.

[Sarah Longwell]

Another thing. Add another thing. J.D. vance on the flopping is the worst of the floppers, because this guy managed to do on the Puerto Rico thing the other night or on the Trump rally goes, I didn't hear the joke. And also, we need to be stopped being so offended at everything he did that just after being so offended by Gretchen Whitmer. I don't know, feeding a Dorito. I, like, didn't quite understand what the thing Gretchen Whitmer did.

[Tim Miller]

Catholics pretended the Catholics were flopping on that one. That that was a mocking of the Holy Eucharist.

[Sarah Longwell]

Okay, well, all right. So J.D. vance freaked out about that. Then he said we all needed to just calm down and not get so offended about jokes. And then last night he talked about how this was the most offensive thing that he could possibly imagine. And I was like, you, J.D. vance, are the worst flopper of all floppers, including, you're a flip flopper on Trump. And just, boy, do I loathe you with every fiber of my being also. But I do have great news. I've got really good, awesome, awesome news as a result of this, which is, did Joe Biden, regardless of the apostrophe gate, did he say something deeply offensive? Is he too old to be president? You know what? Great news.

[Tim Miller]

Concur.

[Sarah Longwell]

This guy is not running again. You do not have to vote for him. He is gone. There is a total, normal, totally normal lady over there who looks just like a great American president who's talking about being the president for all people, who's talking about listening to voices from others, who loves the country, loves freedom, loves.

[Tim Miller]

The country, wants to use lethal fighting force.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah. And she is an option. She is an option. These two soup for brain octogenarians, you don't have to vote for either one of them. You can vote for her. And you should.

[JVL]

I mean, that all sounds good, but is she black? Even better, because that's going to be a problem for some people.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah.

[JVL]

Can I just say again, I don't want to take a position on the Joe Biden statement and the parsing of it, but I would like to go back and defend the honor of Hillary Rodham Clinton, who, whatever the political deplorables, nailed her basket of depression. Totally correct. She was early on this in a way that many other people now recognize, because again, she didn't say, like, everyone. She was like, you can separate Republican. The Republican Party voters into like three different. There's like, you know, the normie types who are about a third and then the other types, I forget who it was, are about a third. Then there's this third basket for just totally. You know what? I am sorry, but truth is an affirmative defense and you know, where's the lie? Where's the lie?

[Tim Miller]

I agree. She was right on, on basket of deplorables. Nailed it.

[Sarah Longwell]

Guys, that's not the point. The point is when you're running for office, when you're running for office, you should not. And frankly, I think if you're an elected politician, I think if you're President of the United States, the current President of the United States, you should be loathe to label any American in a broad brush terms as deplorable or garbage or any of that.

[JVL]

Donald Trump does that literally every minute of every day.

[Sarah Longwell]

I know. And you know what I think about Donald Trump? You should not be the win.

[JVL]

No, no, but we're only talking about political expedients, right? I mean, we're only talking about political expediency, not truth.

[Tim Miller]

You're saying it doesn't harm him, then you're talking about the.

[JVL]

It doesn't harm him because of the nature of his coalition. Because we disagree with that.

[Tim Miller]

It does harm him.

[Sarah Longwell]

It does harm him.

[JVL]

I think that we harm him.

[Tim Miller]

It doesn't harm him enough for our liking, but it does harm him.

[JVL]

Some not as much as it helps him. Right. He uses that to turn out his low turn. You know, Sarah, I'm writing a little bit today and I went to look up your contention about like, you know, women vote more than men and of course you're right, but I didn't realize how right you were. Do you off the top of your head know how many more women than men voted in the 2020 election?

[Sarah Longwell]

I think it's like 55, 45.

[JVL]

It was 10 million more women voted than men.

[Sarah Longwell]

Okay, well, I don't. That's a. You gave a hard number. I gave a percentage.

[Tim Miller]

I don't know. It's more than 10%, though. Well, no, it is.

[JVL]

Yes, it was. It was like 80 million and 200,000 to 75. 5 or something like 72. 5.

[Sarah Longwell]

There's just more of us.

[JVL]

10 million more. I mean, that is good. That's not, that's not. Women have. Women have. The percentage of voters who have voted for women has been higher in every election since 1980. Right.

[Sarah Longwell]

But I'll also, and this is where. Can I just say that the number that I am obsessed with is the non college white women in these swing states and how they break. Because for me that's a, that's a Dobbs JD Vance misogyny kind of thing. And in the crosstab, that's the crosstab number. I look at a lot and Kamala Harris is right now over performing with those non college white women relative to Biden, which is the big. That is where to the extent that I'm being forced to give predictions right now and I try to defend my feeling that she's going to win, it is those numbers because you can offset a lot of slide with young black men and Hispanic men and young men in general with sort of like 55 year old working class white women because there's just more of them as a percentage.

[JVL]

Yeah, no, that's, that's exactly true. Tim, would you like to share with us a message from our sponsor?

[Tim Miller]

Guys, there's a reason that they put me in the big chair for this ad read and it's because this episode of the Next Level is brought to you by our good friends at Seoul. Let me tell you, when Joe Biden marble mouthed his way into possibly maybe calling Trump supporters garbage last night and undercut Kamala's great speech, having to watch the CNN segment transition from Kamala's marvelous moment on the mall to dissecting apostrophes, I really needed a gummy. And so that's why I turned to Soul's new out of office THC gummies perfectly microdosed to get you blissed, not blitzed. Seoul's new out of office gummies are perfectly microdosed with hemp derived THC and CBD to give any day that chilling on the beach vibe. Did you know you can now buy hemp derived THC products in all 50 states because of the 2018 Pharm Bill which my husband worked on. Hemp derived THC is now legal and accessible nationwide. The out of office Gummies help you get that much needed me time at the end of the day or during the day. Well, if you don't have an important job like me, they're convenient and delicious. Out of Office Gummies give you that warm, fuzzy, euphoric microdosed feel without sending you to the moon. You can go for a jog, watch your favorite TV show or head out to a party. Whatever floats your boat. Soul was founded five years ago by Mike and Angie Lee. Mike's a former world ranked professional boxer and Angie is an author and professional speaker. They had the desire to create natural alternatives to medication that tackle problems they deal with themselves like sleeplessness, anxiety, focus and pain. That's not all Soul's got. Whether you're looking for a sleep aid, enhanced focus or pain relief, Soul also has all your wellness needs covered. And Sol's products are grown right here in the US of A. As for me, we're getting into serious time. It's too serious. It's too serious for me to be hungover. I'm off of drinking. And so the right answer, when you need a little, little extra help going to sleep or when you have a little extra anxiety, it's Seoul. This holiday season, give the gift of Soul. Head to getSoul.com and use code the next level for 30% off your order. That's 30% off your order. Using code the next level one last time getSoul.com and code the next level for 30% OFF. Sounds like you needed some soul last night, Sarah.

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, I think gummies are good.

[JVL]

I got an idea for you guys.

[Tim Miller]

Good for you.

[JVL]

Let me just, let me just float this. On election night we will be doing a bulwark live stream to help all of our friends get through this. And we're going to do one that's just for everybody, for the people that's going to be open. But what if we did a subscriber only, a members only feed which is just me on gummies all night long and I just do it solo. I just me in front of a camera.

[Tim Miller]

I couldn't be more supportive of you doing that JBL. Unfortunately, I'm on MSNBC from 2 till 6am on election night, so I think I'm gonna have to be sober.

[Sarah Longwell]

Do they hate you? Why? Why would you get that? That is a horrible.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I think they hate me. Yeah, I do.

[Sarah Longwell]

What a punishment.

[JVL]

You know who else hates Tim, but in a weird non social way, Steve Bannon. So Timmy, you went to see Steve Bannon yesterday and he looks a lot like Jon Voight's character in the movie Heat at this point. The hair is really flowing and stringy now. It's kind of the waves and curl is gone. Not a lot of body to it. He looks like he lost a lot of weight while he was in Danbury.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I think that was maybe misleading. I think he might have just lost a lot of weight around his jowls underneath the podium. Still looking a little thick.

[JVL]

Really? Okay. Because from the sides I thought, oh, maybe Stevie, maybe, you know, the cafeteria food up there was. Anyway, you know, he was bantering with you and you know, looked like he was Just happy to, happy to get down in the back and forth of politics again and, you know, get ready for the next insurrection. What are you, what thoughts would you like to share with us?

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, hate is maybe not the right word. I'm very much a frenemy for him. He sort of needs a foil, I think. Frenemy. He likes to be argued with. You can almost sense it, like, this room, as weird as Bannon looks with the pirate hair and the face splotches and like the 18 shirts. Like, he's kind of like the most normal person in the room, honestly. Like, besides like a handful of other straight reporters that are there, like, Von Hilliard is there and a couple other voters. But, like, the people that he surrounds himself with, like, can't even look at me in the eye. Like, they're very, they're so uncomfortable. And then they have all of the reporters from like, Real America's Voice there. And so it's like after my question. And then Vaughn asked some, some good follow ups about whether he's talked to Trump. He has. Shocking that Donald Trump is on the day of an exercise.

[JVL]

I thought Trump barely even knew his name.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, he's talking. He called Sloppy Steve on the black car ride from Danbury down to Manhattan, apparently, but. And watch the war room, according to Steve. But the other questioners are like, hey, Steve, it's Harry from Real America's Voice. And I just, can you feel the momentum in New York? We're going to win in New York, aren't we, Steve? And it's like, you know, hey, Steve, it's natasha from patriot news.org and I can, it's just like, oh, what do you think about the great patriots? And like, you can kind of sense him getting annoyed by these people, like, wanting to be like, I want to fight with, I want to fight with Miller again about my, about my crimes. So, you know, the Steve of it. I don't know. Is that interesting. I wrote for the morning shots. The big takeaway is not surprising. Like, he's not, like, he's, he's back getting right back in the saddle. He still wants to do the kayfabe where he pretends to fight with the elites, but he's obsessed with them. Like, he shouts out the Vanity Fair cover story on national populism in this press conference. And I'm like, how did you read that? Like, is Vanity Fair going to the prison library or was like your first. Yeah. When your first thing, when you got.

[JVL]

Out was locked up. Like, it's a, you know, it's not like real prison.

[Tim Miller]

They got Vanity Fair at Danbury. Maybe they just brought him a stack of his favorite upscale periodicals as soon as he got out of prison. I don't know. But so I, you know, so that part is like. But at the same time, he's practical. Like, when he talks about the race, he kind of sounds like pluff. You know, like, he's like, it's very narrow. You know, like, we need to win. Like, we need to break the blue wall. He can break the blue wall, but we assess it as a very close race, and we can't lose focus. Right? So I. He, for all of his horrible traits and criminality and the fact that when I said to him later in the press conference the part wasn't on video, I was like, you seem like a high risk for recidivism to me. And he basically just was like, yeah, yes, we're going to do this again. We're taking on Pelosi again. We're doing the same thing again. So that part is ominous. The big main takeaways. I have the real ominous part. So less Steve himself than his message to his people, the war room listeners, is you need to be prepared to go to jail for your country. And, like, taking at one level, that's just kind of like this fantasy, whatever, like, craziness. It's like, okay, a little cheeky.

[JVL]

Fingers crossed.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah.

[JVL]

Prepared to go to jail for their country.

[Tim Miller]

Cheeky bluster on the one hand. On the other hand, I'm like, man, if 1% of the audience takes that a little too seriously, you know, like, that, that could lead to some pretty ominous results. So that's the part that I like. The stochastic element of this is, I think one of my big concerns. My other concern is the freaks around him. So it's like that guy Mike Davis, you know, who's like once, who has been tweeting about how me and Mehdi Hasan are going to go into the women's gulag. And, like, Jeff Clark is there, listener to the Bulwark podcast, apparently. Hey, Jeff Clark. I told him that I thought he.

[JVL]

Should be future Attorney General. Jeff Clark.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, exactly. And then, like, and then he's got this posse of little people who are around him trying to tell me to stop asking questions. And the muscle comes over to sit next to me and start. And it's like, Steve's like, just shut up. Like, you little fucking weirdos. But, like, all of them, when they finally get the courage to talk to me afterwards, and I'm Having their conversations with them. I mean, they're deep in the sauce, bro. Like, they're deep in the sauce. And like, they've convinced themselves, like Mike Davis, for example, has convinced himself that if Trump wins, Kamala is going to do what they did, right? And so they're rationalizing their own plans for nefarious actions by having. They've all convinced themselves, like, this was not shtick for me. Like, it was like I'd stayed around long enough was like listening to them talk to each other and whatever. Like, they've convinced themselves that, like the Kamala Nazi thing and whatever, like that the deep state is really coming for them and that they're gonna try to block Mr. Trump's presidential win next time and that they don't. That they are going to act extrajudicially. And it's all right. Every accusation is a confession. But to me, like, most of the alarming part of it was just like, how, how perfunctory that was. Like that, that was just. That's just kind of how they talk, right? Like, that's just kind of how they talk. And the off, that off camera element to me was. Was the part that was kind of raising the hair on my arm a little bit.

[JVL]

Sarah, what do you think?

[Sarah Longwell]

I mean, the main thing that jumps out to me is the way that Trump has always been like a mob boss. This is very, like mob esque, right? Like, you know, Banning, like a good soldier, he did his time. He didn't sing, didn't sing to the feds, right? He's telling all the other people, sending a message, right, that care about this. Cause you care about the, I don't know, mob terms, capo, like, whatever. You care about the boss, the Godfather, family. The family, right? You don't, then this is what you do. You prepare yourself to go to prison for the family. And I really agree with Tim that, like, this is. It's always where the Trump, the clown with the flamethrower kind of, kind of comes together, right? Where it is unserious and performative and Bannon knows what he's doing, but there are a bunch of guys. It's funny, we got a voicemail the other day at the office and it was just. And we get lots of these, but it was somebody just saying the F word over and over again. But, like, would change the cadence. They would just be like, fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck you. And I got all day. I got nothing to do, bro. So I'm just gonna say all day I'm gonna fill up your inbox with me saying. And just went on and on, and I was like, you know, healthy. Well, sure. But it's also a lot of people. He was very candid in the fact that he doesn't have anything better to do. And there's just a lot of these young men hopped up on video games and Bannon's war room, who. This is where, you know, Trump loses, but it's close. These are the guys who come out of the woodwork and like. So it is both stupid but deeply disturbing.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I'd One other. I agree with all that. I want. Other analogy that I want to give you besides the mob thing. I guess it's related because there's an Eastern European mob. I meant to get to this with Vindman today on the Daily Pot, and I just. We just didn't have time. It felt kind of like Eastern Europe, like a Russian block press conference as well, you know, like that we were in Belarus. You know, it's like the man, like, Lukashenko's man is out of prison, and he's gathered with him like this, like, weird cadre of, like, security and bagman. And, like, you know, it did not. You know, I'm just like, you're imagining. I don't know who, like, Scooter Libby gets out of prison right during the bush. I'm trying to think of, like, more like traditional, like, upscale, you know, kind of crimes in the past that have been created. It's like the people around, you know, it would have felt. And having a press conference, it would have felt like you'd have the lawyer and the press secretary and they had this coat on, and, you know, it'd be very formal. And it's like, you know, learn from our mistakes, and we're going to move forward. And like, this, to me, felt like Belarus, which I think is only an interesting insight, because if Trump wins, like, we might be on the path to Belarus. And I think that it kind of answers the question because I get a pretty minor. At this point. It's pretty minor, but I do get some feedback from people that are like, why do you give this attention? Why do you give this attention? It's like the freaks in that room are running the government. Next time, it would be one thing if it was like, 2028 and Glenn Youngkin is the nominee running against Kamala and Steve Bannon, and a bunch of freaks are having a press conference about how they're going to overthrow the government. It's kind of like, probably better just to not give them attention then in that space. But I think that in a lot of ways, it's an important insight into where this thing is headed if things go the wrong way on Tuesday.

[JVL]

So that actually segues very nicely into Jeff Bezos and the Washington Post. So I've been kind of on fire on the Washington Post stuff.

[Tim Miller]

You really have?

[JVL]

Yeah. This is just one of those cases where I see everything much more clearly than other people do. And I'm sorry, it's just the truth.

[Tim Miller]

No, you've been right. You're right. I'm clouded by. I was clouded in this situation. Right. I was clouded, and here's why I was clouded. I've had a long time bugaboo, that I don't think that newspapers should endorse in presidential elections. Right. And so, like. And I. Yeah, and so you're the same. And so, like, I allowed.

[JVL]

There's a reason the Bulwark doesn't endorse candidates.

[Tim Miller]

I allowed that bugaboo, to kind of cloud the clarity that you have had on this. So, anyway, continue.

[JVL]

But I mean, at the very, very root. And it was a buddy of mine, Topher Harrison, who said this to me. He's a Russia scholar, and he's like, this is what happens when the oligarchs believe that the rule of law can't protect them. And that's ultimately what this is about. Right? So Jeff Bezos is not an idiot. He lives in the world, and he's been looking around, and he has seen that the machinery of the law has refused to hold Donald Trump accountable, and our democracy has thus far refused to hold Donald Trump accountable. And so he's like, okay, so what am I supposed to do? Like, I'm out here on a line, and if the rule of law has failed, then I have to do what I need to do. And this is. You know, Bob Kagan had a great line on the show with you, Tim. He said, you know, capitalism depends on the rule of law. Capitalists do not.

[Tim Miller]

That was good.

[JVL]

And so that's exactly what this is, right? I mean, if you're Jeff Bezos, you're looking at guys like Steve Bannon coming out, like, ready to recidivate or whatever the verb form of that is. And so you do what you do. Right? And I don't know, Sarah, did you. I feel you and I haven't talked about this at all. I get the sense that you were kind of, like, blase about the post thing.

[Sarah Longwell]

No, I'm not blase about it. Oh, okay. I think that that the surrender, I think that the pre surrender is, is really concerning. I think I've got, I think what I've got is I'm conflicted about the mechanism by which people are expressing their outrage, which is to cancel their Post subscription. And I, I tend to be sort of like, I don't love the idea of all these journalists who've been doing some of the best investigative journalism in the country over the last eight years. They're the ones who are going to bear the brunt of it. And like 250,000 subscribers is. Man, is that a lot of people.

[JVL]

10% overnight.

[Sarah Longwell]

Overnight.

[JVL]

We understand. I would just say if I could just for listeners just off the table a little bit like Sarah and I and Tim understand at a very deep level the idea of how Churn works and the economics of the business and whatnot. And you know, publications expect to either gain or lose subscribers who are, you know, in an ongoing relationship with the product at certain rates. To have 10% go away in 36 hours is catastrophic.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah. Although I will, I will say, I mean this is a Bezos decision, right? To not endorse and not endorse right now, which means I assume he offsets the loss in the short term. Like he has more money than God. I do think I saw some commentary about like people telling on themselves when they canceled their Washington Post subscription and not their prime subscriptions, which I thought was kind of a good point. But I do want to say screw Jeff Bezos and all the other cowards who are pre surrendering everybody who. And because when you say, when Tim says like they're on the line. No, he's not. Nobody has more protections in place than Jesus.

[JVL]

That was me who said that, not Tim.

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. Jbl. Nobody has more protection than Jeff Bezos. Like the idea that these people who are richer than God, who have personal wealth, that is the GDP of a medium sized country, like I'm sorry, you think you're going to, you think you can just. Because like I have always also been had like mixed feelings about the idea of a newspaper endorsing. But like the idea of like, well, we've lost people's trust. I mean to take a paper from Democracy dies in darkness, like to we can't endorse because oh, people don't trust us is just like they give up the game. Like, don't lie to me, don't act like I'm an idiot. We know exactly what you're doing and why you're doing it.

[JVL]

Right.

[Sarah Longwell]

It's just pathetic. And I don't like if you think people are so dumb that they're gonna believe that paper is failing too.

[JVL]

So you don't, you don't buy Jeff Bezos explanation, Sarah, that you wrote on Monday where he said it was all, you know, was just about regaining, climbing up a tick on the trust scale. And this meeting with Blue Origin that, I mean, just came out of nowhere. He didn't know about it. Nobody talked, Nobody, nobody talked with the Trump campaign. It's just suddenly the campaign called Blue Origin that Monday morning and they threw it together.

[Sarah Longwell]

You know what I. Yeah. You know what I think about this story is that, like, if I let myself feel the full weight of this story, it's like too scary and depressing. Like, I just need Kamala Harris to win. Because every single one of these things that happens if Trump wins is a preview of the next level of capitulation that we're going to see. You know, going back just to one of your newsletters and also our friend Christian Vanderbilt's been out there re upping all of these old things from all the anti anti Trumpers or even the pro Trumpers from 2016. And it's not just that they were opposed to Trump, it's that they were specifically opposed to Trump because he was a fascist or an authoritarian or behaved in ways that were extra governmental or outside of his power or for reasons of conservatism, like he was going to burn down institutions. All this stuff. These folks who now all either sit on the fence or do sort of casual water carrying for him or like Scott Jennings and some others are now sort of some of his biggest boosters. They sound exactly like us today. They did back then. And I just. The extent to which we every election cycle has both been us sort of escaping narrowly from the worst outcome and has brought, you know, sort of a new phase of political realignment. It's also brought with it new capitulation every time. And this time to see the billionaires capitulating. Right. And going from boosterism in the case of Elon to capitulation in the case of Bezos or sort of sinking to the back like a Zuckerberg, it's really scary. Like there just aren't a lot of people willing to stand up anymore.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, my path to Bernieism just gets one tick over every episode of the next level because I did, I guess I was doing Nicole's show on Monday and I had missed that. Warren Buffett also didn't endorse this time. And it's one of these things. It's like kind of who cares with Warren Buffett on the one hand, but on the other hand, just the accumulation of all this, that we went from a time in 2016 where it didn't work, but there were a lot of extenuating circumstances for why it didn't work. But at an elite level, there was a universal saying of no to him, and the intensity probably wasn't where it should have been. There are a lot of things that explained why 2016 went the way it did. But to have backslid from that and to now be in 2024 after the attempted insurrection after January 6th, for them to have weakened their opposition to him substantially. I. Weakened. It is even the wrong word to have moved from opposition to neutrality across the board. Jamie Dimon, Buffett, Bezos, Zuck, Google. Apparently Sundar and Donald are talking. I mean, it is outrageous. And when Sarah says the weight of all thinking about it makes her feel too scary, for her, the weight of all of it for me, like, makes me just want to be. For Bernie, it's just like. Actually, I think that maybe we can bring some balance to the situation. If we really did, if we really were planning on doing the tax on unrealized gains, I think maybe for everybody over 1 billion, I think maybe Kamala, we were just joking about that tax on unrealized gains, or that was just some Elizabeth Warren people talking, weren't really going to do it. But after seeing how the billionaires behave this time, I think maybe a tax on unrealized gains for billionaires is what we should do.

[Sarah Longwell]

And. But just. Okay, so the Bernie thing notwithstanding, the thing is, though, is that just. I'm not going to launch into a whole defense of capitalism, but, like, the reason that they're doing this is because Donald Trump operates in transactional crony capitalism ways. That's it. Right, Right. And so in a normal thing, and the reason they're doing it with him and not with Kamala is because nobody thinks Kamala is going to be retributive toward them. Right.

[JVL]

And like, that's a thing we can fix.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah. Maybe. Maybe they need a little high heat. Maybe they need a little high heat.

[Sarah Longwell]

No, no, no, no, no.

[JVL]

I know, I know, I know.

[Sarah Longwell]

But. But this is. But. But the very fact that they're doing it is in itself the argument about why Trump is so dangerous. Not just because they can't be there as bulwarks, so to speak, against him. The richest people in our country, to whom this country has given him so Much. But it's that Trump's transactionalism and sort of low level menace towards these companies has created an anti, not a anti capitalist environment, but a much more like a Russian environment of patronage.

[JVL]

So what makes me feel a little ashamed of myself here is that I should have realized like five or six years ago that this is necessarily where we would head. And I didn't. I thought like, well, you know, the elites will stand up because the elites, it's in their best interest because they need a stable order in order to continue making money. Right. I just thought like their self interest aligned with this. And actually history is as, as Bill and Bob talked about with you the other day, Tim. This is what happens in every time a fascist movement takes hold within a democracy. The business elites always make their peace with the fascists because that's the only way they can preserve their position in the short and medium term. Like maybe in the long term, like they really need stability, but in the short and medium term, that's not what they need. They just need room to continue operating. And they always do this. And I didn't quite realize that this is inevitable. And what that really speaks to is a failure of the Biden administration to not go after Trump and Trumpism hammer and tongs from day one. And this is a thing, I think we've all had like different opinions at different times in the course of the last four years. Charlie was always really like, you know, what is Merrick Garland doing? Why isn't he going harder at these guys? I was more of a, no, I like this. We should try to, you know, let the fire die down and, you know, maybe peace will break out and stuff. The answer is that the, when the good guys control government, they need to pursue, pursue accountability to the maximum possible extent. And if you don't do that, that's what creates room for the elite classes, especially in business, to say, oh, well, you know, I have to just go and throw in with the strongman. I don't know, is that too deep a thought? You guys don't like that?

[Tim Miller]

I don't know. I don't, I don't know that it matters. I don't. I think with the benefit of hindsight, I was always, as is my want, usually pulled and pushed between the you and Charlie point of view on that. Like, I wanted Merrick Garland to do more, but I also kind of wanted comedy. And, and, but with the benefit of hindsight, I don't really know that that would have mattered.

[JVL]

Maybe, maybe that's true. Maybe none of it matters. Sarah, do you have thoughts? I forget where you were on the question of. I think you. I mean, we were. Look, we all went back and forth on this, right? And ultimately none of us had anything to do with it because the AG is independent and the AG makes its own decisions.

[Sarah Longwell]

But, yeah, I mean, I think for me, I tended to. I lean towards comedy moving on a little bit. If you think Trump's gonna exit the stage. I do think, though, I shifted a little bit during the January 6 committee, where once they presented all the evidence, there was part of me that was like, wait a minute, you've got all these people. And I think that sometimes for us to make these judgments can be a little hard because we don't know what they have. The second that the Cheney January 6th Committee produced all of this evidence that they were sitting on, all these testimony, all this testimony from Republicans, from people who were with him, and you were like, how is it possible they haven't moved on this because it was so much more than just the speech, Right? So I feel like, I just think the way when Tim says it doesn't matter, having sort of done this podcast with George where we really thought we were going to get somewhere with these cases and then to have the only one that moved be the Stormy Daniels election interference case, I've actually been really disappointed that the American people did not. I thought the American people, for the guy who's running again, for us to feel like our democracy is functioning correctly, they should have seen litigated and put in front of a jury the question of January 6th and trying to overturn the election and the illegal acts that were in there, too. So things like calling Brad Raffensperger and looking for 11,000 votes. But also, before you give this guy access to nuclear secrets, again, we should know about the fact about how he so grossly not just mishandled the classified documents, but refused to return them, treated them as his own, shared them with people in ways he wasn't supposed to like. And like, if There was a January 6th committee about the documents, I'm sure we would find tons and tons of things, right? Like specific documents that wound up in the hands of people that they shouldn't or that were very sensitive and they were just sitting around a bathroom. And it feels like our system of justice should have allowed the American people to have that in front of them before this election. Again.

[JVL]

But this is another case where, again, I think in hindsight, it is now obvious to me at least, that maximum accountability and maximum aggressiveness on pursuing accountability was the right thing. A lot of people thought that the Alvin Bragg case was like, oh, it's the weakest of the three, and boy, it's the one that seems the most political. And it turns out, thank God we had the Alvin Bragg case because, see, I wouldn't have been convicted of anything.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah. But like, does it matter at all that he was convicted in that case?

[JVL]

I mean, I think so. I think that he would be in a stronger position right now with no convictions. I think it would be harder to pry those, you know, the marginal Trump voters, I think would be less marginal absent his 34 felony convictions.

[Sarah Longwell]

I'm not sure you'd have. In terms of the people who are out on Trump, you don't get that many people, I think don't get that many people talking about his felony convictions. I just think that case was not the weakest case, but just the least relevant to the American people from a decision making standpoint.

[JVL]

Yeah, again, and I agree. But also, it turns out to have been important because without it, we wouldn't have gotten anything. And if you remember, the case was really strong. Like, you know, we all read the, we all watched the case, we all listened to the witnesses. Like, he, he had the goods and it was good that he pursued maximum accountability. And if God, God help us if Kamala Harris wins, I hope that she pursues maximum accountability across.

[Sarah Longwell]

So you don't think she should pardon him? Because I remember a whole piece you.

[JVL]

Wrote about how she should pardon. I no longer believe that. I now believe that would be a catastrophic decision.

[Sarah Longwell]

Well, I'll tell you, I was with George at a live event at one point, and I suggested the potential in the service of national comedy, the Harris pardoning him. And I almost got, I almost got Mike Pence in the room like I was going to.

[Tim Miller]

Ladies were taking tomatoes out of their purse.

[JVL]

No, I mean, I've changed my heart, my mind very hard on the pardon.

[Tim Miller]

Can I give you two, can we, can I give you two pieces of breaking happiness before we leave? Sure. Or did you have another. Do we have another topic?

[JVL]

No, no, that's, that's all I got.

[Tim Miller]

Arnold has come out of the woodwork to endorse Kamala Harris. Arnold. That's good. And just now, new CNN polls out of the blue wall. The last CNN falls from the blue wall. Are you ready?

[Sarah Longwell]

Yes.

[Tim Miller]

Michigan, Kamala Harris, 48. Donald Trump, 43. Wisconsin, Kamala Harris, 51. Donald Trump, 45. Pennsylvania, Kamala Harris, 48.Donald Trump, 48. That's good. That's good.

[Sarah Longwell]

Tied in. Pennsylvania's not good.

[Tim Miller]

But I hey going to bat. As I've said on every podcast in jbl quoted me saying the other day, I don't like going to battle where Donald Trump has three outs. I will feel much better if Michigan and Wisconsin feel stable and we're fighting for Pennsylvania. That's better odds for Kamala Harris. So that is, that's a win.

[Sarah Longwell]

Do they only have blue wall states? Do they have Nevada in just blue.

[Tim Miller]

Wall where you the only disappointment, the only thing that makes me a little disappointed about this is at some level of Pennsylvania and Michigan were the ones that were looking good. Wisconsin leaves combo with another out of North Carolina. I think I continued to be I feel like North Carolina could be winnable for her maybe.

[Sarah Longwell]

I think North Carolina is really tough to pin down now ever since the storm. Like, I think a lot of people left. I think people have feelings that are incredibly localized, both around Mark Robinson, but also around how fema and they got both flooded and then flooded with disinformation. Like who knows what that's done to people. Is it made them more likely, less likely? Couldn't, I couldn't possibly say.

[JVL]

All right, final check, final temperature check here before the, for the three of us before. Since this is the last last night.

[Sarah Longwell]

I thought we were doing these nighttime things.

[JVL]

We are. Okay, Well, I didn't realize that was decided. So we won't do a final temperature check.

[Sarah Longwell]

No, we can't. I mean, we can. Good show. Broad one.

[JVL]

Okay. It's been a very long show, but if you would like to do it, you can do it.

[Sarah Longwell]

I think that, and I've, I've said for a long time that I obviously, I think it's really important which way the independents break at the end. I see a lot of people constantly arguing who is undecided. How could any be on anybody be undecided at this point? But the fact is can't remember if we were all talking about this at some point. But, you know, at the end of Hillary Clinton's campaign, she got the comey stuff. She had that flu. You know, I think Biden had independent. And so independents broke for Trump in 2016. In 2020, they broke towards Biden, I think, because of COVID and because people were just sort of done with Trump. And I think the question now is which one is the incumbent? The independents have broken away from the incumbent both times. Or I think Hillary Clinton was like a third Obama term to the extent. And this time it's like, well, who is the incumbent which way are independent is going to break. I just think that going back to the top of the show, Trump's closing argument. He stepped on. His message got messed up. 450,000 Puerto Ricans in Pennsylvania. Bad bunny. Like, he's just, he's. He's had a. He's had a lousy last week. She's had a stronger last week. Biden would get out of her way. And so I just. I believe independents are going to break for her at the end, including. Including women.

[JVL]

Tim. A.

[Tim Miller]

My palms are literally sweaty. It's not an Eminem reference. My palms are actually sweating right now.

[Sarah Longwell]

Just talking knees weak arms are heavy.

[Tim Miller]

There you go. Sarah. Sarah.

[JVL]

Hey, well done.

[Tim Miller]

B. Rabbit. I fucked up and I'm about to fuck up again. When I was with Mallory McMorrow, I gave the incorrect name of where they have the rap battles. It was the Shelter and I called it the Chapel. I felt like really was a neg against my 8 mile reference capabilities. Anyway, I just. My vote, my view hasn't changed for a month and I don't think it's going to change until next week. I think she has a narrow lead in those three states. I think she can win North Carolina. She can maybe win Nevada. I think there's an outside chance that. I do think there's pole hurting. I think there's an outside chance that there could be a polling error of like three points that I think it's probably more likely that it's in her direction than his, but could certainly be in his direction. And I just. I think we're going to be sweating it out. The only. I've gotten a little. I like the fact that Georgia has fixed the counting. Speed is super important because I think we're going to know a lot more on election night than I thought we would. So that's. That. My temperature check is a little bit down on that. I think it's going to take a long time to count some of these other states. But, you know, if she loses Georgia by one and she did really well in the suburbs, like, that's bad to lose Georgia, but you can still start to feel pretty good that things are going to break the right direction in those other states, you know, we won't do the other alternative. So I think that I'm feeling a little bit better about that.

[JVL]

All right. It's been a good show. Maybe we will be. We are the worst. Yeah, that's right. I am the worst weekend.

[Tim Miller]

Keep an eye for it on the weekend. Maybe you guys. It's a secret bonus, but I'm on a flight tomorrow night, and I can maybe do it Friday, but.

[JVL]

Well, maybe we'll talk about it.

[Sarah Longwell]

JBL and I are gonna do secret Friday. Maybe so.

[JVL]

And I will do a little check in tonight. Maybe we'll do a little check. Maybe they'll just be, like, bedtime, you know, after dark, with Sarah and JVL and we just, you know, 20 minutes. 20 minutes. 20 minutes. Vibe check. Yeah. Well, you and me both, guys. Good luck, America.