Govs.-Elect Sherrill & Spanberger: From the Hill to the State House

Summary

Podcast Summary

Podcast: The Weekly Show with Jon Stewart
Episode: Govs.-Elect Sherrill & Spanberger: From the Hill to the State House
Release Date: November 20, 2025
Host: Jon Stewart
Guests: Governor-elect Mikie Sherrill (NJ), Governor-elect Abigail Spanberger (VA)

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Episode Overview

In this candid, insightful episode, Jon Stewart sits down with Mikie Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger, the recently elected Democratic governors of New Jersey and Virginia, respectively. The conversation traces their parallel journeys from national security careers to Congress to their latest executive victories. They reflect on the frustrations and inertia of Congress, the intricacies of state-level governing, overcoming negative campaigning, and the challenges blue states face under the Trump administration. With warmth and humor, the discussion highlights both policy substance and personal connection, offering rare authenticity in political discourse.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Parallel Paths: From Service to Statehouse

• First Female and Barrier-Breaking Governance

  • Sherrill is only NJ’s second female governor and the first woman veteran to become governor in the US.
    • “I think that her Excellency might be solely in Virginia. ...the first woman veteran ever elected as governor in the United States, so really exciting.” – Mikie Sherrill [03:38]
  • Spanberger is “Her Excellency,” the first woman to hold the role in Virginia’s history.

• Intertwined Stories and Roommate Years

  • Both ran in 2018, bonded as women with national security backgrounds, and even “fake roommated” before sharing an apartment in DC.
  • A funny moment: Mikie’s sister was Spanberger’s constituent and campaign volunteer.
  • “We would just go down there and get beaten to hell. ...there’d be no food in the house... pickles and peanut butter and nuts...” – Mikie Sherrill [09:46]

2. Culture Shock: Transitioning to Congress

• From Mission-Driven to Dysfunction

  • Both came from backgrounds valuing order, chain of command, and results.
  • “You’re used to mission... you’re used to chain of command. ...What was it like learning the sorts of, ‘this is how we do it down here’, and thinking... well, that’s not how they should do it anywhere?” – Jon Stewart [12:23]

• Institutional Inertia and ‘Messaging vs. Delivering’

  • Frustration with leadership’s resistance to change and preference for ‘messaging bills’ over real solutions.
  • “Nobody in my district wants a message. They want flood prevention, that kind of thing.” – Mikie Sherrill [13:37]
  • Spanberger describes the years-long effort to pass a widely-supported fix to Social Security penalties for public servants:
    • “We did a discharge petition because we couldn’t get leadership to bring it [to a vote]... And we got it through. ...It was last bill signing that President Biden did before he left. And it’s, I mean, changed lives everywhere across Virginia.” – Abigail Spanberger [21:05]

3. The Congressional ‘Play’: Cynicism and Workarounds

• Theatrics vs. Substance
  • Jon Stewart underscores how congressional delay and drama often masks broad consensus.
    • “You had the ability to do this whenever you wanted to... It took 30 seconds. ...Are we just putting on a play down here?” – Jon Stewart [31:46]
  • Sherrill: The realization led her to run for governor instead.
  • Spanberger and Chip Roy—odd political pair—joined to author a congressional stock trading ban, building bipartisan momentum by appealing to public desire for governmental trust.

4. Campaign Life: Attack Ads, Family & Resilience

• Personal Impact of Negative Campaigns

  • Early attack ads, including one calling Spanberger a terrorist, had real family effects (“My oldest daughter... said that kids on the playground... ask, like, ‘Is your mom a terrorist?’” – [38:02]). Both women now take such attacks in stride.
  • Sherrill on misleading soundbites: “But you can’t, you know, if you’re explaining, you’re losing. So I wasn’t going to put a million dollars of me direct to camera saying, that wasn’t actually what I was saying.” [42:25]

• The Real Keys to Winning

  • Despite national narratives, on-the-ground organizing, field staff, and showing up matter more than TV ads.
    • “People want to have a sense of who you are as a person... and some of that comes from television ads, ...but they also want to feel, like, invited into a campaign.” – Abigail Spanberger [44:02]
  • Positive, “bio” ads and authentic engagement are crucial.
    • “It’s about having that engagement... making it so nobody could go anywhere without kind of hearing my name or knowing a little bit about what it is that I might be for.” – [47:28]

5. Washington vs. the States: Governing Power and Frustration

• State Executive Power: ‘You Can Actually Get Things Done’

  • Stewart notes NJ’s governor wields more authority than counterparts in many other states.
    • “New Jersey has a very different prescription for even what the budget can be. The New Jersey governor is very powerful...” [51:32]
  • Spanberger: Virginia’s one-term limit and complex budget cycle create unique challenges.

• Federal Retaliation Against Blue States

  • Both cite how Trump’s administration is slashing funding for blue states—transportation, healthcare (especially Medicaid, rural hospitals), education—and using it as leverage.
  • “At every level, the federal government is failing to run programs that they are on the hook for traditionally.” – Mikie Sherrill [54:16]
  • Virginia’s rural hospitals are particularly endangered due to federal definitions crafted to win an Alaskan senator’s vote.

• What Can States Do?

  • Potential legal challenges, “multi-state compacts,” and even the (tongue-in-cheek) idea of a “federal tax strike.”
  • “If they’re not going to run the programs, then what are we paying them for?” – Mikie Sherrill [65:15]
  • Stewart: “Maybe states need to start bribing him. Seems to be the most... I see they both just get real sad.” [65:04]

6. Current Republican Party & The Future

• Corruption, Kleptocracy, and the Stakes

  • Sherrill points to transactional, self-enriching Trump administration actions: “It is this totally kleptocratic, corrupt administration.” [63:41]
  • Spanberger on the refusal of some leaders to defend their states’ interests: “Abdication of responsibility.” [69:32]

• A Call to Effective Democratic Governance

  • Sherrill: Best way to help the party is to govern effectively, deliver for people.
  • “We need to govern...that is the very best thing I can do in this position.” [49:16]

• Contrast with National Media Narratives

  • Both reject the manufactured drama of “left vs center” frame (“Is it you or is it Mamdani?”) as disconnected from what actual voters care about.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “You know, this is like one of those... Lincoln had a secretary named Kennedy, and Kennedy had a secretary named Lincoln.” – Jon Stewart [04:17]

• “Was it nerve-wracking to ask Abigail to be your roommate?” – Jon Stewart [09:36]

  • “No... I think our families feel like it was like this. They all seem to think that going to Washington was this sort of sorority type situation...” – Mikie Sherrill [09:46]

• “If we don’t deliver...nobody in my district wants a message. They want flood prevention.” – Mikie Sherrill [13:37]

• “The ads didn’t really bother me...I’d watch an ad first with no sound on...to see how spooky I look.” – Abigail Spanberger [38:02]

• “If you’re explaining, you’re losing.” – Mikie Sherrill [42:05]

• “Everything you heard was, is the Democratic party Mamdani and socialism? Or is it Mikie Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger and the national security mom? ...on the ground, it’s none of that shit.” – Jon Stewart [48:13]

• “I actually think it’s a lack of understanding of the basic of economics of how the federal government interplays.” – Abigail Spanberger [61:17]

• “That’s the most exciting thing I saw, was that hey, everybody is ready to tackle hard problems...” – Mikie Sherrill [56:11]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [03:28] – “Her Excellency”: The historic wins & barrier breaking.
• [06:42] – 2018 elections, first meeting, and shared backgrounds.
• [08:33] – How Congress freshman pick roommates (and Animal House fridge tales).
• [12:17] – Military/security backgrounds vs. dysfunction in Congress.
• [18:25] – Spanberger’s Social Security fight for retirees.
• [22:26] – Congressional “play”: drama vs. reality; why Sherrill ran for governor.
• [37:19] – How attack ads impacted their families and coping strategies.
• [44:02] – Field orgs & personal connection: key to campaign wins.
• [51:32] – Gubernatorial powers differ: executive tools in NJ & VA.
• [53:23] – Fighting federal cuts, corruption, and the New Jersey/blue state squeeze.
• [58:39] – Coordinating blue state response, multi-state compacts, legal action.
• [61:17] – Spanberger: It’s ignorance, not mere punishment, driving harmful policy.
• [63:41] – Sherrill: Trump’s “kleptocratic, corrupt administration.”
• [69:32] – State leaders’ cowardice, and federal interference in state affairs.

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Original Tone: Humor, Frustration, & Camaraderie

The conversation blends Stewart’s trademark sarcasm and irreverence with the guests’ candid, sometimes self-deprecating humor. There’s warmth between Mikie and Abigail as roommates and mutual supporters—and frankness about the absurdities and constraints of political institutions. Throughout, the mood balances personal anecdotes with real policy substance, illuminating the human side of political work.

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Closing Reflection

Jon Stewart wraps with appreciation for the guests and a note that their executive roles now better match their abilities:
“You both now seem to be in situations where the job is commensurate with your abilities...where you can really start to accomplish the things that I think got you into public service in the first place.” [70:41]

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For listeners, this episode offers an inside view of modern political leadership, how real change is made (or blocked), and a hopeful reminder that authenticity and public service aren’t dead—even when a system tries its best to grind them down.

Transcript

[Abigail Spanberger]

If we knew more about our sleep.

[Jon Stewart]

What would we do differently? Would we go to bed at a consistent time or take steps to reduce interruptions to our sleep? With the all new Sleep score, Apple Watch measures your bedtime consistency, interruptions and sleep duration. Then every morning it combines these factors into an easy to understand score from 1 to 100.

[Abigail Spanberger]

So you'll know how to take the.

[Jon Stewart]

Quality of your sleep from good to excellent.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Introducing the new Sleep Score on Apple.

[Jon Stewart]

Watch iPhone 11 or later required. Hello friends.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Guess who?

[Jon Stewart]

That's right, it is I, the replacer. Once again I've been called on so you can play the new Call of.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Duty Black Ops 7 with three expansive.

[Jon Stewart]

Modes, 18 multiplayer maps and the tastiest zombie gameplay you've ever freaking seen. Call of Duty Black Ops 7 available now.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Rated M A mature.

[Jon Stewart]

Hey everybody. Welcome to the weekly show podcast with Jon Stewart. My name is actually Jon Stewart, so it is appropriate that I'm the one who is addressing you right now. It is Wednesday. It is November 19th. The world's still celebrating the shock vote from the House and the Senate which shows that when they want to get something done, they can do it immediately because all of their prevaricating and all of the stalling and all those things was absolute bullshit. They could have done this thing from the start and gotten it out there instead of all the rigamarole about getting the Epstein files released and it is onto the desk of President Donald Trump who I'm sure will sign it and, and we will have access to all of the information non redacted, unclassified, except obviously protecting victims names and we will finally get to the bottom of all this. I of course am lying and being sarcastic but you know, we will see what we see. But on the other side, on the other front, there have been developments electorally this past November that I think many people were excited about and we're very fortunate today to have two of the leaders of that electoral charge and two, two governor elects that are going to be joining us to discuss not just their road to becoming governors, but the fact that they're both, oddly enough, really connected in a variety of kind of different and interesting and cool ways. So we're just going to get right to them foreign. And so we have as our guest today, very exciting, tremendous election victories this November by margins that in the words of Donald Trump have never been seen before in this country. Ladies and gentlemen, Governor Elect Mikey Sherrill, Democrat, New Jersey. Governor elect Abigail Spanberger, Democrat, Virginia. Governors elect. How are you? Congratulations. Now we spoke Earlier, Governor elect is the proper title, but when you become governor, and this is particularly for Virginia, you will be referred to as your Excellency.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Her. Her Excellency. For the first time in Virginia history, actually, you are.

[Jon Stewart]

And Mikey, you're only the second woman to ever be elected in. In New Jersey, right?

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yeah. And I think that her Excellency might be solely in Virginia. I am quite sure that will not be the title here in New Jersey. But yeah, it's really exciting. And the first woman veteran ever elected as governor in the United States, so really exciting.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

You know, you both come. Here's the thing people don't realize, you know, you're sort of bonded by this barrier breaking achievement. You become governors in states. As you said, Mikey, only the second. Christy Whitman, you're the first Democrat. Abigail, Virginia's never had that. But people might not realize your stories line up really, really in an interesting fashion. You're both in sort of the national security state. Mikey, you're a veteran. Abigail, you were CIA. You come to Congress in, in 2018 and not to get too together. You room together in Congress. And. And this is where it gets a little bit weird. Mikey, you were born in Virginia and now you're the governor of New Jersey. Abigail, you lived in New Jersey and now you're the. This is like one of those. Lincoln had a secretary named Kennedy, and Kennedy had a secretary named Lincoln. How did you find each other for the first time? When was that?

[Mikey Sherrill]

Well, the stars aligned, obviously with all the connections, but we were both running in that 2018 cycle, and there were groups of people that were supporting veterans that were especially, you know, supporting women veterans. That was that class, as you know, with Alyssa Slatkin and Chrissy Houlihan, Elaine Luria. So we had gotten to know each other even before we got into Congress. And because we come from that background of service, we were sort of team players. You know, we worked with a group. And while there were a lot of people in Congress that sort of felt like they were an army of one. I remember one of my members of the New Jersey delegation, I said, are we gonna come together and make, you know, do this? And they said, oh, I gotta be honest with you, it's every man for himself.

[Jon Stewart]

But I, by the way, feel free to name all names, including nicknames, at any point that you wanna. That you wanna do that. But is that had you known each other before you both made the decisions, Abigail, to run for Congress or this through the process of. Because people forget the 2018 election was the. Oh, My God, what have we done? Election Trump had won in 2016, and the American public at that time thought, oh, I didn't think it was going to go this way. And so the congressional election in 2018 was a real barn burner for Democrats.

[Abigail Spanberger]

That's right. And we had met each other along the campaign trail, like Mikey said, because we would do events together as predominantly as folks with national security backgrounds, but also as women with national security backgrounds. And in. We had one other connection, which is that Mikey's sister, one of her two sisters, I also have two sisters, was my constituent in my first election. She later moved out of state, but for a time I claimed her. So I would get updates on Mikey's race as well, even from her sister, who I would see frequently, very clearly.

[Jon Stewart]

Let's point out, Mikey's sister did not move out of your district because of it.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Correct.

[Jon Stewart]

Not because you. I'm sure it was a different situation. It was a life situation. It had nothing to do with the representation.

[Abigail Spanberger]

No, she.

[Mikey Sherrill]

She hosted.

[Abigail Spanberger]

She hosted canvas kickoffs for me. She was a super volunteer.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Oh, my gosh. I called her. I'm, like, running this hard, I thought, very difficult campaign in a Trump district, as Abigail was. And I called my sister up one morning, I had like, five minutes, and I was like, hey. She's like, I can't talk. I can't talk. You know, I'm about to launch a canvas for Abigail Speaker Span Burger. Like, well, yeah, already I'm running, too. Thanks a lot.

[Jon Stewart]

How do you choose? When you're in Washington and you're in these freshman classes, how do they do the roommate selection? Because it is, you know, generally, especially freshman members will. Will try and team up two, four, whatever, to. To an apartment. Is that something that. Is there a. An orientation that takes place where, where they bring in the freshman Congress people and say, you're going to need an apartment or a pier or something along those lines. How did, how did you guys end up going? Okay, are you with anybody on this project? Let's partner up.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Well, I'll. I'll start. Mikey.

[Mikey Sherrill]

We were.

[Abigail Spanberger]

So Lois Frankel from Florida. I'll name names because she'll be pleased. She was going to say Lois. Lois. Lois Frankel from Florida always reaches out to. She's very supportive of women candidates, and so she creates this. This network. And then when you get elected, Lois says, I can help find you an apartment. She, like, has a, you know, her.

[Jon Stewart]

Real estate agent to the stars. That's nice.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Her side activity is helping people find apartments and so we both went through the Lois connection.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Initially.

[Abigail Spanberger]

I was very determined to sort of, you know, find my own way and not leverage Lois. And then I failed in finding an apartment, so I went to Lois, and we ended up. Mikey and I were both actually on the same floor within the same apartment building. So we were initially sort of like fake roommates. And we would end up walking to the office together and back, and we were fake roommates for a bit. And then from there we decided to be real roommates and get the plug.

[Jon Stewart]

Was it Mikey? Was it a nerve wracking conversation? Like, I really want to ask Abigail, but I'm nervous she's not going to want a room together. Was it anything? Did you just.

[Mikey Sherrill]

No, but it was funny because our. I think our families feel like it was like this. They all seem to think that going to Washington was this sort of sorority type situation where we were just taking a break from life and going down there. And, you know, we were just. We would just go down there and get beaten to hell. And you'd be working these days and you'd come home and, you know, and more than once we're sitting there eating. And the one way it was like college is we'd come home and be eating like, pickles and peanut butter and nuts or, I mean, there'd be no food in the house because you can't leave it. There it goes. It spoils when you're back home and all that. You know, this kind of really, really, like tough days in the office, if.

[Jon Stewart]

You would, Ramen noodles always going real.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Smoothly in Congress and. And then you'd get home and you'd be like, oh, God, I'm exhausted. And, you know, I know my husband Jason would be like, yeah, whatever. Kind of like, oh, you're exhausted from hanging out and, you know, no kids, you know, so it was always a little bit.

[Abigail Spanberger]

My husband Adam said, make sure you mention the potato. Which is kind of shorthand for the way that, I mean, we would go to the office. You know, we were working all the time, and so we never had any good food. And so occasionally when my husband Adam would come was like, why is there a single potato in the refrigerator?

[Mikey Sherrill]

And it was like there for.

[Abigail Spanberger]

For months and months and months. And we would have these terrible conversations about, like, how, like, how many years expire does string cheese need to be before you shouldn't eat it?

[Jon Stewart]

Dear God.

[Abigail Spanberger]

I know. It's actually embarrassing. We probably shouldn't admit to this.

[Mikey Sherrill]

All right, tmi, Abigail, come on. This is circle of Tress. Stuff. No more. No more.

[Jon Stewart]

No, no, no. It's. You two moved into. You moved into Animal House, but, yeah.

[Mikey Sherrill]

We had to run for governor to, like, you know, lift ourselves up to be Her Excellency. No more eating raw potatoes, I guess.

[Jon Stewart]

But it is interesting to hear. It's. It's the type of thing that you don't hear that much about in terms of, you know, freshman Congress people. And there's all the pomp and circumstance in the news organizations, but underneath it all, there really is a disorienting process of getting involved in government. And it's. It's interesting to me in that, you know, look, you guys both come from Mikey, military background, Abigail, security state background. And now you're thrust into this really dysfunctional world. You're used to mission, you're used to order, you're used to chain of command.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Showing up on time, showing up on time.

[Jon Stewart]

What was it like learning the sorts of, this is how we do it down here, and thinking to yourselves, well, that's not how they should do it anywhere that seems ass backwards. What was that experience like?

[Mikey Sherrill]

I think that's probably what the most disoriented thing was to get down there, to have come in on this blue wave, to have built these campaigns much like we just did, from the ground up, speaking to, you know, as many people as we could, because we were flipping Trump districts. So it wasn't just about both of.

[Jon Stewart]

You in districts that really had not had a Democrat in maybe decades.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Right, right. And so you were building something. You were talking to people and convincing them and connecting with them that you had a better path forward. And. And then we arrived in Congress and. And it really was, I thought, with this sense of, okay, we've cracked the code, we should now be in the majority in the House of Representative like this. This should really be lasting. And here's, you know, here's what we saw and here's how we did it. And it was striking to encounter an organization that had a lot of inertia, that. Where people weren't that interested in changing that, that they wanted to keep doing what they were doing. And I would say that's, you know, part of the reason why in the House we were out of power in only two terms because we, I think, focused on many of the right things, but we didn't deliver on things that I think would have been easy wins. And that was the fight Abigail and I engaged in constantly. Like, let's not send a messaging bill. Let's effectively pass a piece of legislation and the disconnect between, you know, oh, the people want to see us sending a message and, you know, Abigail and I having been on the ground saying, no, if we don't deliver, if we don't actually deliver for people, nobody in my district wants a message. They want flood prevention, that kind of thing.

[Jon Stewart]

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[Abigail Spanberger]

Know, it is, it flies in the face of all of my natural tendencies. And this is what I will say, speaking very truthfully about the realities of Congress, but also in case there's anyone who's thinking about running for Congress listening, even though that is how it functions, you don't have to function within that frame. And so I, you know, I remember when we first got there and I represent a district that's very, very, I represented a district that was very heavily public servants, retired police officers, retired federal employees. And there was this little provision in Social Security law that basically stole people's, as I use my aggressive language, stole people's Social Security benefits. So if you had pursued a career, firefighters, police officers, teachers, you know, some post federal workers, if you had pursued a career in public service, but also throughout your working years, worked a job where you also, it was private sector when you retired because you might have had some, in many cases, very nominal public sector pension, you saw your Social Security benefits reduced in some cases, I mean, thousands upon thousands of dollars.

[Jon Stewart]

Wow.

[Abigail Spanberger]

And so people were headed off into their retirement, get their first Social Security check and it's fractions of what they thought they would get. And this, this law went into place back in the 80s. I get to Congress saying, oh my goodness, okay, we're going to, we're going to fix this. Everyone agrees. For a time it was the most sponsored bill and I coated with a Republican from Louisiana, bipartisan co sponsored bill.

[Jon Stewart]

Fantastic.

[Abigail Spanberger]

And everybody said, oh, but, but if we're going to do this, we like, if we're going to repeal this, these terrible two provisions. And where it was really horrible is if someone lost their spouse, they themselves had worked throughout their career, they lost a spouse who had been a, you know, a firefighter, police officer. They saw their own as the surviving spouse. Their Social Security benefits, I mean, people were thrust into poverty, people lost their homes. It's an outrage. But frankly, part of the problem is so many, you know, there are more than 3.2 million people who saw change the day we ultimately, I'll get to the finish of it, pass this bill. But you know, people would say, oh yeah, I support it, I would support it. They'd co sponsor it. We'd have all these co sponsors. But then year after year we couldn't actually get leadership, Democratic or Republican leadership to bring it for a vote.

[Jon Stewart]

Right.

[Abigail Spanberger]

And we know we have the votes.

[Jon Stewart]

People have to. You don't realize, like, people can co sponsor, they can do whatever they want, but if it doesn't go through leadership, because leadership controls, and in the House especially, which is a zero sum game, whoever controls it has full control of committees, of what gets to be voted on, of any of those different situations. So you can have all that, and they just hold onto it.

[Abigail Spanberger]

And on the Democratic side of the aisle, the pushback we would get would be like, well, we need to do, you know, a general reform. Let's save this for a larger reform. Because, you know, frankly, like, giving benefits back to people who earned it seemed like the sweetener. And then on the Republican side of the aisle, it was, oh, this will cost so much. Well, it will cost so much because we're actually giving people their earned benefit, right?

[Mikey Sherrill]

Like, and the CBO score cost so.

[Jon Stewart]

Much because we're fixing a problem that occurs within the money they've already given to the government.

[Abigail Spanberger]

And I think one of the most horrifying things is this. When the CBO scored it, they actually said that we would see cost reductions in some of the safety net programs because suddenly seniors who had worked their lives in service to their community or their country would no longer be eligible for food stamps or, you know, SNAP programs and safety net programs. Long story short, we ended up doing a discharge petition because we couldn't get leadership to bring it. We forced the hands of, you know, leadership in the House, people familiar with.

[Jon Stewart]

Discharge petitions now, because everybody knows, everybody knows the title now.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Before I used to have to reference Legally Blonde too, where. That's where a discharge petition, that's where we all learned notoriety.

[Jon Stewart]

It's the Schoolhouse Rock of the new generation.

[Abigail Spanberger]

So we got it through. We, we got it signed into law. You know, it was, it was last bill signing that President Biden did before he left. And it's, I mean, changed lives everywhere across Virginia, you know, and I got letters from across the country.

[Jon Stewart]

But think about that. It's. You're talking about six years. You go in there and you do that. And we just said, okay, it was the last bill President Biden signed. Well, that's six years after you guys had come into Congress and wanted that. And Mikey, that's, and this is great because I think it encapsulates all of the frustration at times that is the congressional body. So much of it is Republicans, like in high school going door too, and going, would you sponsor me? I'm doing a dance a thon, and I'd like. And you have to gain. You have a very particular thing that you want to do. Right. That's going to fix a problem. And, and then you get all the signatures and you get the bill that you want it to be, and then leadership will tell you, well, actually, we're playing this different game where we're trying to, you know, use leverage for those things to get this other thing.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yep.

[Jon Stewart]

Is that something that happened to you, Mikey, as well?

[Mikey Sherrill]

It did. And I think, you know, in some cases you get it right. It's. It's really trying to get the voting block you need to get stuff forward and what the deal is. I think the problem for people like myself and Abigail, she just charted out, was this sense that we run tough races, and when you run tough races, you win in places that don't have Democratic votes by connecting with people, by saying, look, you know, I'm a Democrat, I'm a proud Democrat, and I'm that, you know, I'm a proud Democrat because I deliver for working people and here's what I'm going to do. And, and I will tell you, after years of serving in my district, you know, we just. I would win with about a quarter of registered Republicans and stuff like that because of delivering effective government to people. And you do see sometimes in Washington, there becomes this. There is sort of this disconnect and there is. I remember, you know, something that I think would. Would blow our minds often and we, we've talked about it, is we were told there was this procedural motion that they always wanted you to just vote with the party on. And yet the votes, they would be gotcha votes from Republicans. And they'd say, well, just tell your constituents that it's a procedural vote. I'm like, okay, I'm gonna go tell my constituents after I vote against something they really, really want. Don't worry about it, guys. It's just a procedural vote, like, disconnect. And, and I think, you know, because you've been there, I mean, you fought John for 911 funding for the Victim Compensation Fund. You fought for the PACT Act. So you see how hard it can be. But to Abigail's point, you see how good leadership, how people focus, people who are elected, who are focused on the people they serve, can get stuff accomplished in a powerful way. It just, it feels like in too many cases, that becomes very difficult with the leadership in place, with a sort of leadership that's disconnected from the people. And certainly with Mike Johnson, I mean, that is a man who is not serving the people. He is serving Donald Trump Sure. So with that kind of leadership, you get nothing done.

[Jon Stewart]

I also think it's. What I viewed from being down there is that Washington works on a different currency system than the rest of the country does. It's. It's almost as though you've gone into the Eurozone when, you know, when you go into D.C. because as. As you just said so there's sort of this idea of direct. And I'll give you an example. So when we talked about like PACT act or Zadroga. Zadroga was the 911 first responders bill and Democratic leadership. And I don't think you guys were. Were there yet. This was earlier. This is probably 2015. 20.

[Mikey Sherrill]

That was early. We were just getting money for the victim compensation fund in our.

[Jon Stewart]

That's right. Okay. So that was, that was the 2019 vote, I think.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Yep, yep.

[Jon Stewart]

So we would go down there and we'd say, these people are dying of cancer. And the Congress people would say, and. Absolutely right. But we can't go and put it on the floor at the regular order. We're going to try and sneak it into the omnibus bill like Transportation, which passes every year, or the ndaa, which is the Defense Authority. National defense.

[Abigail Spanberger]

National Defense Authorization.

[Mikey Sherrill]

That's where I do my best work. Yes.

[Jon Stewart]

We're just going to jam it in there. And then in the Senate, Mitch McConnell would say, actually, I want an export tax on petroleum, so I'm going to remove your. And it was all, it was all a jigsaw puzzle that they were working on, but none of it to your point, I guess. When you were down there, did you see a system that was so out of touch? And my frustration with it was it didn't have to be that the rules that they would tell you are, you know, sacrosanct. They broke all the time. Yeah. And I saw Abigail's eyes just literally like, rolled back into her head, like. But what you begin to realize is, oh, this is all. They're pretending that these things are sacrosanct when they manipulate them all the time and they could actually do it to the good.

[Abigail Spanberger]

And I think one of the challenges is that then when you, particularly in the House, because there's just so many members, when you're withholding information and when votes come up so quickly, it becomes at times a disorienting process for newer members or for members who are endeavoring to really be effective and do things. In the early days of COVID I was sitting on the floor with Chip Roy, who, for anyone who's unaware, Chip Roy is a right winger of the.

[Jon Stewart]

But a right winger's right wing even beyond. Most right wingers are, like, won't sit on the floor with Chip Roy. Like, it's too hard.

[Abigail Spanberger]

No, I. It was sometimes just me, actually, at times. And now the similarities. You try to find similarities is how you govern. Chip Roy and I are both UVA grads. We both happen to have the same birthday and.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Wow.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Yeah. And in 2019, UVA was the national champions in basketball. So, you know, the year, a year later, basketball season's, you know, not really happening because of COVID We're sitting on the floor and we're talking. And this was when there was story after story of, you know, all these stock trades in the early days of COVID Yes. And so he and I are sitting there and we're saying this is kind of outrageous. And whether you think that people are intentionally trying to get rich off of information or not kind of doesn't matter. The fact that everybody thinks and it's being reported as though it's fact that you're in this meeting and then you buy this stock, therefore it's correct. Corruption, like, let's put an end to it. So we did something that, you know, not. And Mikey can speak to this as well. Like, not all the time do people just write their own bills. I always wrote my own bills. But a lot of people think you got to go to committee to like, mother, may I get my bill? We said, this is wrong. Let's write a bill to fix it. We consulted with all these sort of good governance groups that were a little bit kind of surprised by the combination of me with Chip Roy, you know, and. And in fact, we really went from a place where people would be deeply offended, you know, and I would have many members. Tell me you're implying that members of Congress are corrupt. To which I. I would say it. It actually doesn't matter, like, whether it's true or not. If the public perceives it. It's on us to change that perception. And it's amazing because in a short period of time, what went from a bill that was, you know, broadly seen as this, you know, this. The Democrat and Republican sort of pushing up against tradition in their parties has a really broad coalition. When I left Congress to run for governor, Seth Magaziner was the Democrat who's now continued to work with Chip on this bill. And it's really got some legs to it. And, you know, we'll see. Cause so far, a lot of people are saying, yes, they want it to be Brought for a vote. But it's. It's interesting to just see the way that, to Mikey's point, when you're being responsive to the things that you're hearing on the ground and what the American people or your constituents want, you know, like. And so everyone's surprised. Oh, wow, this is really popular. Yeah, of course it's popular. Because people deserve to trust their government and we should take proactive actions to help them do that.

[Jon Stewart]

Listen, a great example, Mikey, you can speak to that. You know, they talk about releasing the Epstein files, and this thing is locked in Congress and nobody is going to vote. None of the Republicans are going to vote for it. We're not going to bring it to the floor. There's this huge discharge petition and they get the 217. And then there's a representative in a special election from Arizona. She's the 218th. And that's all they need. And then they can force the vote. Great. I'm not going to swear in. We're just going to keep this thing. Mike Johnson holds it back. Everything goes. This is the most controversial. How dare they? The Senate. It'll die in the Senate. There's nothing that can be done. And the moment it appears, oh, shit, it's going to happen. Suddenly it's a vote. It's 434 to 1. It goes to the Senate that night. It is voted on by unanimous consent and immediately goes. And that's when you. This is why I think people are cynical about Congress. What it shows is, oh, all of that reticence was nonsense. You had the ability to do this whenever you wanted to. You had the votes to do it. It took 30 seconds. And now you're all claiming. You saw the floor of the House. They're all cheering, hey, it's what we fought. It was exactly that way with PACT act, exactly that way with Joker. Mike, is that the part where you go, are we just putting on a play down here?

[Mikey Sherrill]

I think it's the part where you decide to run for governor, quite frankly. You know, when you start to say, look, because you're right, you could use your power for good. If you were just relentlessly focused on serving the public, it would not only be, you know, using your powers for good, it would be very powerful.

[Jon Stewart]

Right.

[Mikey Sherrill]

And yet people are thirsty and the.

[Jon Stewart]

People are thirsty for it.

[Mikey Sherrill]

People get caught up in these, like, arcane, weird things, and we can't do it this way and we have to do it that way. And the only thing we can do to leverage power is to do it with only Democrats or only Republicans and we can't do this. And so I'll tell you, I got on the ground here and I'm running hard, and I can't tell you how many times as I was running, people said, mikey, everybody says that, oh, I'm going to do this. Oh, everybody says that. And so then I'm like, okay, look, I'm going to hold me accountable on day one. I'm going to declare a freeze on utility rate hikes. So here we are, like, you know, brass tacks, I'll be very clear. So you don't think I'm making something up or speaking in generalities or, you know, coming up with a 10 year plan, I'm going to do it. And immediately even members of my own party are like, oh, I don't think you can do that. I'm like, I know exactly. People keep saying, how are you going to do that? I go, here's how I'm going to do it. And they're, can you do it? I go, I know exactly how I'm going to do it. And. And yet even in my own party, it's like, oh, I don't know. I don't think so. You know, let's write a strongly worded letter.

[Jon Stewart]

Oh, yeah. The Chuck Schumer method works very, very well. Ladies and gentlemen, I am 62 years old, going on 63, and I don't know if you're familiar with this, but gravity is a bastard. Gravity has been pulling me down for God knows how long, and I am giving in. I'm not gonna lie to you. I am no match for gravity. I need help. And that's why these dudes such an awesome thing. It's an uplift desk. What more do I do than work? And it's always at my desk and it's always sitting down, which is what I'm doing all day long. But this uplift desk, it gets you moving. It's called the uplift V3 standing desk. It's this. You don't sit at it. You can make the transitions between sitting and standing. It's not even hard to put together. And it's got like, I guess they call it a flex mount cable manager. Keeps cords organized. It's out of sight. It's got upgraded speed and stability. And you know, the ergonomics, because I'll be honest with you, it's gotta be good ergonomics. I will fall down. I am a problem when it comes to the getting up and the going down. And you don't have to worry about it being looking crappy. There's a wide range of desktop styles, accessories. Set it up however you want. It's the Uplift V3 standing desk. Work better, live healthier. Go to upliftdesk.com weekly and use code weekly for four free accessories, free shipping, free returns and a 15 year warranty. That's upliftdesk.com Weekly and use code weekly for a special offer exclusive to our audience. Is the fear from the party that like, I know those, those votes where you say like, oh, they're procedural votes, but they're there to just create the ads. And by the way, the ads, thank God the election is over. Mikey, I live in New Jersey.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Uh huh.

[Jon Stewart]

I, I wanted to jump out a window.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

It's just.

[Mikey Sherrill]

You wanted to jump. They were about me. Yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

That's a good, that's a good point. By the way. What does that feel like? Because it even goes look like the stock trade thing Abigail was talking about, like, my guess is you were supporting that.

[Mikey Sherrill]

But yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

Yes, they caught you. They caught you in that. And it was really hard. I was like, you know, I mean.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Again, lick, you know, there's no crying on the yard here. Like, shame on me for getting caught on some ad that had come out right before I go on a program and not being prepared to talk about it better.

[Jon Stewart]

Right, right.

[Mikey Sherrill]

But that is tough. And so, you know, to Abigail's point, I think it's really important. It's not just impropriety, it's the appearance of impropriety. Right. So my husband and I have divested of all individual stocks. We don't trade individual stocks. We don't, you know, we've gone above and beyond ethics. We've put out. And this is really cringy when you're doing it as a candidate. We've put out all of our finances. I mean you can track to the dollar. There is no more transparent candidate probably in the history of New Jersey than, you know, what we've put out on all of our information. And so you do all that to really be responsive. But again, sometimes I was just. I feel like the New York Post owes me some money because I sold so many papers for them. I mean they. Every single day, I think my favorite, somebody framed it and gave it to me. On election night. There was a title that said, mikey, Cheryl's pulling five points ahead. Why? That's really, really bad for her. I mean it was every day.

[Jon Stewart]

Right. Was there, Are there ads that do get that do get under your Skin like Abigail or Mike. You know, was there an ad that ran that you thought that is so either asinine or outrageous or close to the bone? Like, were there ads that you feared or ads that you just got angry at? Abigail?

[Abigail Spanberger]

I think it. I certainly reacted differently. Like, when you're running your first race and, you know, Mikey and I had no political background. We weren't necessarily. We didn't know what to expect. And so when the first television ad comes out and it's just like, you're the worst person in the world, it certainly impacted me a lot more back then, and it impacts, I will say, my. My mother substantially, really. And to this day, by. By this election, the ads didn't really bother me. I would usually watch them first. This. This is my coping mechanism. I'd watch an ad first with no sound on to sort of to see.

[Jon Stewart]

What you look like in black and.

[Abigail Spanberger]

White, to get the visuals of how spooky I look. There was one ad they did, I guess, in my last congressional race where they sort of superimposed my head on Nancy Pelosi's body. And I think they called me, like, Nancy Pelosi Jr. Or something. And I looked at that one, I was like, wow, I look really good in that color.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Blue.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Who knew? But they really impact my mother most especially because, I mean, and so she. She needs to talk through all the reasons why it's not correct. And. And then with my. With my kids, in my first election, there was an ad where they basically kind of tried to call me a terrorist. And, you know, my. My oldest daughter, I guess she was fourth grade at the time, and she said that, you know, kids on the playground for her and for my first grader would just ask, like, is your mom a terrorist? And they would say no. And then the kids would sort of run away. But I think, well, now we know.

[Jon Stewart]

Who the ads are effective for.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Oh, my goodness.

[Jon Stewart]

Fourth graders are really the level. Mikey, did you have that as well? Just ads that, you know, ripple. The effects ripple through the family, or ones that you thought, that one's gonna.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Be a problem for me, you know, it's. You never, like, see yourself looking like an idiot. I mean, that's just kind of, I think, universal. So you don't love different missteps, or you're like, oh, damn it. But to Abigail's point, the people you're most worried about, oddly, are not your constituents, but your family members, your kids, your husband. You know, you just don't want them to face any retribution or blowback because of what you do. But, you know, I think our kids are probably pretty resilient at this point. My son was down the shore, and he was really thrilled to report because my opponent was having these airplane banner ads.

[Jon Stewart]

Oh, God, he's hitting him up on the shore. God.

[Mikey Sherrill]

One of them said, I mean, you know, I can't throw stones from this glass house. We had our own airplane ads, but nevertheless, it said, mikey Sherrill Equals Phil Murphy 2.0. Which I didn't think it was super effective. But my son was thrilled. He was like, oh, my God, Mom, I saw your name. He's like, I tried to get a picture. It was on an airplane. It was awesome. So, you know, he was quite pleased.

[Jon Stewart]

He didn't realize that was a negative. He didn't realize that was in quotes, a negative ad. He thought it was kind of exciting.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yeah, yeah, he was really excited. But I think the key thing for the ads and stuff was to titrate here in New Jersey there. You know, I think it's. It's understood here that you need to be swinging in an election. I've had people who work around the country that, you know, I'll say, I think we're going to have to go negative. And I'm like, yep, hell, yeah. I call just pointing out the truth, but let's go right. The people. And when I'm not doing that, there are some races I run where, you know, we don't have to do that. We can just present our case, and people tell me, you know, hey, you're not running hard enough. People sit here, don't think you're running hard enough. So the ads do. They're like. They come at swing. The thing that bugs me is when they're. They're just so not true. So, for example, I was in one interview saying in the Dino Badallah show, I was saying, you know, Democrats can't say this, and sort of charting out how. Oh, you know, electricity costs, et cetera. And. And they.

[Jon Stewart]

Right. If you're a good person. I remember this ad. If you're.

[Mikey Sherrill]

I'm not saying it again, notice, because I don't.

[Jon Stewart]

No, no, no, I'll say it. What the ad was, was Mikey was saying in the guise of. What Democrats can't say is, it's more expensive for this renewable energy, but if you're a good person, you'll do it. And they took that, as you were saying to people, if you're a good person, you'll pay more.

[Mikey Sherrill]

And I was doing the opposite. Yeah, I Was saying, you know, we shouldn't be saying this now. We can drive down costs in this way.

[Jon Stewart]

Right.

[Mikey Sherrill]

So that clip, which was just like, not true. That was bugging me, you know, and it was important. Yeah, yeah. So. But you can't, you know, it's just, you know, you know, if you're explaining, you're losing. So I couldn't just go up on. So I wasn't going to put a million dollars of me direct to camera. Saying that wasn't actually what I was saying.

[Jon Stewart]

Shut up.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yeah, you're a jerk.

[Jon Stewart]

Yeah.

[Mikey Sherrill]

You know, that's not fair.

[Jon Stewart]

Do you guys. Is there a sense. Because the ads, again, it's sort of the conventional thinking is the ubiquity of the ads or how that goes, that's going to dictate who wins. Abigail, they ran, you know, the. They them. She's. For they them for you. It didn't work on. On your campaign in the way that people say it worked on Kamala's campaign. But what is the thing. Because as a. As a spectator in New Jersey watching the ads and all those things, like his ads, they were good. He. He did a good job misrepresenting or doing whatever it was that he did. And then the election comes, and you blew his doors off in a way that, I mean, Murphy only beat Chittarelli, who was Mikey's opponent, by, I think, two or three points last time. Mikey beat him by 13 points. Abigail. You did the same.

[Mikey Sherrill]

He liked to round up to 14.

[Jon Stewart]

Son of a. You know what? I'm going to get a plane in a banner and fly that on the Jersey shore this year. Hey, Jack, how's that 14 points taste, Abigail? Same. So are we missing the point with the people on the ground as to how things are connecting and what is the importance? Because I know that those ads are the thing that dominate. What are the keys in your mind, Abigail, that candidates do that actually make a difference?

[Abigail Spanberger]

Well, and I think it can change at different levels depending upon the size of the electorate. Certainly running statewide is. Is different in many ways than running in a congressional race.

[Jon Stewart]

You can't touch everybody in the way you can. Congressional.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Exactly.

[Jon Stewart]

Right.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Exactly. And what I. What I believe to be the case is people want to have a sense of who you are as a person, as a candidate. And some of that comes from television ads, and some of that comes from interviews, and some of that comes from just engagement. But they also want to feel, like invited into a campaign, I think. And I'll speak for both of our campaigns. And what I found so interesting is I would talk to people who are always worried about Mikey's race, and I would always say, you don't need to worry about Mikey. Mikey's going to win. She's going to win her primary. She's going to win the election. I have no doubts, like, relax, because I think that what people were missing.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Is Abigail's time talking to my mom. I think.

[Jon Stewart]

You guys are just. Your whole job is just calming down each other's moms.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Well, yeah.

[Abigail Spanberger]

When our sisters don't do it well enough, then we have to step in. But, you know, it's about having that engagement. And I think what we did both very well, and I'll just kind of speak a little bit more detail about my race, is we built out a field organization very, very expansively all across Virginia, where I had people on the ground who were working for the campaign, who were getting together, who were creating community. In the end, I didn't have a primary, so I had the advantage of more time. So, you know, in the spring, we were doing petition parties where we were getting people together. They were coming together around something that they care about, which might, which in this case was the election. And then those people continued on through the summer, knocking doors and, you know, and going to farmers markets and getting out and delivering signs. And, you know, importantly, while a lot of these negative ads were out there, I always thought it was extraordinarily important to have positive bio. What am I for Ads? Because you can't just be about, you know, vote against this person.

[Jon Stewart]

Right, right.

[Abigail Spanberger]

And, you know, we're trying to deliver an economic message on affordability. And I'll take credit for this whether I don't know if in the end the people who made my television ads liked it or not, but I was like, why don't I just say, like, there's so much more to be done than you can say in a 30 second ad. And can I put the website up? You know, and everyone's like, oh, I don't know that anybody will go to the website. I'm like, well, if they don't, they don't, but at least they know. And so then we would say like, this is what I'm for. I'm for a more affordable virginia. Go to affordablevirginia.com to see my plans. And we did a lot of bio work as well so that people understood who I am as a person, why I'm running. And what was interesting is the ways that people would create threads of personal connection, whether it's because they're also parents of school age kids or because they too had grown up. My father was career law enforcement. My mother was a nurse. And so I would have people say, like, oh, my mom was a nurse too. I know what that means.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Right.

[Abigail Spanberger]

And these threads of places where people are recognizing that there is some commonality in this world that at times feels so chaotic and so disconnected and people are at each other's throats to have those threads and also know, like, oh, that's the woman who says she wants to work really hard, you know, to do right by me and my community and the people I love. And so it's kind of all of those pieces that essentially making it so nobody could go anywhere without kind of hearing my name or knowing a little bit about what it is that I might be for.

[Jon Stewart]

The reason I bring it up is because we talked about the disconnect between kind of the Washington establishment and the leadership of the party and the needs of the people that they purport to represent. And that dissatisfaction and disconnect, I think, is what in many ways gave space for somebody like Donald Trump to demagogue and to get into power. But the other thing is the disconnect between the national narrative about what people like yourselves represent for the Democratic Party. So everything you heard was, what is. Is the Democratic Party Mamdani and socialism? Or is it Mikey Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger and the national security mom? What is it?

[Abigail Spanberger]

Who. Who are also really boring, right.

[Jon Stewart]

And boring and not Mamdani and can't do that. And what you realize is on the ground, it's none of that shit.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

It's the story of an individual connecting on different levels in many different ways. And the narratives that were fed at a national level through the media or through party leadership are so disconnected. And, Mikey, did you feel that as well in yours?

[Mikey Sherrill]

Oh, certainly. I finally was in one interview with someone who asked me for, like, the 12th time in interviews and stuff, you know, is it you or is it Mom Donnie, or what do people think about Mom Donnie or what about him? And I just looked at him and I said, you know what? You're the only person asking me about Mom Donnie right now. You know, I don't go around to Metuchen and people are like, oh, my gosh, Mikey. The number one thing on my mind today as I woke up was, what do you think about Mamdani? It was, you know, it was, how are you going to lower my utility costs? Right. You know, I never heard.

[Jon Stewart]

Which, by the way, is what he ran on.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Right.

[Jon Stewart]

You may have different prescriptions, but that's what he ran on.

[Mikey Sherrill]

And so what we need to do is Democrats is field candidates who are connecting with people. That's a, and that's what I think, you know, everyone in the Democratic Party just did right now. But then B, and this is also critically important is then we need to govern and we are having a conversation right in the Democratic. I mean, the best thing I can do now, you know, I could go around the nation talking about my field program or Latino voters or white working class men and how I overperform there or how I get young people out or my social media program. That's new. I could chart all this out for everyone. But the, the best thing I could do for anybody, any Democrat in this country is to govern the state of New Jersey in an incredibly effective way and find a pathway forward. When we have a president of the United States that is trying to destroy the economy of our country and finding ways to deliver for people, that is the very best thing I can do in this position. And we're having a conversation in the Democratic Party with our campaigns about exactly how to deliver for people. And the Republican party is just 100% doing whatever the hell Trump decides that day. Should we release the Epstein file? Should we not?

[Abigail Spanberger]

What?

[Mikey Sherrill]

You know, whatever you say, boss. Right.

[Jon Stewart]

We've gotten to now. So we see the dysfunction of the House and how it's removed from the sort of direct governance of getting things done for people and how they overcomplicate what should be much simpler, you know, and direct help for their voters and that frustration leading you guys to step away and, and get the top executive job. What I think some people might not realize is the top executive job is not the same in every state. New Jersey has a very different prescription for even what the budget can be. The, the New Jersey governor is very powerful, has, you know, veto power over a lot of different things. Abigail, you're in a different situation. I think in Virginia, the governor, you, you can only serve one. You can't serve consecutive terms. You've only got one. And even within that term, it'll be two years before you can put your budget forth. Is that correct?

[Abigail Spanberger]

That's right. We're the only state in the country that has a one term governor limit. You can serve non consecutive terms, but nobody's done it for decades. And I'll be coming in on our current governor's budget and we can move forward with our own budget amendments. But, but the reality is that yes, we're going to be kind of adjusting. I'll be in the middle of my term when I put forth my own budget and then I'll be leaving when I'm handing a budget off to somebody new. And just yesterday I was in a large meeting briefing for the House of Delegates Appropriations Committee, looking at the kind of historical revenue coming in, spending in the general fund. And frankly, and they were very clearly outlining because of so many of the dollars that came in because of COVID that Mikey and I voted for, for the state has had a lot of money to move into different places, spending more than we have been bringing in for a number of years. And so, you know, even in that committee, when I was speaking with committee members at the end of a number of presentations, I said, you know, I think everybody saw on page 30 of that presentation that this is going to be, you know, next year. This is going to be the year when our spending can't outpace what we're actually bringing in in revenue because those historical federal dollars that emanated out of the pandemic are no longer there. So there's going to be. And we're so impacted.

[Jon Stewart]

And also you'll be penalized.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

You know, and this is happening in Jersey as well. I mean, Mikey Trump has removed projects, you know, he is penalizing almost entirely blue states. But have you looked at the levers of governance that, that you can use to more effectively and directly do the types of things that you're talking about? Is that a practice that you guys are already taking part of?

[Abigail Spanberger]

Yeah.

[Mikey Sherrill]

So I don't, this may come as a surprise to people because we, we run, you know, I've traditionally run these knockdown, drag out fights here in New Jersey for, for votes and campaigns and issues. But I actually, the only reason I do that is so I can govern, so I can actually get to that.

[Jon Stewart]

Place, get in that office, get to that place.

[Mikey Sherrill]

And so we've been at it for over a year now, meeting with so many different groups across the state, whether it's, you know, how to revitalize Atlantic City, what it's going to take to build transportation across the state, where, where those pockets of innovation are that we've got to over invest in. But on layered into all of this is the fact that New Jersey, a state that gives $70 billion more to the federal government than we get back, we are now seeing massive cuts to Title 1 school funding, to SNAP programs, to Medicare, to the Affordable Care act subsidies. So at every level, the federal government is failing to run programs that they are on the hook for traditionally. So what this is is sort of a both. And Trenton needs to function much more effectively. Right. The red tape and permitting issues are just layered upon. Layered upon, Right. And people have kicked the can down the road, whether it's the state health benefits plan or some of the, you know, flooding problems that we have in on the Whippany River. Right. So the Canada's big. It's time now to address that. And really the thing that I have been most, I guess, excited by, because if you live in New Jersey, you have this kind of sense that, that there's all kinds of entrenched interest in Trenton and you can go up against them, but you're just going to fail miserably.

[Jon Stewart]

Right. And corruption, I mean, flat out, if you live in New Jersey, you understand the level of corruption that's been endemic here since the beginning.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Right. And so to get down to Trenton and to almost have several people come to me with this sense of like, I'm so excited to finally have somebody that's willing to take on the hard fights, you know, to have a meeting with, with people that, you know, you kind of lay out, like, this is going to be rough, guys. We've got, like, some problems. We've got a cut through. We've got entrenched interests that we've got to deal with. We've got, you know, Canada's been kicked down the road. We got pension debt, et cetera, and we've got all these cutbacks at the federal level and we've got to deal with that. And to have them actually be excited that there's somebody that wants to take this on and help navigate this and a leadership that's going to take it on and not say, oh, let's just duck our heads and hope it happens on somebody else's watch.

[Jon Stewart]

Push it to the next person.

[Mikey Sherrill]

That was the most exciting thing I saw was that, hey, everybody is ready to tackle hard problems that have have not been addressed for decades here.

[Jon Stewart]

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[Abigail Spanberger]

Oh, Hilton, stay.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Oh, Hilton stay.

[Abigail Spanberger]

When you want holiday comfort, you can count on it matters where you stay. Enjoy comfortable rooms and friendly service when you stay with Hilton. Instead, save up to 25% this season when you book with Hilton Hilton for.

[Mikey Sherrill]

The stay terms apply.

[Jon Stewart]

Shopping is hard, right? But I found a better way.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Stitch fix online.

[Jon Stewart]

Personal styling makes it easy. I just give my stylist my size style and budget preferences. I order boxes when I want and how I want. No subscription required. And he sends just for me pieces.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Plus outfit recommendations and styling tips.

[Jon Stewart]

I keep what works and send back the rest. It's so easy.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Make style easy.

[Jon Stewart]

Get started [e-mail] Spotify. That's stitchfix.com Spotify. Have you guys, have either of you looked into, you know, Mikey, you mentioned New Jersey gives $70 billion more to the federal government than it gets back. Meanwhile, they're cutting, you know, different transportation projects and those things. And Abigail, I don't know what Virginia's, you know, net payments to the federal government are versus what they get back. I do know that as a state that largely relies on government workers because, you know, so many of them live near Washington, D.C. i'm sure you guys are suffering through these layoffs that have been occurring within the federal government and all kinds of other problems associated with it. Is there any thought to how these blue state governors who've been penalized so drastically with whether it's ICE enforcement issues or money being taken away from research or schools or any of those things, what governors can do to level that field? You know, so many have just tried to stay out of Trump's way to avoid it, but it's unavoidable. He's going to do it. So is there anything, Abigail, that you've seen that governors can do well?

[Abigail Spanberger]

And I think there's a variety of different things. In some cases we've seen some states come together for multi state compacts and, and certainly we will be heavily, heavily impacted by the ramifications of HR1, particularly in the healthcare space. Economically, Virginia is set to be the second most financially hurt state in the country in the healthcare space. Many of our rural hospitals will close. We've already had she's talking about in.

[Jon Stewart]

Terms of like Medicaid rescissions and things like that, where they took money away from and by the way, created a fund to help alleviate some of that for Trump voters in rural areas, but we'll do nothing for those hospitals in urban areas.

[Abigail Spanberger]

And importantly, yes, the cuts will impact safety net hospitals across the board, urban areas, suburban areas, the like. But importantly, in a state like Virginia where we have, I mean, you know, agriculture is our number one private industry, we are a very rural state in many parts of the Virginia. But unfortunately, the parameters and the federal definition that they use for what constitutes rural was meant to get the vote of an Alaska senator. And in fact, the rural hospitals in Virginia that are absolutely rural in who they serve and how they serve them, and in distances that people need to go across, you know, through mountains to get to. We actually don't even qualify here in Virginia for those dollars. Even though we're set to see some of our hospitals close. We've already had three rural health clinics announce their closure. So I say that because we have seen some states are moving towards some multi state compacts to try and leverage telehealth, a variety of different efforts. But importantly, what I think is also missing is because you can't hide from the numbers anymore, it's how many dollars are not flowing into a state. And in a state like the Commonwealth of Virginia where it's millions upon millions upon millions of dollars pulled back from transportation projects, pulled back from research at our many, many public universities and private universities, it's.

[Jon Stewart]

Are they trying to force you into austerity plans? Is the idea here? Is Trump in any way trying to leverage these blue states to get governors into austerity stances so that they deliver less for their people? Is, is that, is the strategy here purely punitive or is there an electoral message behind all this? Did either one of you have Mikey, do you have a thought on that?

[Abigail Spanberger]

Can I give a quick answer on that one?

[Jon Stewart]

Yeah, yeah.

[Abigail Spanberger]

I honestly think it's a lack of understanding of the basic of economics of how the federal government interplays.

[Jon Stewart]

I didn't even give you that option.

[Abigail Spanberger]

I, I don't actually know that it's as maniac that I think that people are just like, oh like even the way that Medicaid is broken down between state payments and federal payments, the fact that giving someone access to preventative healthcare is actually a cost savings. Right. Because then they're not rolling into hospitals in an exigent circumstance where because of Ronald Reagan they will get life stabilizing care. I think it's actually just a total lack of understanding about how the basics of government works and in a willingness of Republican legislators and I'll call out the ones in Virginia to vote for a bill that, you know, rural hospital leadership in their districts, known Republicans, you know, the list goes on and on. It's not a political issue. We're just writing op ed after op ed and waving red flags saying danger, danger, danger, this is going to hurt us. And in fact some of the communities that will be most hurt by that bill in particular are the ones that are represented by Republicans in Congress. Though I will note there are also districts that I won on election day.

[Jon Stewart]

Oh, look at that.

[Mikey Sherrill]

You got to throw that in There, Yeah, that's. Everyone's on notice.

[Jon Stewart]

You gotta go, there's two of them.

[Mikey Sherrill]

What's so hard to understand about what's going on here is that I think we have a president who literally doesn't seem to give a crap about the economy of the United States of America and is solely intent on enriching himself. And so you look at the regulations around technology for the uae. They throw billions into his crypto account and suddenly they're all lifted. You're a fossil fuel company. You pay 250 million to his campaign and you get all your regulations lifted. I mean, it is this totally kleptocratic, corrupt administration. And it's really hard. And it's, I think, especially hard maybe for people who come from this lifetime of public service. And, you know, I've taken, I started taking oaths to the Constitution when I was 18. I deeply believe in this. This, to me, you know, maybe I'm a rube here, but, but I deeply believe in the values of this nation. And, and that there are, that there are so many public servants who really want to serve this country. And so to have a president who really simply wants money and really will sell out the country. Anything gold, Anything gold is really, I think, twisty to get your head around. And I think that's why this election was so important, because it was a shot across the bow, as I kept saying it needed to be to wake up some of the Republicans that, you know, the, the Trump magic is not going to work here and they better get off their butts and start blocking some of this and delivering for the American people or they will be out of office very quickly.

[Jon Stewart]

I wonder if maybe I've thought about this all wrong. So I've been thinking about, well, you guys, you run blue states. Maybe there's a way, it might be drastic, but a federal tax strike where you say, I've given you $70 billion more than I get back. You're taking money away from me. We're going to, we're going to call, we're going to call federal tax strike. Maybe the idea is you go more the Saudi UAE and you say, Donald Trump, I'm going to let you build whatever you want to build, wherever you want to build it. I'm going to give you $10 billion and maybe that's the way to do it. Maybe states need to start bribing him. Seems, seems to be the most I see. They both just get real sad. I think I just read you both.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

Have you guys talked about, like, A federal tax strike or any of those types of things that could force the hand on these issues.

[Mikey Sherrill]

I think that's a great idea. I talk often about clawing back federal money. I mean, the easiest place to start with that is in the courts. That's the easiest because how people pay taxes is not. There's not some state portal. There are areas that you can claw back and freeze. But I think that's something that, you know, I know Gavin Newsom brought up how much money. California, I would love these. I would love to start to rework the federal taxation system. If the federal, you know, as I say, and I think people here in New Jersey agree, you know, if they're not going to run the programs, then what are we paying them for?

[Jon Stewart]

Right? And it's clearly punitive.

[Mikey Sherrill]

It's like, you know, you're paying us for a service and they're not delivering, so let's stop paying for it.

[Jon Stewart]

But he uses it transactionally. He very clearly uses it as leverage. If you don't allow me to choose your professors and your curriculum, I'm going to take away this money. Is there any, at any point, fire your presidents or. Look, Abigail, you had that UVA suffered. That UVA president was pushed out for some bullshit idea of their DEI programs. And by the way, I've had enough of their. We're only doing it so that these universities fight anti Semitism. This is an administration that allows in people who say they have Nazi streaks, who, you know, any time that these text messages come that are horrific, they say, oh, kids will be kids like you want to clean up anti Semitism, Physician, heal thyself. Like their administration is rife with this nonsense, and yet they use that against your states.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

And what is, Abigail, what can you do about those things?

[Abigail Spanberger]

Well, in Virginia might be a bit of a unique case, in particular, at least relative to some of the private universities that have come under fire. Because our universities are public, The Board of Visitors, as we call the governing board in the Commonwealth, are appointed by the governor and then they have to be confirmed by the. The legislature. And so right now, at a number of our universities, we have boards that are not fully constituted, as is the case with UVA. And in fact, UVA's board, in part because it's not fully constituted, it's missing five members. It's also not statutorily compliant because there's requirements related to residency. There's a requirement for a certain number of UVA grads to be on that board. And so they're in the Middle of this search process, of course, they signed onto this weakened pack pact with the federal government. And frankly, we're out celebrating that UVA doesn't have to pay any sort of damages to the federal government. The question is, for what?

[Jon Stewart]

For what?

[Abigail Spanberger]

The former president of UVA put out a very, very long letter going through all of the.

[Jon Stewart]

I thought it was fantastic. Thought it was fantastic.

[Abigail Spanberger]

It was incredible. And it was something he had written most of it contemporaneously through the events of the summer. And he spoke to, and this is important in Virginia, he spoke to the fact that their intentionality around recruitment of students isn't necessarily related just to the kind of the diversity that people will think of in gender or in race, but in fact, in making sure that if you are from the coal fields of Virginia, you know, you can get to the University of Virginia. It's not just Northern Virginia kids who make their way there, right? It's that the intentionality of who is coming to study in this place. And so as governor, I will be appointing members of the board that my goal is that they are steadying the ship, but we also need legislative changes. Another uniqueness about Virginia is it's our attorney General here in the state who appoints the council for each of the universities. And so when people question, well, why is it that, you know, the university or the president didn't defend themselves? Well, because the university council was handpicked by our state attorney general who's doing the bidding for the Department of Justice.

[Jon Stewart]

It's so hard. You know, the whole thing is you're basically look at the dances and look at all the things that you guys have to do to battle against things that are happening in your state that are not good faith things. They're not being done for purpose or for government.

[Abigail Spanberger]

I mean, Doge, doge on Virginia. I mean, the fact that you have an attack on our entire economy and our governor, our current Republican governor and Lieutenant governor have said nothing. I mean, it is an abdication of responsibility.

[Jon Stewart]

The cowardice of those in this current moment will be written in stone. But I wanted to just thank you guys, congratulate you guys. I know you apparently have states to run now.

[Abigail Spanberger]

We're a commonwealth in Virginia, actually.

[Jon Stewart]

I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Her Excellency. Get back to your Commonwealth, Mikey. Good luck running our state and I just wish you the best. But what I'm most pleased with for you is that you both now seem to be in situations where the job is commensurate with your abilities, where you're not. You're no longer in a House of Representatives that's designed to diminish any possibility of action or in places where you can really start to accomplish the things that I think got you into public service in the first place. And so just thank you both for being here. And congratulations to Mikey Sherrill, the governor elect of New Jersey, and Abigail Spanberger, the governor elect of the Commonwealth of Virginia. And I hope you have wonderful. I guess reigns would be the right. No, terms, Terms, terms.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Maybe reigns in Virginia, but terms. Terms of service.

[Jon Stewart]

Terms of service. Thank you both.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Thank you.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Well, thank you. I really appreciate it. Have a great one.

[Jon Stewart]

It is so funny to me. You know, I've spoken to enough politicians and. And been enough there, but when they have a personal relationship with each other, it immediately transforms the conversation in such pleasant ways.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yes.

[Jon Stewart]

I love the fact that I have two sisters. She is. Oh, my God, your sister. She told me, like, you can tell their history. It really is like. It's like talking to college friends who have kind of a language and a.

[Mikey Sherrill]

It absolutely felt that way. Yeah. Well, they basically did that.

[Jon Stewart]

Yeah.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Being roommates and all. But it was nice to have candidates. Politicians on, like, it felt a little more candid. Yeah. They were so lovely and charming, which is very funny considering basically what I.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Know about Mikey before this was from.

[Mikey Sherrill]

The attack ads that I get from the New York metro area.

[Abigail Spanberger]

So it's like, Mikey Cheryl, as opposed to Mikey.

[Jon Stewart]

Relentless.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

But also, even, you know, unfortunately for. For her as a candidate, then her ads are not reflective of who she is either. Like, you would think at that point, you're like, is. Is New Jersey a helicopter? From every, like, from. From these ads. The only thing she knows how to do is fly a helicopter. And. But it's not that at all. But what I thought was so interesting about the conversation is it shows how the people are the product of the system, not the other way around. The system doesn't seem to be a product of the people that has grown and metastasized and become. But you've got really good, effective, smart people neutered by a system that is designed to put all the power up into the, you know, barely sentient leadership. And. And that's where it all lies. And everything that they do are decisions about preserving their own status. And it drives these good people.

[Abigail Spanberger]

And it really makes you wonder, like, what's wrong with the people that stay.

[Mikey Sherrill]

And want to operate within this system as it is. You know, I really appreciated the candor about Congress and I actually a million years ago interned for Mikey's predecessor who.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Was a moderate Republican.

[Mikey Sherrill]

And he said behind closed doors to me in the one meeting I had with him as an intern, like, if I could do it over again, I'd do the foreign service. So, you know, I don't think this.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Is a new idea that people are.

[Mikey Sherrill]

In love in Congress.

[Jon Stewart]

By the way, like, how sad is the meeting you have with your fresh faced bushy tailed interns where the first who are working in a congressional office and the first thing you say to them is, yeah, it's not.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Get out.

[Jon Stewart]

It's not.

[Mikey Sherrill]

It.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Basically, it's not a life.

[Jon Stewart]

It's not a life. It's not something that you want. That's, that's wild, Brittany. But what do we got from the, this is, we're heading into the break now, the Thanksgiving break. What are the, what are the, what can we do for the listeners on our way out?

[Abigail Spanberger]

Alrighty. First up, John, when taking on Trump, does Marjorie Taylor Greene have bigger balls than Elon?

[Jon Stewart]

Oh, wow. I, that's such a. I would never even place them on the same. You know, the difference is Elon is, you know, he's a masters of the universe guy. He's in that Silicon Valley. Like, who is the next, who is the next Neo that will be the one that will control all the levers of our, of our new society. So they're, they're such different things. And you can see that Elon would like to repudiate at times this administration, but also understands the trillion dollar contracts and pay packages and like, if you're in, if your game is I will have it all, you know, those guys are all competing in like a Thanos beauty pageant. Like they all want to know. Marjorie Taylor Greene's like just such a very different animal. And by the way, like, good honor for doing that. But like, I'm not exactly, oh, Marjorie Taylor Greene, she's so ballsy to stand up to her thing. Like, she also sees where the wind is blowing on this. I think this whole like, and now I'm going to go on the View and pretend like I wasn't who I was. It, it all feels very cynical to me. But again, just getting directly back to the question, just, I think on a purely physical level, I do think her balls are probably bigger. But that's, I'm, I'm saying this purely anatomically because I know what ketamine does to the testicles.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Wow. Well, at least she's not deleting her tweets about Trump.

[Jon Stewart]

Yes, yes, that's right. Like, his thing is so cynical. Like, even his Grok AI is full of like, if you plug in there, did Elon back out of a interview with the Daily Show. Grok is like, it's complicated. He's, he's, you know, it's an interesting question, but he's a busy man with lots of things. Why would he lower himself? And you're just like, all right. Ridiculous.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Oh my God, that's awesome.

[Jon Stewart]

Yeah.

[Mikey Sherrill]

What else, John, what do you think.

[Abigail Spanberger]

About all of the CEOs attending the White House dinner for MBS?

[Jon Stewart]

What did we think they were? Honestly? Like, I don't. I. Are people surprised by it? Are people. I cannot believe that the head of Apple, the head of all the different, would sit at a state dinner with the guy who is funneling billions and billions of dollars into their businesses.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Right.

[Jon Stewart]

Donald Trump hosted. You know, this was the whole fucking thing. Do you remember the Mamdani? You know, all these right wing guys are like, how dare he take a picture with an imam? Has he forgotten the lessons in 9 11? How one guy came after me has. John Stewart, he's talking pleasantly with Mamdani. You know, this is a guy. Has he forgotten 9 11? First of all, fuck you. Fuck you to the highest order of fucking you that you can be fucked. Don't you ever ask me about that, you fuck. And second of all, your guy hosted a live golf tournament in the shadow of the towers with the Saudis and palled around with them. So again, let me repeat myself. Fuck Yahoo. Yeah, the guy you support. Like, how, how dare they? It's so shocking. And by the way, like, I'll even give it up for if you're a businessman and they've got, you know, a funnel and you've never made the case that your business has any moral underpinnings whatsoever. So the idea that you want to hook up your mouth to the largest teats in that area and just suck down as much as that glorious Saudi money as you can get to. But I'm sorry, live golf tournaments are an elective. That is an elective. You make a choice like that. That is not something that your business requires. That it is foundational. That is an elective. And so for any of those right wing guys that want to go out there and criticize the associations between, you know, anybody that would even talk to him, I'm Donnie. Because clearly, you know, he's so out there with his points of view. Look in the mirror, fuckface.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yeah, fuck these people.

[Jon Stewart]

Sorry, man.

[Abigail Spanberger]

I Love it.

[Jon Stewart]

I probably what I meant to say was, yeah, I haven't thought about it much.

[Mikey Sherrill]

It is really crazy how we shouldn't be surprised at all yet seeing MBS in the Oval Office and Trump saying, don't embarrass our guests or whatever to the reporters. It was just shocking still to my system.

[Jon Stewart]

And also, like, getting handsy with him and grabbing them and playing by the knee, like, and giving him a noogie and holding on to him and go like, hey, this Khashoggi guy, you know, he was a real troublesome individual.

[Abigail Spanberger]

No, he wasn't just a journalist.

[Jon Stewart]

He was just a journalist who asked questions that were uncomfortable. And it's pretty clear that Trump wishes he lived in an environment where all the little piggies can be taken out to. To, you know, to a farm upstate. You know what I mean? Like, he is so much more comfortable in the trappings of autocracy than he is in the standards of democracy. He just. It's. It's when he is at his most congenial. Yeah, he loves it. He loves it. He loves, you know, grabbing Putin's hand on the red carpet and giving, you know, MBS a noogie and having Orban there for a little. They love it. He loves it.

[Abigail Spanberger]

What a friend circle. My God.

[Jon Stewart]

Do you think they have a text chain?

[Mikey Sherrill]

Oh, my God. What would it be called?

[Jon Stewart]

Immortals Mount Olympus? Circle of God. Like, you know, they believe themselves all to be touched by. It's a throwback to noblesse oblige. Like, that is right of kings. That's what these guys think. It's. It's all about. It's so clear his relationship with mbs and, and I'm not naive enough to think, like, oh, look, Saudi Arabia is. We're allied with them. We've been that way. And, like, pretending that, like, we're horrified at their actions. Like, even the idea Biden like, to. He wanted to do the fist bump. Like, oh, you know, I don't like the fact that you killed people, so I'm not going to give you the whole hand. I'm just going to give a fist bump. And that's what Trump was making reference to when he was grabbing him and holding him and all that other shit. But there are electives and there are prerequisites and required courses. And, you know, I'm not naive enough to think this country doesn't do things or have relationships with people that are, in a lot of different ways, beneath the standard of moral behavior that we purport to carry ourselves with. But there's a difference between that and gleefully embracing the trappings of it.

[Abigail Spanberger]

He loves the shit.

[Jon Stewart]

It's not more honest. It's not more authentic. It reveals. It reveals the world you'd rather live in. He has much more respect for strong men than he does for constitutionalists, by far.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Yeah. I would think Donald Trump would be more upset with what Saudi Arabia did to the PGA Tour than to any journalists, so.

[Jon Stewart]

No question. And by the way, he loves what they did with Liv. And that's why he hosts the. It's. It's great. It's entertaining. Near. Near, you know, the towers, where the towers were. And yet all these right wing guys are out there screaming about photos being taken, you know.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yeah. It's so disingenuous.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Hypocrisy at its finest.

[Jon Stewart]

Yeah, sorry, I got. I got. I got a little hot there.

[Mikey Sherrill]

I love it.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Yeah. Take them down one by one, baby, to get us into the holiday spirit.

[Jon Stewart]

Yes.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Easy pivot.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Easy pivot.

[Jon Stewart]

Thank you.

[Abigail Spanberger]

John, do you think Ozempic will be.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Better or worse for Thanksgiving dinners moving forward?

[Jon Stewart]

What an. What an interesting question. I guess it depends on. On if. I guess it depends on if the turkeys are on it. Just. What an interesting thing for Americans. You know, it's basically a holiday that is, you know, turkeys were like. The turkeys that we get are not what turkeys are supposed to be like. If you ever look at the, you know, the heritage turkeys of the American past, like, they don't. They were not giant breasted dumbasses that waddled around like.

[Abigail Spanberger]

No, they were on Ozempic.

[Jon Stewart]

They were. They were. They were. They were free range. So I guess the point is the Ozempic is merely to get us out of a pickle that we put ourselves in. Like, the whole. The orgy of food that comes along with Thanksgiving is in many ways, you know, like, it used to be, like, let's do that once a year to celebrate that we didn't get smallpox. And now we put it on the table because it's Thursday and Boston Market had a special. So let's, you know, it will be. I wonder if it will have a demonstrable effect on the amount of food we buy as a nation. But also, I do wonder if you're going to start seeing, like, Jetsons, like, you know, meal in a pill that has all the nutrients that they think you might not. They're gonna find a way to monetize it.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Oh, yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

This has gotten very dark. Yeah, guys. I hope you guys have A wonderful. You got you. Everybody got good plans for the holidays.

[Mikey Sherrill]

I'm gonna eat a lot.

[Jon Stewart]

We, We. We do the cooking. We're. We. We're. We're the hosts every year. And we bring. It's. It's my favorite holiday. We get all family together. We get a big group. Everybody goes crazy eats. And it's. It's a. It's. It's my favorite, for sure.

[Abigail Spanberger]

What's your favorite side?

[Jon Stewart]

Oh, it's got to be the sweet potato pie. I'm a sweet potato pie with cranberry. You know, I love the cranberry, sweet potato pie. All those different things. And then obviously, like, I'm a pie. Like what? Any kind of pie. Come on.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Are you waiting for the end of Thanksgiving?

[Jon Stewart]

Yes. I don't. I don't eat. I. You know, I have my one frozen protein meal.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Yes, exactly.

[Jon Stewart]

And then I just sniff the pies.

[Abigail Spanberger]

As I go along.

[Mikey Sherrill]

That's enough for me.

[Jon Stewart]

That's right. And to the audience, too. I hope you guys have a wonderful Thanksgiving. We got no podcast next week there. And to everybody who's been listening and all that, we are very thankful for you. But mostly I am thankful for the people that helped put this thing together every week and do such a phenomenal job for it. And those are the ones that you've been talking to and some others as well. We got our lead producer, Lauren Walker, our producer Brittany Momedovic, producer Gillian Spear, video editor and engineer Rob Votolo, audio editor and engineer Nicole Boyce, and our executive producers, Chris McShane and Katie Gray. Have a wonderful holiday, and we'll see you back in, I guess they call it December. Early December. Bye, guys. The weekly show with Jon Stewart is a Comedy Central podcast. It's produced by Paramount Audio and Bustboy Productions.

[Abigail Spanberger]

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[Jon Stewart]

Style, every home, extra value meals are back.

[Mikey Sherrill]

That means 10 tender, juicy McNuggets and medium fries and a drink are just.

[Jon Stewart]

$8 only at McDonald's for a limited time only. Prices and participation may vary. Prices may be higher in Hawaii, Alaska and California. And and for delivery.

[Mikey Sherrill]

Paramount Podcasts.