Transcript

Top Political Strategists Debate How Democrats Can Ride The Blue Wave Through 2028

From Pod Save America · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 1 h 39 min · 18,901 words · 192 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "Top Political Strategists Debate How Democrats Can Ride The Blue Wave Through 2028", an episode of Pod Save America published November 8, 2026 (1 h 39 min, about 18,901 words). It mentions 139 people, works and ideas, including Democratic Party, Donald Trump, Congress, 2026 United States midterm elections, Pennsylvania.

What this episode is about

A panel of leading Democratic strategists analyzes the 2028 political landscape, highlighting unexpected outcomes from the recent elections, including rural affordability pressures, voter trends, and strategies to sustain a Democratic surge. Key contributors discuss what happened, why it happened, and implications for future campaigns.

Key takeaways

  • Blue-to-green data: while a blue wave sparked attention, turnout shifts and rural-urban divides rewrote the map in real time.
  • Momentum matters more than margins: durable wins require strong staffing and post-election soaks, not just flashy headlines.
  • South’s surprise churns: Mississippi to South Carolina signals a regional pivot, complicating red-state assumptions for 2028.
  • Turnout vs persuasion isn’t a coin toss—roughly two-thirds turnout, one-third persuasion, with base dynamics driving the spread.
  • Narrative lock-in risk: post-election chatter often confirms preconceptions; data-driven, on-the-ground truth beats storytelling.

Who speaks in this episode?

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 10:00: Democratic Party, Mississippi, Rebecca Katz, Donald Trump
  2. – 20:00: Donald Trump, Democratic Party, Florida, Helix Sleep
  3. – 30:00: Texas, Planned Parenthood, Congress, Democratic Party
  4. – 40:00: Democratic Party, Texas, Michigan, Donald Trump
  5. – 50:00: Democratic Party, Republican Party, Trees.com, BetterHelp
  6. – 1:00:00: Democratic Party, Immigration, Republican Party, NBC
  7. – 1:10:00: Pennsylvania, Democratic Party, Republican Party, South Carolina
  8. – 1:20:00: Congress, Pennsylvania, 2026 United States midterm elections, Medicaid
  9. – 1:30:00: Pennsylvania, Congress, Artificial Intelligence, Donald Trump
  10. – 1:39:28: Israel, Donald Trump, Congress, Pennsylvania

Notable quotes from "Top Political Strategists Debate How Democrats Can Ride The Blue Wave Through 2028"

  • What times we live in. Okay. The goal of our panel day is I have some of the smartest minds in politics and we're going to break down what happened on Tuesday and what it means going forward with Sarah Long who obviously you all know.
    about 2026 United States midterm elections · at
  • He also decided to run John Cornin out of town for being insufficiently proTrump, even though John Cornin was Here's my art of the deal. I'm reading it. And someone took a picture.
    about Donald Trump · at
  • Gina was walking around the data centers giving, her lives as she's talking about what's happening. And we were building and building a real following because in Texas,.
    about Texas · at
  • Spending this time though is like do you have to have something to spend money to say? And Republicans were Okay, so we started a war and everything's bad for you, so we're…
    about Republican Party · at
  • Democrats of course had an incredible Tuesday in Pennsylvania, but also Kansas, South Carolina, Texas, Mississippi. what do you think Democrats in those red.
    about Democratic Party · at
  • Well, so you will now have the chance to govern Pennsylvania with Democrats in control of the state legislature. Yep.
    about Pennsylvania · at
  • Obviously the country's dissatisfaction with cost of living was the top issue in these midterms. If you could get one big thing done nationally to bring down the cost of living to make life more affordable in America, what would it be?
    about affordability · at
  • Absolutely. Period. I the senators and the members of Congress up here, they'll tell you what the mechanism is for which vote or what have you. I'm not going to get into that. But the idea that we would give Pete Hegs,.
    about Congress · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Donald Trump — Person · Referenced political figure / antagonist · 22 mentions · first at
    Central subject of criticism and a primary political foil in the episode; his policies, conduct, and impact on 2026 results and future politics are repeatedly discussed.
  • Josh Shapiro — Person · Guest (Governor of Pennsylvania) · 3 mentions · first at
    Interview subject discussing Pennsylvania governance, midterm results, governing priorities, AI/data centers, healthcare, immigration, and potential role in national Democratic politics.
    Governor, thank you for being here. It's good to be here.
  • Dan Pfeiffer — Person · Host / Moderator · 2 mentions · first at
    Host of the panel portion (moderator) leading the 'What just happened?' discussion and conducting the conversation with panelists about 2026 outcomes and lessons.
    What times we live in. Okay. The goal of our panel day is I have some of the smartest minds in politics and we're going to break down what happened on Tuesday and what it means going forward.
  • Carlos Odio — Person · Panelist / pollster · 6 mentions · first at
    Panel participant and pollster offering analysis on electorate composition, turnout, persuasion, Latino and youth voting patterns, and polling/modeling caveats.
    So exactly all that ju just some of just some of the math on this right. So there is the turnout piece. I think if the early estimates hold up this will be the least white electorate ever. if you.
  • Rebecca Katz — Person · Panelist / Democratic strategist · 5 mentions · first at
    Panel participant and strategist credited with working on successful campaigns (e.g., Texas); she discusses organizing, candidate quality, messaging, and the energy/ground work needed to overcome spending gaps.
    But the candidates that won and that beat all the money, they worked harder than anyone else. And you just got to outwork them.
  • Sarah Longwell — Person · Panelist / strategist · 5 mentions · first at
    Panel participant offering perspective on voter behavior, focus groups, and messaging; led immediate post-election focus groups and provided insights on Republican voters who crossed over.
    Yes. So we did two groups immediately and it wasn't after we woke up. It was just we just never went to sleep and we just kept going and got the voters in there. and we did the group that was.
  • Addisu Demissie — Person · Panelist / strategist · 3 mentions · first at
    Panel participant providing strategic takeaways about discipline, messaging, turnout vs persuasion, and campaign operations across states.
    Or was it mostly just better environment? I'm not going to lie, it was a lot of better environment, but that's I think that ended up reflecting in our candidates. So, honestly, the answer is like discipline.
  • John Favreau — Person · Host / Co-host · 2 mentions · first at
    Host of Pod Save America and participant in broader production; referenced in intro and episode context.
    Hey everyone, it's John. As Crooked Con was this weekend in Washington, and we had tons of great discussions as we all worked through our feelings and thoughts about Democrats.
  • Dr. Jack Abbott — Person · Referenced incumbent opponent in Texas · 2 mentions · first at
    Mentioned as the Republican governor in Texas whose governance and corruption were criticized as background for Democratic opportunities in the state.
    Then you get so he's I need a really corrupt person who mirrors my corruption in Texas. And they put up the absolute worst candidate that they could have possibly found in…
  • Abdul El-Sayed — Person · Referenced candidate (Texas context) · 4 mentions · first at
    Consolidated name to a standard spelling to align with evidence and avoid ambiguity with Abdul Ali and Gina Henos
    And Abdul like was constant with the attention economy. He knew how to grab some headlines. He would go anywhere whether it was Fox News, whether it was on his own channels and.
  • Bernie Sanders — Person · Referenced political figure / ideological reference · 4 mentions · first at
    Cited as an origin point for economic populism and compared to policy direction Democrats might adopt; used as shorthand for left economic ideas.
    This way. And we never had an autopsy to figure out what happened. Now it's 10 years later. A lot of people on the left, me included, think that Bernie's economic populism was…
  • Annie Andrews — Person · Referenced winning candidate (South Carolina) · 2 mentions · first at
    Cited as a surprising Democratic victor in South Carolina, used as evidence of southern shifts and the appeal of certain campaign styles.
    Surprised me and was a harbinger, I think, of things to come in Mississippi was South Carolina. Not just that Annie Andrews won. but to win by five in South Carolina, right, we…
  • Terri Rico — Person · Referenced winning candidate (Texas) · 2 mentions · first at
    Referenced as a candidate who took heavy attacks and helped make the ticket competitive in Texas; cited as part of the coordinated approach that helped flip the state.
    Well, first of all, credit was due to Terra Rico who took on the first many hundreds of millions of dollars in attacks, right? And he was building something. And remember, people would.
  • Joe Biden — Person · Referenced incumbent / contrast point · 2 mentions · first at
    Referenced in critiques of older leadership and as part of the generational discussion about moving beyond older presidents; mentioned re: age.
    Its ashes and make sure that it can never come back. And like some of that is Donald Trump is 80 years old and Joe Biden was older than that. and so like to have this new…
  • Paige Cognetti — Person · Referenced successful congressional candidate · 1 mention · first at
    Used as an example of Democrats flipping districts that Trump previously won by large margins, illustrating the breadth of gains.
    And the governors. I think that tells an interesting story, but go look at those members of Congress. People like Paige Cognetti who won in Scranton. I love Paige.
  • Gina Hinojosa — Person · Referenced candidate (Texas) · 12 mentions · first at
    Correct garbled spelling to the widely recognized name that matches evidence
    And it's because I did not allow myself to believe she was going to win.
  • Barack Obama — Person · Referenced historical comparison / exemplar · 4 mentions · first at
    Referenced as part of past Democratic strategies (2008) and to illustrate lessons about building beyond 270 electoral mindset and nominating trajectories.
    If that had not happened, Barack no one would have nominated Barack Obama. That would not have been a possibility. I just let's get back to the advertising for a second because yes, we were.
  • Elon Musk — Person · Referenced tech donor / influencer · 3 mentions · first at
    Mentioned as a powerful tech figure who had influence early in the Trump administration and spent heavily against Democrats; cited as part of corruption/elite capture narrative.
    We brought, people brought up Elon Musk and the $400 he wasted. But one of the things that I think kept a lot of people, like you look at the fundamentals, you look at.
  • J.D. Vance — Person · Referenced Republican figure / critic · 2 mentions · first at
    Mentioned for posting an essay about changing the relationship with Israel and cited as an example of Republicans trying to distance themselves after electoral losses; criticized as linked to Trump.
    JD Vance listed the need to change our relationship with Israel is one of the top four reasons Republicans lost the midterms. Do you agree with that on the JD Vance thing? I mean look,.
  • Beto O'Rourke — Person · Referenced campaign ally / example · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as someone who advised that two coordinated campaigns can win in Texas, illustrating local coordination strategy.
    Forward is really good tickets. And nowhere is that better than in Texas because Terrigo and Gina and Bobby campaign together. They I mean we I was with them in the valley last week.
  • Randy Vieyra — Person · Referenced successful candidate example · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as an overperformer and example of a candidate who overcame establishment skepticism; used to argue for openness in primaries.
    Randy Vieos is one of the biggest overperformers in the whole country. I think he's going to win by like 33 or 35.
  • Hakeem Jeffries — Person · Referenced potential House leader · 1 mention · first at
    Named as a figure some are not enthusiastic about for leadership; part of party leadership debate.
    Leaders and okay, but also do you guys want to have a big nasty fight as your first thing right out of the gate? I'm not sure. It's a question for the room.
  • Chuck Schumer — Person · Referenced potential party leader · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a possible Senate leader and as part of intra-party leadership conversation about who will shape the party going forward.
    Everybody's super psyched about Hakee Jeff or Chuck Schumer being the next leaders and okay, but also do you guys want to have a big nasty fight as your first thing right out of the gate? I'm not sure. It's a question for the room.
  • Ken Paxton — Person · Referenced negative example (Texas corruption) · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a poor-performing Republican figure in Texas to illustrate broader Republican candidate problems in the state.
    Then you get so he's I need a really corrupt person who mirrors my corruption in Texas. And they put up the absolute worst candidate that they could have possibly found in…
  • Mark Zuckerberg — Person · referenced tech CEO · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as one of the tech billionaires who got elevated to influence in Trump's inauguration/administration, used to illustrate elite capture of power
    I think the story starts a lot on January 20th, 2025 when you know who got the front seat to Trump's inauguration.
  • Pete Hegseth — Person · Criticized media/defense figure · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned derisively as an incompetent figure whose actions would not merit further funding for the Iran war; used rhetorically to argue against further war funding.
    Mechanism is for which vote or what have you. I'm not going to get into that. But the idea that we would give Pete Hegs, who is like an 8-year-old playing with toy soldiers…
  • Nate Silver — Person · referenced polling analyst · 1 mention · first at
    Quoted to explain that polls are models and the limitations inherent in modern polling methods
    Not what people do. People try to have it both ways. but here's what I would say. Nate Silver says this. All polls at this point are models.
  • Katie Hobbs — Person · Referenced governor (Arizona) · 1 mention · first at
    No change needed; capitalization verified and evidence aligns with Arizona governor
    She got a trifecta for the first time I think since 1960 something. So, she beat me by a few years there. But I'm excited about that. And I'm also I think looking forward to making sure that as.
  • Tom Ridge — Person · Referenced historical actor · 1 mention · first at
    Named as the architect/founder of DHS framework after 9/11 in the governor's account
    I think it was built in response to 9/11. By the way, built by a friend and a predecessor, Governor Tom Ridge, a patriotic American, but it was built to deal with threats from 25.
  • Michael Chertoff — Person · Referenced expert (mentioned in context of DHS discussion) · 3 mentions · first at
    Mentioned alongside other former officials as voices on overhaul of DHS
    Was built to deal with threats from 25 years ago. And I think the threats are completely different now. And I agree with Michael Tridoff and Jay Johnson, one who served Obama…
  • Jeh Johnson — Person · Referenced expert · 3 mentions · first at
    Mentioned (alongside Michael Chertoff) as voices who argue DHS overhaul is needed
    Years ago. And I think the threats are completely different now. And I agree with Michael Tridoff and Jay Johnson, one who served Obama, one who served Bush. The entire agency…
  • Lindsey Graham — Person · Referenced Republican candidate · 2 mentions · first at
    Spelling capitalization verified; adjust quotes to match transcript usage
    Right? So, so there was that level of disappointment. He didn't release the Epstein files, but also he picked Darlene Graham. He handpicked weird Lindsey Graham's sister, who…
  • Bill and Hillary Clinton — Person · Referenced historical actor · 2 mentions · first at
    Referenced in discussion of Democrats' historical strategy (Clinton/Obama era)
    So after 2016, the Democratic Party just like imploded a little bit and we all blamed each other and we said, Bernie would have won. We should have done it.
  • Scott Colom — Person · referenced local official · 1 mention · first at
    Canonical spelling standardized; aligns with Mississippi official
    Henos in Texas. Adisu Deisi who you may also know from Pon America who has worked for every Democrat and he's the first person who told me that Scott Cologne could win in Mississippi.
  • Vivek Ramaswamy — Person · referenced political figure · 1 mention · first at
    Correct spelling; ensure accurate mention
    Centers like those were the three things. and then in some of the specific places though voters in Ohio that Vivik Rama Swami ad like they thought it was downright evil and we did a focus they were right.
  • John Cornyn — Person · Referenced Republican senator · 1 mention · first at
    Fix garbled spelling in evidence quotes to reflect correct attribution
    He also decided to run John Cornin out of town for being insufficiently proTrump, even though John Cornin was Here's my art of the deal. I'm reading it. And someone took a picture.
  • Jon Ossoff — Person · referenced senator · 1 mention · first at
    Fix garbled spelling to canonical name
    That is an interesting sort of political science experiment right there. And if you and you look at Georgia, John Oaf and Kesha Lance Bottoms, they put their arms around each…
  • Keisha Lance Bottoms — Person · referenced former mayor/ally · 1 mention · first at
    Correct spelling; aligns with cited figure
    That is an interesting sort of political science experiment right there. And if you and you look at Georgia, John Oaf and Kesha Lance Bottoms, they put their arms around each…
  • Jeff Bezos — Person · referenced tech/commerce CEO · 1 mention · first at
    Correct name mention in transcript; ensure exact quote matches transcript
    I think the story starts a lot on January 20th, 2025 when you know who got the front seat to Trump's inauguration.
  • Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — Person · referenced progressive leader · 1 mention · first at
    Key political figure; transcript uses full name and alias is acknowledged.
    He brought in Bernie and AOC the last couple weeks of the election. He's Let's go. And it energized people.

Companies & orgs

  • Congress — Company · Legislative body / decision-maker · 17 mentions · first at
    Central actor for reversing policies, passing reforms (healthcare, AI regulation, stopping Iran war funding), and for using the power of the purse.
  • Department of Homeland Security — Company · Government agency under critique · 2 mentions · first at
    Named as an agency that should be overhauled; DHS structures (including ICE) were criticized for being outdated and unfit for modern threats.
    Oh, I mean I think the entire Department of Homeland Security is broken. I think it is outdated.
  • Crooked Media — Company · Producer / network · 8 mentions · first at
    Parent company producing Pod Save America and Crooked Con; credited in episode context and production notes.
    Dudra, Desmond Taylor, Dan Farrell, David Tols, Mia Kelman, Ryan Young, and Naomi Single. Our staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.
  • Twitter — Company · Platform / rhetorical foil · 5 mentions · first at
    Mentioned as a media environment that amplifies factional fights and toxic primary behavior; discussed as a place candidates and commentators interact.
    It was the one in Florida and the reason that I liked it so much is that it was like what happens if you instead of the factional fight on Twitter, you actually put a never…
  • ICE — Company · Referenced federal agency / policy target · 2 mentions · first at
    Discussed in the context of immigration enforcement and calls for overhauling Department of Homeland Security and ICE's practices; referenced as activity stopped in Pennsylvania.
    You helped stop two ICE detention centers in Pennsylvania. Two massive ones, by the way. They wanted to house 9,000 human beings in Burks and Skookul County. I said, Hell.
  • The Bulwark — Company · media organization · 3 mentions · first at
    Identified in episode context as a guest affiliation (Sarah Longwell is associated with The Bulwark)
  • Amazon — Company · Referenced corporate actor / data center investor · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced in discussion of big tech investment in data centers and AI infrastructure
    I was going to say right now. so you've had a lot of experience with this. I know you announced a $20 billion data center investment from Amazon last year. you've more recently put a lot of restrictions on data centers.
  • Ekky's Research — Company · Referenced polling firm · 1 mention · first at
    Carlos Odio, a guest from Ekky's Research, was on the panel and referenced polling analysis
    We have Carlos Odo from Ekky's Research who you probably know from many appearances on Pate America, Rebecca Katz, one of the best Democratic strategists who just helped elect many.
  • Democratic Governors Association — Company · party institution · 1 mention · first at
    Clarify type as organization/association; leadership content
    So, the DGA is well, I want to win as many seats as I can now. So, where are the most easy six seeds, seven seats, eight seats I can win? And not thinking about the fact that after the.
  • FDA — Company · Referenced regulatory agency · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as an example of an agency that reviews products (analogy for AI regulation)
    You go ahead and take it no it's got to go to the FDA first for their approval, for their review. We don't let like an airplane manufacturer build a plane, then you go fly to…
  • Bulwark — Company · Referenced media outlet · 3 mentions · first at
    Mentioned in episode context as Sarah Longwell's affiliation earlier in the transcript context
  • FAA — Company · regulatory comparator · 3 mentions · first at
    Used as an analogy for how AI models should be regulated (like FDA/FAA testing before deployment)
    Challenges as a result of this technology being built without any oversight like we don't let a pharmaceutical company make a prescription and tell you it's good for you go…
  • Fox News — Company · Referenced media outlet · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced as a place candidates (e.g., Abdul) would appear to get attention across audiences
    And Abdul like was constant with the attention economy. He knew how to grab some headlines. He would go anywhere whether it was Fox News, whether it was on his own channels and.
  • Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps — Organization · referenced foreign actor · 1 mention · first at
    Capitalization and context clarified; IRGC is a proper acronym for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps
    And by the may I just add one more thing? I think we can all agree no one here no one here has any sympathy for the IRGC. No one here wants Iran to have a nuclear weapon. But what is clear is that Donald Trump does not have a plan.
  • Siena Research Institute — Company · referenced pollster / poll brand · 3 mentions · first at
    Mentioned (Siena) in context of polling and public polling conversations (NYT/Siena referenced earlier about youth support)
    South. But on the persuasion piece, just to say, not only do young people turn out, the current estimate in the New York Times of youth support for Democrats is also the…
  • Writers Guild of America East — Company · Union representing staff · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced in credits noting the show's staff is unionized with WGA East
    Dudra, Desmond Taylor, Dan Farrell, David Tols, Mia Kelman, Ryan Young, and Naomi Single. Our staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.
  • Cheesecake Factory — Company · Humorous proposal / metaphor · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned jokingly as a potential reuse of White House space
    Are we keeping it? Are we tearing it down? Are we turning it into a cheesecake factory? What?

Products & tech

  • TikTok — Product · Media platform · 1 mention · first at
    Change type to platform to be precise; maintain that it is a platform mentioned in transcript
    The majority of voters were millennials and zoomers. That's what made up the majority of voters. So, they weren't watching the evening news. They were watching what was on their feed.
  • Oura Ring — Product · referenced consumer product · 1 mention · first at
    Canonical product name; fix variant spelling in transcript
    Sleep for months, but he switched to Helix mattress made an immediate difference. Even his Aura Ring backs it up. His overall sleep score improved, showing more sleep, more…

Concepts & topics

  • Democratic Party — Concept · Core subject / organizational actor · 36 mentions · first at
    Frame for much of the conversation — winning strategies, governing responsibilities, 2028 positioning, primary dynamics, messaging, and delivering results are all discussed in relation to the party.
  • Republican Party — Concept · Opposition party · 16 mentions · first at
    Referenced throughout as the primary opposing force; panelists analyze Republican shortcomings, spending, messaging failures, and internal fractures post-2026.
  • affordability — Concept · Core voter concern / issue · 4 mentions · first at
    Identified as the top voter concern driving midterm outcomes — gas prices, cost of living, healthcare, and related economic anxieties are central to messaging and governing priorities.
  • Trump administration — Concept · Policy source / antagonist context · 4 mentions · first at
    Referenced as the administration whose actions (tariffs, war, corruption) drove voter dissatisfaction and shaped the 2026 political environment discussed throughout the episode.
    Trump is but a bunch but along a bunch of different vectors. He is a failure as a president. He was lying to people. He cannot lower your prices on day one. He cannot end the…
  • Immigration — Concept · Core topic / policy issue · 4 mentions · first at
    Repeatedly discussed as a politically salient issue that shaped Latino voter behavior and as a policy area Democrats must handle carefully during primaries and governance.
    For multiple fronts. One is this primary. I will say obviously immigration was an important factor in this midterm, especially among Latino voters. It wasn't the main factor.…
  • Artificial Intelligence — Concept · Core policy topic / emerging political issue · 9 mentions · first at
    Discussed in terms of data centers, local community impacts, economic costs, federal regulation, and the need for oversight to prevent corporate capture and protect consumers and workers.
    But and what part of the appeal of Trump in 24? We still have to talk about this is was the America first. It was the sense of Democrats are putting other people other priorities ahead of you,.
  • MAGA — Concept · Political faction / antagonist · 2 mentions · first at
    Referenced as the movement behind Trump's brand of politics; discussed as the foe Democrats aimed to defeat in 2026.
    Then you get so he's I need a really corrupt person who mirrors my corruption in Texas. And they put up the absolute worst candidate that they could have possibly found in…
  • Medicaid — Concept · Policy instrument / legislative focus · 2 mentions · first at
    Discussed as a priority to protect from federal cuts and a lever to preserve access and control healthcare costs; Shapiro urges Congress to block cuts affecting state residents.
    Bring down the cost of healthcare. You got to make sure that it is not just accessible, but affordable. And the best way this new Congress can do that is by using every bit of…
  • Tariffs — Concept · Economic policy criticism · 4 mentions · first at
    Identified as one of Trump's policies that increased costs for voters and contributed to dissatisfaction; part of the explanation for Republican underperformance.
    Thorough repudiation of everything that Trump is but a bunch but along a bunch of different vectors. He is a failure as a president. He was lying to people. He cannot lower…
  • Gas prices — Concept · Economic factor / messaging asset · 3 mentions · first at
    Identified as a visceral, daily issue that was successfully used in Democratic messaging to persuade voters and drive turnout.
    Abdul say were saying the same things a lot of the time, right? Well, you can't lie to people about what they're seeing with their own eyes. And they know that the system is…
  • Super Intelligence — Concept · AI risk category · 2 mentions · first at
    Referenced in the context of calls for pauses/bans and the need for government oversight of advanced AI capabilities.
    Do you think on the development of AI, do you think we need to slow it down? Do you think we need to There's been proposals bandied about on banning super intelligence. this idea that you know.
  • Electoral College — Concept · Institutional mechanism under debate · 1 mention · first at
    Discussed as an object of criticism and target for reform (abolition / National Popular Vote) after the panel highlighted changing electoral maps.
    Would you push to join the National Popular Vote Compact? which for people who don't know would award the participating states electoral votes to the national vote winner once enough.
  • America First movement — Concept · Political message / ideology · 2 mentions · first at
    Described as part of Trump's appeal in 2024 emphasizing putting American voters first; discussed in relation to how Democrats can reclaim similar priorities (e.g., 'Michigan first').
    But and what part of the appeal of Trump in 24? We still have to talk about this is was the America first. It was the sense of Democrats are putting other people other priorities ahead of you,.
  • Trans rights — Concept · Contentious cultural/policy issue · 2 mentions · first at
    Raised as a wedge issue Republicans used and Democrats learned to respond to strategically; influenced messaging choices in certain states (e.g., South Carolina).
    For you, so we're going to talk about trans people the whole time. And Darlene Graham literally just talked about trans people. That was all of her advertising. And the one of…
  • National Popular Vote Interstate Compact — Concept · Electoral reform option · 2 mentions · first at
    Raised as a potential reform to abolish or circumvent the Electoral College; discussed in relation to Pennsylvania's role in presidential elections.
    Would you push to join the National Popular Vote Compact? which for people who don't know would award the participating states electoral votes to the national vote winner once enough.
  • Rural America — Concept · Demographic / electoral geography · 1 mention · first at
    Discussed as an area where Republican turnout declined and where voters were uniquely affected by costs and data center projects, contributing to Democratic gains.
    Okay. Okay, so in the voter trend, anybody who was listening to me knows that I was saying, Guys, in rural areas, Republicans are going to do way less well than normal because the prices and affordability issues were hitting.
  • Electability — Concept · Primary consideration / debate topic · 1 mention · first at
    Discussed as an uncertain attribute—what 'electable' means in 2028 is unclear and should not be pre-judged; used to argue for openness to diverse candidates.
    Into play in 2028, not just for like the political establishment, for everyone in this room, is no one knows what electable means, and no one really knows what electable is going to mean in 2028.
  • Fascism — Concept · Ideological critique · 1 mention · first at
    Used pejoratively to describe potential authoritarian directions in U.S. policy under Trump; contrasted 'smart' vs 'dumb' fascism in assessing risks.
    Going to play. Let's think about this affects the Democratic brand at any given moment. That said, when Trump was elected, I thought, okay, he could do smart fascism or he…
  • Medicare for All — Concept · Policy proposal referenced in debate over House agenda · 1 mention · first at
    Raised as an item progressives want the new Democratic House to vote on; used to illustrate tensions about what should be prioritized versus achievable cost-lowering measures.
    Had before. Primila Gyipol and other progressives have said that they really want the Democratic House to vote on Medicare for all. I know you helped elect Bob Brooks in Pennsylvania.
  • Autopsy — Concept · Organizational practice / post-election review · 3 mentions · first at
    Used metaphorically to argue for conducting an evidence-based audit after a victory to learn what worked and replicate it rather than hold competing narratives.
    So after 2016, the Democratic Party just like imploded a little bit and we all blamed each other and we said, Bernie would have won. We should have done it.
  • Populism — Concept · Descriptive trend · 2 mentions · first at
    Phrase used to capture a cross-ideological populist message that appealed to voters across traditional factional lines.
    Like it wasn't about the red states and blue states anymore. It was like this is what we got to get done for the people.
  • Liberal nationalism — Concept · Framing / ideological alternative · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned approvingly as Abdul Sayed's approach — a politics that emphasizes prioritizing citizens and public investment.
    Fights like moderates, progressives, everybody was saying the same things. It was very similar. And by the way, the best America first message I heard in 2026 was from Abdul…
  • Impeachment — Concept · Accountability tool debated · 1 mention · first at
    Discussed as a possible accountability mechanism for Trump but criticized as potentially polarizing and counterproductive strategically.
    The accountability front? Who you hold accountable and how much of that is Trump? And I've been a big proponent of not impeaching Trump because I think you end up then with…
  • Voting Rights Act — Concept · legal/historical reference · 1 mention · first at
    Key civil rights legislation impacting voter access and turnout, especially in the South.
    But I do think with black voters in the south, Jerry Mater, yeah, I think there was a sense that the voting rights act, the incredible spike in turnout among black voters was…
  • Palestinian state — Concept · Policy objective / diplomatic outcome · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced as part of a vision for a stable Middle East alongside Israel
    On the left and the right have said is we should stop this military aid, the subsidized aid. I agree with that. I also believe that America has a national security interest for…
  • Gerrymandering — Concept · electoral factor · 1 mention · first at
    Represents how district boundaries affect outcomes and turnout.
    Entire American electorate and young people. It was as young as about 2018. Then you have the persuasion piece which is a lot of pissed off Trump voters came out and crossed the aisle and voted for Democrats.
  • Epstein file — Concept · referenced controversy · 1 mention · first at
    Contemporary political controversy; capitalization fixes needed for proper noun.
    Right? So, so there was that level of disappointment. He didn't release the Epstein files, but also he picked Darlene Graham. He handpicked weird Lindsey Graham's sister, who has no political experience. And the voters.
  • Bush line — Concept · Rhetorical reference · 1 mention · first at
    Phrase used as a quotation reference; should be treated as a named rhetorical concept
    I think, still have to think about an offense strategy on Trump to make sure he is deeply unpopular and do nothing to make him accidentally more popular.

Places & events

  • 2026 United States midterm elections — Event · Central event / context · 7 mentions · first at
    The episode analyzes outcomes, voter behavior, messaging, turnout vs persuasion, down-ballot victories, and implications for 2028 and governing.
  • Pennsylvania — Place · Setting / case study · 21 mentions · first at
    Governor Josh Shapiro discusses state governance, trifecta control, policy specifics (Medicaid, data centers, workforce), and Pennsylvania's swing-state importance for national politics.
  • Texas — Place · Case study / battleground · 13 mentions · first at
    Discussed as a major strategic prize flipped blue in 2026; campaigns (Gina, Terrigo) and data center/local issues are used to illustrate lessons for investing in long-term map-changing opportunities.
  • South Carolina — Place · Example state showing Democratic gains · 11 mentions · first at
    Referenced as a surprising Democratic pickup (Annie Andrews) and evidence the South may be shifting; used to show Democrats can win in red states.
    But to get to maybe 260 265 seats, never been seen even in the 2008 wave is crazy. The other race that both surprised me and was a harbinger, I think, of things to come in…
  • Texas Senate Race 2026 — Event · Specific competitive race example · 1 mention · first at
    Used to illustrate how a quality ticket, coordinated campaigns, and ground game overcame massive spending and flipped important statewide races.
    Day school weeks because they just gutted that whole process for Abbott's corruption and vouchers. So Gina had a whole campaign going that way and then you had other folks on…
  • Mississippi — Place · Example state showing Democratic gains · 8 mentions · first at
    Named as a state Democrats unexpectedly won or overperformed in, signaling shifts in the South and the efficacy of targeted campaigns.
    Like Mississippi and Texas by huge margins and South Carolina, you're doing everything. But how much of this do you think was turn what our voters turning out their voters not turning out? Persu how much was persuasion?
  • Iran war (2026) — Event · Foreign policy issue influencing voters · 3 mentions · first at
    Referenced as a major factor in Republican unpopularity and voter concerns that helped Democrats; used to critique Trump's handling and the administration's decision-making.
    Toy soldiers, completely incompetent, that we would give him money to continue to prosecute a failed war, a war they had no business getting into. You'll remember the president…
  • Trump 2024 election — Event · Background cause of shifts & backlash · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced as the prior election that produced Trump gains among Latinos and other groups that Democrats then reversed in 2026; used as context for voter defection dynamics.
    Consequences for them and they were very big. and the best case of that is among Latinos. So Donald Trump had made these pretty historic gains among Latinos over the course of…
  • Michigan — Place · Case study / battleground · 7 mentions · first at
    Referenced in relation to Abdul El-Sayed's campaign and as an example of competitive races where candidates faced headwinds but ultimately won, highlighting organizing lessons.
    Repped what we sowed which was huge wins everywhere but we almost didn't win. I want to just be clear. There were a lot of people who really doubted what could win this year.
  • Israel — Place · Foreign policy subject · 6 mentions · first at
    Mentioned in discussion on U.S.-Israel military aid, recent Republican statements (Vance, Trump) and broader foreign policy debates tied to midterm outcomes and party positioning.
    We should stop this military aid, the subsidized aid. I agree with that. I also believe that America has a national security interest for ourselves in having a stable Middle…
  • Washington — Place · setting / political center · 5 mentions · first at
    Referenced as the city where Crooked Con occurred and as the political context for discussions about Congress, oversight, and national politics
    Hey everyone, it's John. As Crooked Con was this weekend in Washington, and we had tons of great discussions as we all worked through our feelings and thoughts about Democrats huge night on Tuesday. We're going to.
  • White House — Place · Setting / symbol of administration actions · 5 mentions · first at
    Referenced in relation to Trump's renovations and symbolic changes (ballroom) and broader critiques of presidential actions benefiting private interests.
    Whether it's the ballroom whether it's that reflecting pond or any of that stuff there has to be congressional oversight of what this guy's doing you know to our national…
  • Iran — Place · Foreign policy actor · 5 mentions · first at
    Referenced in the context of the Iran war, U.S. actions, and the need for a strategy to prevent nuclear development and manage the Middle East crisis.
    Minnesota pissed off about Trump invading and Operation Metro Surge, you name it. So, we had a surge, but we also did persuade, right? Latino voters, I'm sure you'll talk about…
  • Georgia — Place · Example of prior Democratic durability · 3 mentions · first at
    Referenced as a state where Democrats gained durable Senate seats in the Trump era, illustrating that some gains can be lasting.
    Take anything away from them. Mcken Paxton obviously sucked really hard. And then if you even think about if you even think about Georgia when Donald Trump was deciding to say that the 2020 election was stolen, what happened?
  • CrookedCon — Event · Source event / venue · 2 mentions · first at
    This panel and interview were recorded live at Crooked Con; the event setting frames the conversations and guests assembled.
    Hey everyone, it's John. As Crooked Con was this weekend in Washington, and we had tons of great discussions as we all worked through our feelings and thoughts about Democrats huge night on Tuesday. We're going to.
  • Florida — Place · State example / cautionary note · 6 mentions · first at
    Mentioned as a missed opportunity where a mixed ticket nearly closed the gap with little investment; referenced emotionally by panelists.
    And one of my favorite tickets this cycle was actually a losing ticket. If it was the one in Florida and the reason that I liked it so much is that it was like what happens if you instead of the.
  • China — Place · geopolitical comparator · 2 mentions · first at
    Treat as location with a clarified geopolitical comparator role; ensure evidence explicitly discusses AI regulation
    Believe to the first part of your question, you can do that and still move swiftly, still beat China, still ensure that communist China is not dictating the rules of AI, which…
  • Hormuz Strait — Place · Strategic reference in foreign policy critique · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a basic strategic point that an administration should have considered in the Iran conflict, used to criticize Trump's handling of the war.
    Earthly idea how to get out of it. And anyone in a freshman political science class would have told you first thing they're going to do is shut down the trade of hormuz. And…
  • California — Place · Referenced large state / electoral context · 3 mentions · first at
    Referenced as one of the large states and context about shifting electoral map
    Attitude. And I think we got to look back at Clinton, Obama who are pushing 370. And that needs to be our attitude.
  • Minnesota — Place · Referenced state · 2 mentions · first at
    Keep as location; align evidence to reflect voters in Minnesota
    Trump administration, Latino voters in the RGB, pissed off about what Trump is doing, Latino voters and all voters in Minnesota pissed off about Trump invading and Operation…
  • White House ballroom — Place · Reference to physical space / decoration controversy · 2 mentions · first at
    Mentioned jokingly in conversation about Trump's renovations and the need for congressional oversight of changes to national monuments/venues.
    Whether it's the ballroom whether it's that reflecting pond or any of that stuff there has to be congressional oversight of what this guy's doing you know to our national…
  • Kennedy Center — Place · referenced venue · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced as an example of national landmarks potentially affected by changes to the White House/Trump renovations and subject to congressional oversight
    Whether it's the ballroom whether it's that reflecting pond or any of that stuff there has to be congressional oversight of what this guy's doing you know to our national…
  • Kansas — Place · Referenced state with electoral success · 3 mentions · first at
    Mentioned among states where Democrats saw wins
    Democrats of course had an incredible Tuesday in Pennsylvania, but also Kansas, South Carolina, Texas, Mississippi. what do you think Democrats in those red.
  • 2008 Obama presidential campaign — Event · historical reference · 2 mentions · first at
    Historical political event; standard form improves consistency.
    2008 was one of the messiest primaries I've ever seen and we got Barack Obama after it. So, I'm I'm for it. I just want to make sure I in Michigan especially, the attacks.
  • Operation Metro Surge — Event · referenced policy event · 1 mention · first at
    Capitalize correctly; treat as policy-related event
    Trump administration, Latino voters in the RGB, pissed off about what Trump is doing, Latino voters and all voters in Minnesota pissed off about Trump invading and Operation…
  • Canada — Place · Referenced international trade partner · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned in context of tariffs and how tariffs increase domestic costs
    No business getting into, he's got no earthly idea how the hell to get out of because the tariffs that he clearly didn't understand when you put a tariff on Canada, we pay more…
  • Scranton — Place · Referenced congressional district / city · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as Paige Cognetti's win in a Trump-leaning district in Pennsylvania
    And that's a district Trump, if memory serves me correct, I think Trump won that by eight and a half for nine points. and we won that district this time. It is imperative that those.
  • Burks County — Place · Referenced local site · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as one of two proposed ICE detention center locations that were blocked in Pennsylvania
    You helped stop two ICE detention centers in Pennsylvania. Two massive ones, by the way. They wanted to house 9,000 human beings in Burks and Skookul County. I said, Hell.
  • Bakersfield — Place · Referenced district/city · 1 mention · first at
    Geographic reference in transcript; clarified as a city.
    Reclaim our narrative and that was done by our own party and I just think that like you look at what happened in California 22 that's Bakersfield Randy Viegas the DC spent…
  • Nebraska — Place · Referenced polling outlier · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as the one Senate seat where polls did not underestimate Democrats
    Were wrong. We can say that polls underestimated Democrats in every Senate seat except Nebraska. the average of generic ballot was D plus 9. The result was D+ 14. So in Yeah. Wow. Right.
  • Arizona — Place · Referenced state (comparison) · 1 mention · first at
    Legitimate location name; keep as location
    Time since 1978 in Pennsylvania. I was actually texting with Katie Hobbs last night in Arizona, great governor.
  • Detroit — Place · Referenced example city · 1 mention · first at
    Common city name; should be categorized as location and capitalized
    You go ahead and take it no it's got to go to the FDA first for their approval, for their review. We don't let like an airplane manufacturer build a plane, then you go fly to…
  • Skookul County — Place · Referenced local site · 1 mention · first at
    Paired with Burks County as a proposed ICE detention center location mentioned in the discussion
    You helped stop two ICE detention centers in Pennsylvania. Two massive ones, by the way. They wanted to house 9,000 human beings in Burks and Skookul County. I said, Hell no. We fought back. We won. We drove them out of Pennsylvania.
  • Philadelphia — Place · Referenced city (labor / building trades example) · 1 mention · first at
    City name; treat as location
    First off, I got a whole bunch of building trades from Philly who would love to show up with a hammer and a chisel and scrape that gold off the white house.

Media & podcasts

  • Pod Save America — Media · Producing podcast / show · 4 mentions · first at
    This episode and panel are part of the Pod Save America series; hosts and format provide the interview and analysis vehicle for the discussion.
    Slotkin. Then Dan and I will be back on Friday with a brand new episode. Talk to everyone soon. Positive America is a crooked media production. Our show is produced by Austin…
  • Crooked Con Panel: What Just Happened — Media · Panel session / episode segment · 2 mentions · first at
    The event/panel from which much of the transcript derives; features strategists analyzing 2026 results and implications for 2028.
    What times we live in. Okay. The goal of our panel day is I have some of the smartest minds in politics and we're going to break down what happened on Tuesday and what it means going forward.
  • New York Times — Media · Media source · 2 mentions · first at
    Change type from company to media to reflect status as a news outlet; align evidence accordingly
    South. But on the persuasion piece, just to say, not only do young people turn out, the current estimate in the New York Times of youth support for Democrats is also the…
  • More Perfect Union — Media · media organization · 1 mention · first at
    Clarify type as media outlet
    Candidate in different kinds of situations so that people, get interested in it. We had for Gina, we had the flock camera ad. We had data centers. We were we had this ad about…
  • NBC — Media · Media outlet reference · 2 mentions · first at
    Adjust type from company to media to reflect status as a media outlet; ensure evidence corresponds to NBC as media
    To find them in different places and then you have to kind of complement it and amplify your other messages. You can't just be in a void. But if you're like whether it was in…
  • The Focus Group Podcast — Media · referenced media resource · 1 mention · first at
    Media reference; capitalization standardization improves entity recognition.
    Were also the thing about Republican voters, and this has been true in focus groups all along, and this is why you should all listen to the focus group podcast, is that they…

Sponsors

  • Helix Sleep — Sponsor · Episode sponsor · 3 mentions · first at
    Featured as a paid sponsor in the episode with promotional language and a call to action to visit helixsleep.com/crooked for discounts.
    Helix custom builds your mattress based on your sleep needs. Just take the 2-minute Helix sleep quiz to determine your best fit. They deliver your mattress right to your door with free.
  • Trees.com — Sponsor · Episode sponsor · 4 mentions · first at
    Episode sponsor promoted with call to action and coupon code 'CROOKED' for discounts on plant purchases.
    Is America's largest online nursery with thousands of plants and trees and over three million happy customers. They have all the plants your yard or home needs, including fruit…
  • Planned Parenthood — Sponsor · Episode sponsor · 3 mentions · first at
    Sponsor discussed in episode ad read emphasizing reproductive health services and a call to donate at plannedparenthood.org/defend.
    This podcast is sponsored by Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
  • BetterHelp — Sponsor · Episode sponsor · 3 mentions · first at
    Sponsor included with promotional messaging about therapy services and a sign-up discount link betterhelp.com/psa.
    Sign up and get 10% off at betterhelp.com/psa.
  • PDS Debt — Sponsor · Episode sponsor · 2 mentions · first at
    Paid sponsor included in episode; promotional CTA directing listeners to pdsdebt.com/crooked for services and assessment.
    On your credit cards, it's costing you money every single day. No minimum credit score required. PDS is the top rated company in the industry with thousands of five-star…

Full transcript with timestamps

Hey everyone, it's John. As you know, Crooked Con was this weekend in Washington, and we had tons of great discussions as we all worked through our feelings and thoughts about Democrats huge night on Tuesday. We're going to play a few of those conversations with you this week. Starting today with a panel that Dan led. It's called, fittingly, what just happened? And his guests were political strategists and thinkers Carlos Odio, Rebecca Katz, Sarah Longwell, and Adisu Desi. After that, you'll hear my conversation with Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro.

All right. Helen. Yeah. This isn't bull work con people. Someone's wearing a woke Bill Crystal shirt right there. Yeah.

What times we live in. Okay. The goal of our panel day is I have some of the smartest minds in politics and we're going to break down what happened on Tuesday and what it means going forward with Sarah Long who obviously you all know. We have Carlos Odo from Ekky's Research who you probably know from many appearances on Pate America, Rebecca Katz, one of the best Democratic strategists who just helped elect many people including Abdul Ali and Gina Henos in Texas. Adisu Deisi who you may also know from Pon America who has worked for every Democrat and he's the first person who told me that Scott Cologne could win in Mississippi.

All right, I just want to start like we thought in my heading into Tuesday, I had blue wave, blue tsunami and we ended up with something bigger than that, right? Blew through most people's expectations. Just want to ask you to start with like what's one thing that was surprising to you in the results? Could be a race, could be a voter trend, could be something that worked.

Uh, okay. Okay, so in the voter trend, anybody who was listening to me knows that I was saying, "Guys, in rural areas, Republicans are going to do way less well than normal because the prices uh and affordability issues were hitting them hardest. That's where AI data centers are being built, which they're very upset about. What I didn't anticipate though is how many people in rural areas were still sifting through the data, but it looks like not only did a lot of them not show up, a lot of them voted for Democrats.

You know, I feel like I should give a data answer and there are so many surprising data points, but I have to say the one thing that really did surprise me was Gina, you know, Hosa.

And it's because I did not allow myself to believe she was going to win. Down to the wire, I was saying, "Oh, no, no, she's going to lose." Because I didn't want to jinx her.

Thank you. You're very welcome. And but I but I will say and it's not just in the sense of representation in the way that we mean it from a very symbolic standpoint. It is how meaningful substantively it is to have that person in that seat at this moment.

Now you're going to make me cry. Um that so thank you for all you did. I think you did all the work. Thank Wait. Thank you Rebecca. All he did was say was not say she was going to win.

That was important. That everything was every little bit counts. Um the biggest surprise for me when I woke up on Wednesday morning, having barely slept, was realizing how many resumes we needed in Democratic politics right now. We needed so many people to make sure that the people who won actually succeeded. So to me, the most important takeaway is like we have to make sure these people do a good job and we need the we need people who have been on the on the sidelines to come back into politics and get get the best out of these folks because very competent staff matters.

I'd say two two things. One, the size of the house majority. I think we all knew we were going to take back the house, but to get to maybe 260 265 seats, never been seen even in the 2008 wave is is crazy. The other race that both surprised me and was a harbinger, I think, of things to come in Mississippi was South Carolina. Not just that Annie Andrews won. Um, but to win by five in South Carolina, right, we were all talking about the first presidential primary state was a red state. Well, not so much, guys. uh not only did she win, you know, the race outright, but to win by a significant decisive margin suggests and suggested on on uh on Tuesday night that the winds the winds are changing down south.

It's important to understand why we won, how we won, not just so that we can win again, but there's always this like narrative battle that happens afterwards where everyone's fighting over like what the exact reason was and everyone you'll be shocked to find out that all the people having that fight have discovered that the reason we won is the exact thing they believed their whole life. And so like I want to like dig into the data and what you guys saw on the ground about what really happened so we can have like a real fact-based conversation about it. Edisu, let's start. Like obviously when you're winning states like Mississippi and Texas by huge margins and South Carolina, you're doing everything. But how much of this do you think was turn what our voters turning out their voters not turning out? Persu how much was persuasion?

I obviously it was everything. We'll see when the catalyst data and other things come back. It is too early to tell. My guess it is about 2/3 turnout, one one/3 persuasion roughly speaking, right? That's don't quote me on that. Oh I just said it in front of a room of thousand people. Um, but the turnout I think is both high turnout in Democratic areas, but as Sarah said before, low turnout in Republican areas. That's also something we should take as a cautionary tale for 2028. We can't count that that's necessarily going to be the case in a presidential election, but we saw increased turnout in Democratic base areas, as I was talking about before.

Black voters in the South pissed pissed off about Calala, pissed off about the Trump administration, Latino voters in the RGB, pissed off about what Trump is doing, Latino voters and all voters in Minnesota pissed off about Trump invading uh and Operation Metro Surge, you name it. So, we had a surge, but we also did persuade, right? Latino voters, I'm sure you'll talk about it, Carlos, um, swung hard, as we all know, to Trump in 2024, and we erased that and then some, um, with young voters, young white voters. We swung it. So, it was a little bit of everything. Obviously, we'll dig into the numbers, but I do think important to remember what is what happened at 26. We we don't need to forget it, but we need to rethink what 28, 30, and beyond will look like and not just count on it happening happening again.

So exactly all that ju just some of just some of the math on this right. So there is the turnout piece. I think if the early estimates hold up this will be the least white electorate ever. Um if you look at you don't have to clap for least white. You can clap you can clap for the next part. Okay.

Was for diversity but they didn't know exactly how to express that. And diversity. Uh but the next piece the next piece is good which is if you look at we already have voter files back in a Georgia or a Texas um and the black share and Latino share of the electorate grew over the presidential. Just to be clear that's not normal. That doesn't happen. It's usually the opposite. They drop. Including some shocking statistics like young Latinos, Latinos under the age of 30 turned out at a higher rate than young white women.

that also does not happen, right? There is a massive structural turnout gap between white and Latino voters that was still apparent except among young Latinos who are uh have emerged as one of the most important blocks in the entire um American electorate um and young people. It was as young as about 2018. Then you have the persuasion piece um which is a lot of pissed off Trump voters came out and crossed the aisle and voted for Democrats. That's meaningful defection and it cuts across the electorate. And here was

gerrymandering maybe I I you know I would put gas prices and the war and the total betrayal of everything he ran on higher on the list. But sure,

but I do think with black voters in the south, Jerry Mater, yeah, I think there was a sense that the voting rights act, the the incredible spike in turnout among black voters was actually largely concentrated um in the south. But but on the persuasion piece, just to say, not only do young people turn out, the the current estimate in the in the New York Times of uh youth support for Democrats is also the highest level of support we've seen for Democrats among young people basically ever.

But one of the reasons that that is happening is we had really exciting candidates this year. Like it's never happened that there were so many people who were so fun to follow and to see what was happening on their campaign. And the other thing we had this cycle that we should never underestimate going forward is really good tickets. And nowhere is that better than in in Texas because Terrigo and Gina and Bobby campaign together. They I mean we I was with them in the the valley last week. 8,000 people all excited to go vote. If we can keep getting really good candidates up and down the ticket, give someone give everyone something to vote for, they will keep coming back. It's not just what we're voting against, but it's getting excited and inspired to vote for someone again.

Can you actually talk about that a little bit? Because I heard Gina say after the election that before she ran, she met with Betto Aor and he said, "One person can't win Texas. Two people can." Just talk a little bit specifically about that logic there and how you're how those two campaigns work together.

I mean, well, first of all, credit was due to Terra Rico who took on the first many hundreds of millions of dollars in attacks, right? And he was building something. And remember, people would come for him and be polite for Gina. But then Gina was running a different campaign. Gina was also in many of the rural areas going after folks who are upset about the data centers. She was going after um MAGA moms who were upset because the schools in Texas just are terrible. They um there's over 150 school districts in Texas with only four day school weeks because they just gutted that whole process for Abbott's corruption and vouchers. So Gina had a whole campaign going that way and then and then you had other folks on the ticket, you know, getting people excited and one by one they were bringing more and more people in like Gina was doing, you know, through the roof excitement with like older Latinas and um James was

getting so many folks off campuses and getting engaged. When we went, we did a whole college tour, thousands of kids were turning out and they were very laser focused on what they could do to make a difference. So, just having quality candidates up and down the ticket makes a difference.

Just to go back to you, Carlos, for one sec, actually, you know what, Sarah, you did something that I find to be completely insane, and that is that the morning after the election, you held focus groups. Um, you know, those could have waited till after lunch, right?

I had to do John Stewart at 11. So I I needed I needed to know as as one does. Yes. He talk you talk a little bit what who that who was in those groups and what you heard and their reaction to what happened.

Yes. So we did two groups immediately and it wasn't after we woke up. It was just we just never went to sleep and we just kept going and got the voters in there. Um, and we did the group that was the most interesting was the group of Republicans who had voted for Democrats because their vibe was very much like thou art punished. Uh, they just they were like, why did I vote for him? Because I wanted a check on this madness. It's insane what's going on. Um, and I think that this was the part that I'm I over because I've been doing nothing but just like celebrating endlessly and doing interviews where I'm just like can't get out of my skin. Um, but as we really get through the data, I will be interested to see how many people who are Trump voters who ultimately voted for Democrats because I think the number is going to be shockingly high. And just going back to my first point, I was pretty confident

sort of the bottom was going to fall out of the Republican vote. Like I just thought it was going to be way down. Um but I am pretty sure that the persuasion effect you might be even if it's even if it's two to one in a midterm not just because independents totally broke for Democrats. So that's there. But if you get those Republicans do which you have to to get a Josh Shapiro by what was he ultimately 24 points or something insane, right? I mean to in South Carolina, in Mississippi, like you have to have Trump voters who have voted for the Democrat. And so I cannot wait to see what those numbers were. But anyway, the they said they wanted a check. They were also um the thing about Republican voters, and this has been true in focus groups all along, and this is why you should all listen to the focus group podcast, is that uh they were basically saying uh at first it was the tariffs, and they were kind of like, "Oh man."

and then the war and then the data centers like those were the three things. Um and then in some of the specific places though voters in Ohio that Vivik Rama Swami ad like they thought it was downright evil and we did a focus

they were right and they were right. Uh and so and to me though this is this election was about Trump. uh you know that the one thing that the never Trumpers that we have wanted for 10 years and we have not gotten that we finally got was a thorough repudiation of everything that Trump is but but a bunch but along a bunch of different vectors. He is a failure as a president. He was lying to people. He cannot lower your prices on day one. He cannot end the war on day one. In fact, he started a brand new war which he said he wasn't going to do.

Right? So, so there was that level of disappointment. He didn't release the Epstein files, but also he picked Darlene Graham. He handpicked

weird Lindsey Graham's sister, who has no political experience. And the voters in South Carolina were like, "She doesn't have any political experience." He also decided to run John Cornin out of town for being insufficiently proTrump, even though John Cornin was like, "Here's my art of the deal. I'm reading it." And someone took a picture of me reading it. Please, I love you. And he was like, "No, you're done." And then you get so he's like, I need a really corrupt person who mirrors my corruption in Texas. And they put up the absolute worst candidate that they could have possibly found in Texas. Not to take anything away from them. Mcken Paxton obviously sucked really hard. And then if you even think about if you even think about Georgia when Donald Trump was deciding to say that the 2020 election was stolen, what happened?

Democrats got two Senate seats in Georgia and those are durable Senate seats now. and could and then I'll say one last thing about what I think you know I talk a lot about how there's this very scientific term now that I think is very important politics called vibes and it goes back to something that Rebecca was just talking about and I talk about this there's a wonderful lady here she's got my book up front she's been showing it to me um and I'll sign it later but the but but but one of the things I talk about in there is how Democrats if they want to build a community they have to be a community. And this is true in a lot of ways about how do you bring people in? How do you get them excited?

And one of my favorite tickets this cycle was actually a losing ticket. If it was the one in Florida and the reason that I liked it so much is that it was like what happens if you instead of the factional fight on Twitter, you actually put a never Trump Republican on the governor's side and you put a DSA black woman on uh on as in the Senate candidate and then you run them together. And the thing is is that Florida to even come within three points with no investment. No investment. Had there been investment, I you know, but that is an interesting sort of um political science experiment right there. And if you and you look at Georgia, John Oaf and Kesha Lance Bottoms, they put their arms around each other and they ran hard and they showed everybody in all of these states we're doing this together. And that drew so many more people in.

Oh, go ahead. Florida's my home state, so it still breaks my heart. But I will say down ballot was it was fantastic.

Totally was satisfying. Um, so I want to come back to the Latino piece. We talked about persuasion. You know, I think part of what

um had so many people skeptical that what happened on Tuesday would actually happen at the end of the day is because we're so used to Trump doing things um and paying never paying the price. Sarah rattling off all of the terrible things he did. Um and then in the Trump era, it's so unreal that there was no like cause and then effect, right? Um and yet what we saw on Tuesday was Trump had done bad things and then there were consequences for them and they were very very big. Um and the best case of that is among Latinos. So Donald Trump had made these pretty historic gains among Latinos over the course of his elections from 2016 to 2020 to 20 24. He kept Democratic support among Latinos kept dropping. What we saw in 2026 is it circle all the way back to around 2016 again. And the thing is there is a turnout dimension, but we shouldn't really simplify voters as turnout voters or persuasion voters. Most of that trip

back is because of defection. At least around 15% of Latinos who had voted for Donald Trump switch sides, right? They walked back away from the vote that they had just made because of what they felt were the broken promises of Donald Trump. And so the way you get that kind of movement is that you combine turnout enthusiasm, but also a lot of vote switching and new voters and you plus those up and it equals a big ass kicking.

So here so so here's what I want to do. So after 2016, the Democratic Party just like imploded a little bit and we all blamed each other and we said, you know, Bernie would have won. We should have done it this way. And we never had an autopsy to figure out what happened. Now it's 10 years later. A lot of people on the left, me included, think that Bernie's economic populism was the way of the future. And maybe we should have gotten a little bit more curious 10 years ago. But here we are, right? And I'm wondering if we couldn't do an audit when we lost, what if we actually did an audit when we won? And instead of having everyone have their group say, "This is why we won." We actually got some hard evidence. We saw what worked. We learned from it. And then we continue to win.

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because they never stop showing up and neither should you. I think we can kind of start the audit right now. Um, Adisu, as you were looking at the campaigns, you were traveling the country, you've been meeting a lot of campaigns. What did you see the party doing differently in 2026 24 like what lessons did we actually learned or things that actually changed or was it mostly just better environment? I mean, I'm not going to lie, it was a lot of better environment, but that's I think that ended up reflecting in our candidates. So, honestly, the answer is like discipline.

Um, you know, and I think when I say discipline, I mean like message discipline about the president and his failures. And what Carlos said is totally right. You guys all know this. I was involved in 2020. I was involved in 22. I was involved in 24. The one thing we could basically count on for all four years, basically up until 2025, was that Trump's approval rating was basically going to hover around 40 no matter what he did. And because of the tariffs and because of the war, we finally saw those numbers dip to what everybody's seeing in the public in the public polls. Also,

yeah, what do we call that, guys? There you go. Thank you, Sarah. Um, but I think our candidates saw that and stuck to it no matter what was happening on Twitter, no matter what distractions the president was throwing out there with his stupid renovation projects or whatever it might be. And I honestly I think in the first resistance as I like to call it the like capital F capital R back in uh 2017 2018 I was a part of it guilty. Um we chased we chased that because honestly I mean I get it right like I want to chase it too um cuz it's stupid and dumb and hurting people. But the candidates didn't chase it. The campaigns didn't chase it. They were they were as disciplined as I've ever seen a diverse set of candidates in a diverse set of states about the importance of lowering costs and taking on corruption. And I don't think that was some on high uh from Washington or the capital uh command. It was people like Rebecca. It

was people like Carlos. It was people like uh Seth Kran. It was people uh like Pton Lewis in Minnesota. Like people who were the campaign managers who said we are not going to let this guy throw us off our game. and the candidates and the campaigns did it and we saw the we we repped what we sowed which was huge wins everywhere

but we almost didn't win. I want to just be clear. There were a lot of people who really doubted what could win this year. And nowhere is that more clear. Well, Michigan for Abdul who like was such an exciting candidate. There was headwinds all the way. That's a whole another subject.

But in Texas, we couldn't get anyone to believe in Gina. And to me, like the opportunity of Texas was the biggest opportunity the Democrats have had in forever. And we got a like the DJ is a perfect example of an institution that should have just been really interested in saying, how could we take Texas like back? How could we change the map? But there's a whole thing about it like they said there's this many vote like we want this many states and no state is better than any state. So we didn't have people who were excited about investing in the possibility of Texas and that almost cost us the biggest prize we've ever gotten. And so as we look forward we should keep thinking about how we build for the future and not just how many races can I win this year but what does that mean for the future? I mean, this is this is the constant challenge of the party is everyone is on a short-term cycle where they feel like they're

measured by what happens in that moment. So, the DGA is like, well, I want to win as many seats as I can now. So, where are the most easy six seeds, seven seats, eight seats I can win? And not thinking about the fact that after the 2030 census, Texas is going to have three maybe four more electoral votes and California is going to have maybe three or four less electoral votes. And there's no

But why not? Yeah, that's the point, right? everybody thinking about like we have all these we have a Democratic national committee. We have all these groups that are supposed to be thinking about this all the time, but no one in a position of power in this entire city made a bet on Gina.

Yeah. She had to do it all herself. Can can I and this is when we are we're going to sip through the data and we're going to be nerds about it but there's something ineffable that we should put our arms around which is that like a psychological barrier has been broken where the map is no longer like locked in like we've been living through an age of polarization where you think well these things are impossible they can't happen and like now I don't know about you but I'm sitting around being like somebody should invest in Florida again like we should start thinking about all these things and and there's nothing to breed success like success. And that's why this idea of the right normally the autopsy the point is you're dead, right?

And instead if you're like what if you're like I don't know what the word is when you're like let's examine the aliveness of this. Let's see how you make it live harder and longer. I guess it's called like medical attention. But but we but but that is the

more expensive under Trump. Yeah, that's right. Uh they'll cut healthcare. that's all they'll that's how they'll try to beat us. But that psychological barrier being broken is like that's the story of what just happened which is that offense now is something that everybody can sort of lean into because they see it can be done. You know, Adisu brought up a message discipline, right? And individual campaigns were disciplined, but I watched this video that More Perfect Union put out the other day where they had clips and our candidates were as diverse as they could be, right? You have the pastor from Kansas, you have the Bernie endorsed candidate in Michigan, you have J the seminarian in Texas, you have the pediatrician in South Carolina, they're everywhere. But when you listen to what they were saying, they were telling the same story where they were talking about a economy that was not working for

people and they were naming the villains in it. And I just wanted when anyone here can reflect on what a how we got to that point. We're all talking saying whether you are, you know, you are an avowed person on the left or a vowed person in the middle. Rory Cooper and Abdul say were saying the same things a lot of the time,

right? Well, you can't lie to people about what they're seeing with their own eyes. And um they know that the system is rigged. They know that corporations um are a big part of the problem. You know, Bernie rallied against the millionaires and billionaires. Now we have a trillionaire, right, who had the biggest self-own of anyone on election day. Let's be clear. Uh but if you look at all of these speeches, there is a postpartisan populism to them, right? Like it wasn't about the red states and blue states anymore. It was like this is what we got to get done for the people.

And that was exciting. Like we need to learn from all of these governors and newly elected senators that they want to get actual results for people and they and it's not about being a moderate or uh progressive. It's about getting results. So like let's go help them.

I think the story starts a lot on on January 20th, 2025 when you know who got the front seat to Trump's inauguration. It wasn't even his own cabinet nominees. It was Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos, right? And voters aren't stupid. Like they saw they saw Musk get a job in the White House, right? Not to mention spend $200 million against our candidates and sorry for whatever. Uh it's all wasted, right? Uh and so voters aren't stupid, right? And I think it was also an easy message to glob on to because whether you're from the left or the middle or frankly the right, I think that's part of the reason to Sarah's point, we got uh a lot of Republicans in some of these southern states, you don't like when your government is used as a play thing for rich people. And it's a very easy message for to unite our party. And frankly, I would say to anybody who's listening who's here in Washington, it's something we better as

well deliver on actually doing with the majority that we have in Congress. We got to take these people on, hold them accountable, regulate their industries, and make sure they can't buy government for the next two years and beyond.

But and what part of the appeal of Trump in 24? We still have to talk about this is was the America first. It was the sense of Democrats are putting other people other priorities ahead of you, right? They're they want to just they they Democrats want to fight about trans issues. me, Donald Trump, going to lower the cost of living. They want to go do wars in Ukraine. I, Donald Trump, am not going to have any new wars. I'm going to put you first ahead of everything else. And then he got into power and systematically squandered every one of those opportunities.

The message is why are AI data centers so unpopular? Part of it is the uncertainty of AI, but part of it is also a larger narrative of I don't have control over my own life. that there is a small wealthy elite who are making decisions about my future, what my jobs are going to look like, what my community is going to look like, who decides whether they're going to put something in my neighborhood and I'm going to have to pay higher utility prices to pay for it even though I don't understand what it is. This sense of not control that there is a powerful elite that is making the decisions for me and they're rejecting it strongly.

I think the and that led to a consensus among Democrats. Yeah. these factional fights like moderates, progressives, everybody was saying the same things. It was very similar. And by the way, the best America first message I heard in 2026 was from Abdul Sayed

who has taken it back, who's understood the value of a liberal nationalism that is about saying, "Yes, we need to take care of our people. That is the priority of our government." And it's important for Democrats now that they take power. By the way, Democrats are still not popular. They're not right. The need here now is not Biden got into power, squandered the opportunity. Trump got into power, squandered the opportunity. Democrats cannot forget what got them elected because voters can change their minds real quick as we just saw.

And I will say for Abdul, he ran an unapologetic patriotic campaign and it got missed time and time again. But you look at our placards, it was Michigan first. It was spending our money in Michigan. And I think that just got completely overlooked and people didn't want their tax dollars being spent overseas. They wanted them right there to invest in their schools and hospitals.

You know, we brought, you know, people brought up Elon Musk and the $400 he wasted. But one of the things that I think kept a lot of people, like you look at the fundamentals, you look at the polling, you think this is a great year for Democrats. The one thing that gave people pause, at least up until like the last couple weeks, is we've never faced this much money before. This is the greatest financial disparity in any in all these races were just absolutely unbelievable. And Rebecca, you both in Michigan and particularly in Texas, just the spending disparity between what the Republicans are spending and your cancer spend is just like gobsmacking. How did you navigate that? How are you able to sort of close that gap?

So, it it is daunting. Remember, Gina got into this race. Greg Abbott already had a hundred million dollars before we even got into the race. So it it was daunting, but I will say this is the one of the great lessons of Mayor Mom Donnie is to always be communicating, right? And if you look at some of these folks, we we never got that kind of money, but we did build our own following, right? And um Abdul like was constant with the attention economy. He knew how to grab some headlines. He would he would go anywhere whether it was Fox News, whether it was on his own channels and we were constantly producing content.

Gina was walking around the data centers giving, you know, her her lives as she's talking about what's happening. And we were building and building and building um a real following because in Texas, the majority of voters were uh millennials and zoomers. That's what made up the majority of voters. So, they weren't watching the evening news. They were watching what was on their feed. So, we had to get on everyone's feet and it was it was an exhaustive amount of interviews and just going everywhere. But the candidates that won and that beat all the money, they worked harder than anyone else. And you just got to outwork them.

This idea of the everything everywhere all at once communication strategy is so essential but also to do that it takes an enormous amount of energy which is why it's not just that the millennials and the zoomers turned out to vote those were also the candidates they were a bunch of millennials elder millennials right they're all like I saw somebody Rachel John Faza who does a lot of she does some of the millennial focus group stuff so I follow her put out the ages is. And it was like that moment when you watch like college football and you realize they're all way younger than you and it's really depressing. And I was like seeing that they're all 39 and I was like my moment's over. I'm too old like to run for anything cuz they're all 39, 43, whatever. And so the energy this is in Texas. Everyone knows Texas a big expensive state to advertise in. So what did they do? They just went everywhere

like with their feet. They showed up. Do you know why Angie Nixon beat uh Alex Vinman in P I'm sorry in Florida for that primary is because he had more money, she had more energy. And so like the energy from this has to be carried through. But you can see that the generational change like you know everything is about how do we not just beat MAGA but like salt the earth with its ashes and make sure that it can never come back. And like some of that is Donald Trump is 80 years old and Joe Biden was older than that. Um and so like to have this new generation is to is to like bring in a new era. And that's why it does have to sort of define itself early of what it's going to what it's going to do. And it does because this is just one thing I want to make sure you understand. We in this room we are pumped. We are so happy. But we didn't win this election because voters are ex are pumped. We did it

because they're hurting. And so the delivery of something for those people has to be real.

Yeah. And I I couldn't agree more. Like I've been trying to temper my own enthusiasm with the realization that what Carlos said is true. Dem voters don't love Democrats. And also they don't really expect us to deliver. Doesn't mean we shouldn't try, but they are they are they are uh cynical about our ability to make change, right? They were they were cynical about Trump's ability to make change and he did even worse than they thought. But the I think we did have more advertising than they did. I think we had the best advertising campaign in the history of America and it was the gas prices as people were driving down the street every single day. Um we can't a we can't count on that to be the case forever. But more importantly, we have to we have to put together a specific strategy that is specific to an election. This election 2026 was about Donald Trump. It was about the war. It was about the tariffs.

It was about taking back our country. We now have the reigns. 2028 is going to have a whole different electorate. We're going to have a whole bunch of different candidates. We're going to have to think about a whole different strategy. So, we shouldn't we we can't overlearn these lessons even as we in this room at least rightly celebrate what happened on Tuesday.

We also can't put our thumb on the scale of in primaries. I think um what they tried to do to Abdul to take him out in the primary is like unconscionable. we should just have let that play out because there was a lot of damage that we didn't have we didn't have enough money as the establishment so we didn't get to inoculate ourselves against a lot of the attacks that came in and that took you know the the Michigan primary was in August so we had a very short window to have to like like reclaim our our narrative and that that was done by our own party um and I I just think that like you look at what happened in California 22 that's Bakersfield Randy Viegas the DC spent against him for another candidate because they thought he would lose.

Randy Vieos is one of the biggest overperformers in the whole country. I think he's going to win by like 33 or 35. He brought in Bernie and AOC the last couple weeks of the election. He's like, "Let's go." And it it energized people. So, there's not just one way to win. And we have to keep reminding ourselves that because they keep saying what can't win. We don't know what can win because we've never tried something new and this election was the first time and it worked. So, we should just keep going.

The it's a very important point on both Abdul, Randy Viegas, a bunch of other elections is, and this is going to come into play in 2028, not just for like the political establishment, for everyone in this room, is no one knows what electable means, and no one really knows what electable is going to mean in 2028. So you can begin the process with eyes wide open and look at every single candidate and allow them to prove themselves over the course of time and you can make judgments how they perform on a debate stage on podcast hopefully this podcast. Um but like just the 2026 should show us that anything is possible. when we should open to it because I often tell people many of you are too young to remember this but in 20 in 2006 when Democrats bounced back from a terrible loss and took the House and the Senate winning places like at Virginia which at the time seemed insane.

If that had not happened, Barack no one would have nominated Barack Obama. That would not have been a possibility. I just let's get back to the advertising for a second because yes, we were outspent. We also spent as a party an truly ungodly sum of money on advertising and mostly but not entirely linear television. Can you guys just anyone up here talk a little bit about whether the value of that what the media mix should be? Did we light a bunch of money on fire like just you know

well you you have to pop right? You have to no one just watches TV anyone more especially not younger people you always have another screen out so if you're doing an ad you have to do something that makes people look up and I think um you know obviously I work at fight it's we we make ads we've have always tried to make our ads pop and like say something a little bit different because by the end of a campaign you're just the viewers are running scared from ads it's just like ugly like attack ad after attack ad, it doesn't work. So, you have to find them in different places and then you have to kind of complement it and amplify your other messages. You can't just be in a void. But if you're like whether it was in Michigan or in Texas, people had hundreds of millions of dollars and it didn't work because you can't just like yell at people with the same boring ads. You have to try new things and you have to put your

candidate in different kinds of situations so that people, you know, get interested in it. We had for Gina, we had the flock camera ad. We had data centers. We were we were we had this ad about you know her pronouns are mom governor and uh mom Texan and soon to be governor, right? Like we kept having to try to do new things to get people's attention.

Yeah. I think ads it's often like a mutually assured destruction thing, right? The Republicans were spending more than we were and you fear and you probably are polling and seeing whether or not they have an effect. You know, the the minute when we started talking about Mississippi in earnest was for me it was early October, late September because in September was when the byan annual Democratic freakout happened about how much money we were being outspent by. But when we got to the end of September, early October, the numbers hadn't moved. And I think that's because you can't convince people the sky is green, right? And I think Republicans, they were they were trying to convince people the sky was green and people weren't buying it. And at that point, I said, "Okay, they can spend another 100, 200, $500 million, but if all they continue to say is the sky is green, or god forbid, we might want to be nice to

trans people." Like, that's not going to resonate when people have to go to the gas station every day and pay $4 or $5 a gallon. So, advertising still works. It has to be multi- multi- channelannel. It has to be. It cannot just be linear television. It has to be digital. It has to be organic. It has to be paid. But you still have to advertise because especially in a state like Texas or Florida, there are too many voters. But the world matters. What you say really matters. And the fact that we had a chorus of people across the country in a multi- channelannel way at a national level and a state level and a local level basically all saying the same thing, that's how you win massive waves.

You know, one one other thing about Yeah. One other thing about uh the spending this time though is like do you have to have something to spend money to say? And Republicans were like, "Okay, so we started a war and everything's bad for you, so we're going to talk about trans people the whole time." And I mean, Darlene Graham literally just talked about trans people. That was all of her advertising. And the one of the things that Democrats figured out between 2024 and 2026 was how to talk about the trans issue, which was to basically say, "Why are you talking about the trans issue? Can you afford eggs?" and like that level of discipline, right? That because you know in in 2024, we all just remember Democrats were basically like, "Did you say trans? Excuse me. I have to run." Um and or I'm going to say like definitely you should pay for transitions for felons um with tax dollars, you know,

and like that was not popular. And this time Democrats really did figure out and they had different messages for where they were. Like some people were not happy. Like I was with Annie Andrews and you know I you could just see she was like please don't ask me about trans stuff. It's like really terrible here in South Carolina and she had to take a position that I think a lot of um Democrats might not have liked but everybody also understood she had to win in South Carolina. And this is one of the things um that I think Democrats coming out of 2024 are understanding that they have to be a little more flexible with their candidates. The way they understood this about Barack Obama in 2008 when Barack Obama wasn't for gay marriage, everybody knew like he's for gay marriage. Would you just let him get elected? And like people sort of understand that about Democrats right now, which is like they can't talk.

They're not they trans stuff is not good for them in South Carolina or Mississippi or whatever. Let them talk about affordability and do whatever they need to do to get elected because winners make policy and losers go home.

Yes. I I come back often. So much of what we need to do I get asked all the time, well, how do we what do we do with Latino voters? How do we Latino voters back? So much of it's not rocket science. It really isn't for any group of people. You talk to them about the things that they care about and you do it in a way with messengers and language that uh reflects them. And here's the thing though, that's not just an ad. We we like to simplify campaigns down to an ad. Ads do work, by the way. Like there's a lot of literature. Ads do work. Even now, they still work. They tend to work at the end because the effects of it decay very quickly. So that's why you have a lot of spending at the end. If you let one side do all the spending, you're going to get your ass kicked. All these things are true, but that's the very end. To your point, the issue environment is everything in between. And I think

sometimes the wonkier, more technocratic, democratic set think, okay, well, the election's over. Now let's talk policy. when in reality the policy choices you make, the fights you decide to engage on or to pick are all political. You can't go legislate now and think that voters don't hear. Voters understand what your priorities are based on what you do year round. And so you can't get at the end and say like, well, I really care about the economy, but I spent the last year and a half talking about everything except the economy. It is about the consistency of doing this year round.

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In 2018, we a lot of people voted for Trump. they turn around, voted for Democrats uh in the midterms and then threequarters of those voters turned around and voted for Trump again in 2020. And so as you guys think and this is a little bit different because it's not, you know, it's going to be a different Republican uh presumably. Um, and as you guys think about what Democrats need to do both with the power we have, but also like tactically, you know, message-wise, strategically to lock in some of these gains or at least give our 2028 nominee the opportunity to build on them. Do you guys have thoughts on things the party could be doing?

The most important thing is helping Texas succeed because if we can take Texas off the table in 2028, it's ballgame. Uh, so

it's a good point. What happened? You're not wrong. Are you going to argue soon?

No, no, I I had I honestly hadn't thought of it. I was like, "Yeah, it's a good point." Yeah, that's a lot of electoral votes.

So, I I think that's really important, but we also have to remember that presidential years are different than midterms. I think a lot of our nominees in 2020 or a lot of our candidates tried to overlearn the lessons of 28 and outdo each other and they just they they weren't authentic to who they were. And if we're going to win in 28, we also need candidates to figure out who they are and what they're running on and then have other examples of what they've done. And we just can't roll over now that we've got this. Like it's not they didn't they didn't all vote for for Democrats. They voted against Republicans in a lot of these races. So for 28, we need them to want to vote for us. And that is going to be the big, you know, thing we got to get done.

You said this backstage, so I don't want to steal too much of the of the of your thunder, but

did I say something smart? You said something another thing smart. Um, but the messengers that we have coming in to the house, right, are diverse in talent, in ability, in demography, in every way. um on both sides here in Washington in the governor's offices etc. Now obviously the party is going to be defined by who our nominee ultimately is. That's how it always has been. But for the next year in particular and the next two years in general, we have people not only who are talented and have able to communicate our message but like like you were saying Sarah are uniquely fasile in this media environment, the new media environment, right? So whether it's an Abdul or a Talico or that old guy whose name I'm forgetting, Chuck in Western North Carolina who somehow won a house race who was like apparently great at Tik Tok. Um, if you haven't seen him, like I I got lost in his Tik Tok feed one night and like then I didn't go to

bed till 5. It's it's incredibly endearing. But we have all these people who are really really good at communicating a message. We have to our leaders here in DC, our leaders at the state parties, etc. even while we get lost in the uh in the presidential primary have to put those people forward.

And the way that DC communicates is not that different than when Dan and I were on the Hill 20 years ago. You know, they have their big caucus meeting, they come out, they do a press conference, and it's like, that's it. We could have me dozens of different members and senators actually say, "Here's what's happening today. Here's what we are doing. Here's what we're trying to pass. Here's who's not letting us pass this. Go call them. Go make a difference." Like we can use the power of this to actually change. We got to get into it.

Everyone has their own channel now. I mean we we have media entities millions. Abdul is a media entity now. James Terrier Rico is like bigger than NBC like you know you know we've got we've got media entities we got to use.

Let's use it. Let's use it. It's that gets us to 2028 which is gonna m it's obviously it matters in who we pick and we have to pick the right person that will define the brand but it's also worth knowing that at some point next year that's going to become the dominant story for voters and maybe even sooner like I always like in 2006 right we win this historic victory Nancy Pelosi becomes the first female speaker of the house we have all these new people John tester coming all these new democrats we use them they get sworn in on January 3rd on January 13th Barack Obama announced he's running for president. Two weeks later, Hillary Clinton announced she's running for president. No one ever sees the Hill ever again. And so I don't think it'll be like that this time. That was obviously like a titanic once in a century presidential primary. But I at some point when the debates start over the summer, that's going to become the

face of the party and there's great risk in that. And that was a great risk in 2019 because we talked about everything other than the things people cared about. Have you guys sort of thought about like what advice you would give candidates about not just how for them to win the primary, but for the best face they could put forward for the party for whoever the eventual nominee is.

Just the one thing I'll say about this, and it goes back to my community, I don't know if there's a way to do this. Um, but it feels like there should be some kind of a non-aggression pact that just kind of keeps people from like tearing each other's faces off. Like it's not like they shouldn't have a competition of ideas, but it almost feels like this kind of success, you could rewrite the way that you do the primary, which is to say a bunch of the Democrats say like, "Hey, there's a bunch of different ideas out here. Let's go around and instead of just like letting we don't have to do politics the way we used to do politics. You don't have to let NBC set you up for a debate and

Sarah, have you met Twitter?" Boy, has Sarah met Twitter. What do you What do you mean? Oh, about tearing each other's face off.

Yeah. Incidentally, I do have a bit of a Twitter face ripping off problem myself and so I I I understand physician heal thyself on this, but I just for the candidates, it does feel like like let us rip the faces off and let the candidates say there is an opportunity for us to all sit down and like debate these ideas in really good faith and not like destroy each other over it so that they can move in to 2028 with not exactly a unified front, but with a sense that this is a good faith effort to do something great for the American people and not just a factional fight.

And then the other thing I'll say just because I I I wanted to mention this before, there's going to be a real tricky point here on a couple of places. One is you guys may have heard that not everybody's super psyched about Hakee Jeff or Chuck Schumer being the next leaders and okay, but also do you guys want to have a big nasty fight as your first thing right out of the gate? I'm not sure. It's a question for the room. Uh I'm not sure. And then the other tricky point uh to think about in terms of governing is like what do you do on the accountability front? Who you hold accountable and how much of that is Trump? And I've been a big proponent of not um not uh impeaching Trump because I think you end up then with repolarizing your audience or your voters uh with a rally round Trump effect and instead you should be focused on getting Trump to 32%. Uh that Bush line that I love to talk about which is what they were

shouting before. Um because you want them to be an albatross around every because this was the other thing about the focus groups I did the morning after. We asked them about 2028 and all of the Republicans in those groups said our nominee cannot be somebody who is associated with the Trump administration. Now, right now, and that's good, right? Right now, they are separating Republicans into MAGA Republicans and like whatever's left over now that could be vaguely normal. And Democrats can win some of those vaguely normal people with this new generation of people. And so, Democrats, I think, still have to think about an offense strategy on Trump to make sure he is deeply unpopular and do nothing to make him accidentally more popular.

I I've made it this far without talking about immigration. So, let me just talk about immigration because it's important for multiple fronts. One is this primary. I will say obviously immigration was an important factor in this midterm, especially among Latino voters. It wasn't the main factor. It wasn't the only factor. It was a factor among many, but it was part of a much broader story about the message that Trump was sending and Republicans were sending about who they care about, who they feel belongs, who they fight for, and who they don't.

That was only possible because Democrats got more disciplined on immigration. All Americans, including Latinos, want order at the border. You don't want to have a stupid border fight. A lot of the stupid immigration policies came out of a primary uh in 2020 where people were floating ideas were racing to the left and so they were trying to find some way to distinguish themselves. And I think it's important throughout the primary to have voices because the the candidates themselves are not going to do it. Voices who are helping check and say, "Please guys, let's think of the general election. Let's think of how this is going to play. Let's think about this affects the Democratic brand at any given moment." That said, when Trump was elected, I thought, okay, he could do smart fascism or he could do dumb fascism. If he did smart fascism, it would be like in major danger.

Obviously, we know what he chose. Just look at Pete Hex's caveman face. And now the poster boy of dumb fascism is the chief of staff of the White House. And he's not trying to help Republicans win. So, like from an electoral standpoint, great. But he is there to check off other items on his agenda list and top of that is really cruel immigration policies. And you know there were a lot of people who thought that Democrats shouldn't put back push back on what Trump was doing on immigration. But once he started crossing that line, it was an important turning point in his administration that first summer of 2025. It was strategic. It wasn't just taking the bait. We weren't defending uh uh you know murderers being deported. We were saying no, you are going after hardworking people in our communities.

And so keeping that strategy while this is happening and defending our communities, we don't have to stay quiet in order to win elections. I think that is one lesson from 2026. At the same time that we are not absolved from being strategic at all times.

Moral clarity is a good thing. Moral clarity is a good thing. I don't know what to say. I mean, I think uh this primary is going to be tough. Um, and you know, in many ways, the 2019 primary, I agree, I ran a campaign in it. I remember it well. It was not the uh best time I've ever had in my life. But, um, I do think we did a good job. I think because Trump was president and the unifying factor behind all of us was we can't let him get another term to not tear each other apart. Then you have 2008 and 2016, two primaries I also worked on where that was not necessarily the case for the uh entirety of the uh of the primary season. I think this one is honestly more likely to be like 2008 or 2016. But I think

and that it'll go longer or that it'll be nasty nastier nastier. Um, I I just don't I just don't think there's much we can do about that because honestly, we have a 12-year boiling pot in our party that people in this room, I think, are well aware of that basically we've we've kept the lid on because of the threat of Donald Trump. And in many ways, what happened on Tuesday, in my opinion, was the beginning of the end of Trump and Trumpism. But what does the Democratic Party Yeah, I know. Please, God willing, inshallah. Um but but what does the Democratic party look like in 20278 and beyond is an open question and we have to have that debate in public I'm totally fine with it. My my intreatry to anybody watching listening ever hearing this the candidates Scott if they want to listen to me is we have to not go so far as to not be able to come back together. We we we can't let Humpty Dumpty break all the way. And and in

many ways, I think that's about it's when things go from political to personal. It's when you start tearing human beings down for who they are or what their motives might be. Because I know that whatever candidate you don't support in the or candidates you don't support in the primary in 2028 are still going to be infinity times better than whatever they put up on the other side. And keeping that in the back of your mind when we're in the heat of battle in March of 2028 is going to be hard, but I I think we could all do it.

I don't mind a messy primary. I'm sorry. I just I think that's the way that we're gonna get somebody good. It's like when you're you're going through the playoffs and you're just winning a game every week, you get better and better for the Super Bowl. Like we got to do that, too. Uh 2008 was one of the messiest primaries I've ever seen and we got Barack Obama after it. So, I'm I'm for it. You know, I just want to make sure I I in Michigan especially, the attacks were so personal and so hideous on Abdul. Every day they called him a terrorist or a jihadist. It was just it was it was so ugly. So my my wish going forward is that we can at least keep it a a lot less personal because I do think we forget that some of these candidates are actually people and when you're spending hundreds of millions of dollars to attack them it it like it does something. So I just if we can keep it focused on policy

and have a lively discussion I think we'll be better at the end of the day. Yeah. I I completely agree with that. I think like one of the big things I think people are going to have to try to avoid is just because you disagree on an issue that you are therefore corrupt for your position. Like you can have you can disagree on how you're going to do universal healthcare and it doesn't if you believe one thing you're not in the pocket of this person or the other person. I think that's a very important thing. I think the thing that people are um most concerned about concerns me is whether we end up like like what the 2019 campaign primary was not nasty mostly at all. I mean, the things people fought over were insanely stupid. Like whether you thought Elon Musk should be banned from Twitter or all those other things. Um, but the but it was the bidding the bidding each other into these very unpopular positions that

actually didn't come back to haunt us for another four years. Um, so that I think that's the big thing. Carlos, last question. I can't let you off the stage without having to defend the entire polling industry. Um, if we if if if this had been a disappointing night, we would all this entire panel would have been why the polls were wrong.

Yeah. Yet they were still wrong. They were. And so I'm the I'm sure your polls were perfect, but um if just say a little bit about like how you're thinking about what we need to do to get to more accurate numbers. It's just cooler when they underestimate us and the other side, but they're still wrong. The polls were wrong. We can say that polls um underestimated Democrats in every Senate seat except Nebraska. Uh the average of generic ballot was D plus 9. The result was D+ 14. So in Yeah. Wow. Right.

Uh so yeah, individual pollers polls were good. The forecasts were good actually if you judge them as forecast probabistic forecasts, not in terms of what their like median guess was. That's not what people do. People try to have it both ways. Um, but here's what I would say. Nate Silver says this. All polls at this point are models. There is not, we are not in the heyday where we are getting a perfectly randomly sampled uh, uh, slice of the electorate. Response rates are so low. We're using, you know, online methods where you're doing like nonproistic samples. And so everything you're like waiting very heavily toward your expectations. So what does that mean? At EKIS, our final Latino number was 63% which would have been Biden levels. Um, but that was the waiting scheme we used.

We published all the other waiting schemes that we could have looked at. And if we had uh favored more how people were telling us they were going to whether people were how people telling us their vote intent, whether they were going to vote or not, it would have been 65. If we didn't wait on how people had voted in 2024, which we did do, it would have gone up to 70%, which is probably about what the final result is,

which does get maybe to the idea that people were so worried about an overcorrection.

Yes, it's a defensible mechanism if you think that there are Republicans who aren't responding to your polls disproportionately. But here's what I would say. It was wrong in 2026, but if you tried to not wait on recall every cycle, you'd also be in trouble. waiting on recall helped in 22 and in 2024. So at the end of the day, what's happening is you're betting you're as a pollster, you're guessing. These are educated guesses, but you're guessing. And so the real message to consumers is don't use polls as therapy. See like an actual therapist. Like your mood should not be connected to what the the average is at any given point.

But if it is, I have a podcast for you all. Okay, sorry I'm going into your bottom line, but I'll say but like we should be transparent about what polls actually can do, which is like puncture our view, our our own little views of the electorate, but understand them as a range, understand them as possibilities, understand that we're all trying to uh better gro what actually matters in elections. Um, but there's a lot of factors beyond those poll numbers and so you don't have to religiously wait for the New York Times Sienna um every few weeks.

Okay, we are at time. So, I want to thank Sarah, Carlos, Rebecca, and Adisu. These are some of the smartest people in politics, and I could talk to them for hours, but we got to get off the stage. Thank you everyone. Pave America is brought to you by PDS Debt. Are you tired of making monthly payments without seeing your balance go down? PDS debt can help you break free. Minimum payments aren't designed to get you out of debt. They're designed to keep you stuck. PDS debt is the way out. They can reduce up to half of what you owe on credit cards, personal loans, and medical bills. And it starts with a free 30 secondond assessment at pds debt.com/crooked.

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That's pdsbet.com/crooked. This is cool. Not bad. Wow. Uh, welcome everyone. Governor, thank you for being here. It's good to be here.

Uh, congratulations on your re-election. Thank you. Uh, I saw that you just squeaked by.

Yeah, it was a nailbiter there. Yeah. Um, uh, Democrats of course had an incredible Tuesday in Pennsylvania, but also Kansas, South Carolina, Texas, Mississippi. Um, what do you think Democrats in those red states and purple states did right that uh, Democrats haven't done right in the past?

Well, first off, I think it is incredible that we are winning everywhere. I mean, I want you to think about this on the state side. Of the top 10 states in America size-wise, nine of them are now represented by Democratic governors. Wow.

It's amazing. It's amazing. from Texas, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New York, California. And so it shows we can win anywhere. And I think for a long time politically, our party has had a 270 attitude. And I think we got to look back at Clinton, Obama who are pushing 370. And that needs to be our attitude. We got to show up everywhere. We got to treat people with respect. We have to have policies that actually make their lives better. And then we have to importantly show our results. In Pennsylvania, we call that GSD, get stuff done. And you know, I think it may sound corny to you. It may sound dorky to you, but when you actually get a permit in a day instead of a year, when you actually see the effect of the infrastructure work you do, when you actually see a kid get free breakfast or have a mental health counselor in their school, when you see the effect of job creation, when you see, as we did, that

we invested 60% more in helping push young people into the building trades so they can learn a skill. and go out and do the work we need in America. That's concrete stuff that matters. And that is what I saw candidates in Texas and Mississippi and South Carolina and elsewhere talking about concrete stuff to make people's lives better. And now they gave us the keys to the car. We got to drive it. We got to drive it well and we got to drive it forward.

Well, so you will now have the chance uh to govern Pennsylvania with Democrats in control of the state legislature. Yep.

Um like so much of your success over the last four years uh has been the ability to work with Republicans at times in the state senate. Um you've appointed Republicans to work in your administration. Do you think it's possible for that style of bipartisan governance um to work on a national level with this Republican party uh now or even after Trump is gone?

Look, I I'm always someone who believes you got to reach across the aisle and try and work with them. But I will just tell you my experience in Pennsylvania is while we got a whole lot of stuff done reaching across the aisle, there were moments about a year ago where I tried to reach out across the aisle to get stuff done and I was met with a rebuke. I reached out to every one of those Republican members of Congress in Pennsylvania before that beautiful budget bill came up for a vote and I said, "Hey, if you vote yes to give a tax cut to the people at the very, very top who do not need it, this is the number of people in your district who are about to lose healthcare. This is the number of people in your district who are going to lose SNAP. And I'm urging you to vote no." Some of them say, "Oh, governor, don't worry. I'll never vote for that. And then these cowards went to DC the next week and

they voted for it. And that was a moment where I realized trying to reach out and work with them was not possible. So I recruited four great candidates to run for Congress and we beat their asses on Tuesday night because you got to stand up for what's right. And sometimes sometimes achieving what's right is working with them in the halls of power and other times it's using our politics to go make change so you can deliver more for the American people. Um when you look out at the country, do you think our political and economic systems need fundamental change? Do you think like what what what do you think is the essential problem and challenge right now with our political and economic systems in the country?

You got an hour? I mean, it's it's a long answer and there's like it's you know there's I I I'll try it this way. There's there's a theory where um Trump has obviously been awful. Maybe Trump goes away and a Republican party goes back to normal post Trump. And there's also, you know what, what we really need is Democrats in power and once we get Democrats in power, they'll deliver more and things will be better. And then some people say, no, we actually need fundamental economic and political transformation.

Look, there's no going back and there's no looking in the rearview mir mirror. We have to look forward. We've got to have massive reform and real change in this country. And these midterms give us the ability to begin the process of laying out what we would change. Obviously, a whole lot of it will be stopped by Trump, but we have to be for concrete fundamental real change in our system. It's not about tweaking. It's not about working around the edges, it's about real significant change. Whether you're talking about how the government operates, the bureaucracy, whether you're talking about a broken health care system, whether you're talking about a broken foreign policy system, we have got to have real fundamental change. That's what I've tried to do in Pennsylvania. Not nibble around the edges, but make wholesale change. And I do think that is what America needs. We cannot yearn for a day in the past.

We've got to build for a brighter future. Um obviously um uh the country's dissatisfaction with cost of living was the top issue uh in these midterms. If you could get one big thing done nationally to bring down the cost of living to make life more affordable in America, what would it be?

Look, I I can just tell you I'm going to get to the one thing, but I can just tell you from my experience in Pennsylvania, it is by far been the number one thing. That's why we cut taxes 10 different times in Pennsylvania for people who are working, struggling to get by, for families who are trying to afford child care, for seniors who are trying to stay in their homes. These are progressive tax cuts that help put money in people's pockets. We built more affordable housing. We controlled the cost of healthcare. Now, in Pennsylvania, every time we put a dollar in somebody's pocket, the problem was Trump took two bucks out the other side cuz this war of choice in Iran, we had no business getting into, he's got no earthly idea how the hell to get out of because the tariffs that he clearly didn't understand when you put a tariff on Canada, we pay more in Pennsylvania and across America. And so, I understand

folks didn't necessarily feel it at the state level. So, what what do we need to do at the federal level? You got to bring down the cost of healthcare. You got to make sure that it is not just accessible, but affordable. And the best way this new Congress can do that is by using every bit of leverage they have to stop these Medicaid cuts from going into effect. They're going to harm so many people. 510,000 Pennians are in the process of losing access to healthcare. That just drives up the cost for everybody. I would love to see this new Congress come out of the gate and stop those cuts and hopefully use that as a way to begin to bring down the cost of healthcare. There's a lot they need to do, but you asked for one, so that's one example.

Um, your team has a memo out today that includes um that talks about all of your electoral success and what you've done to sort of uh like you said, recruit the the four excellent Democratic Congress uh Congress people to be. Um, it also includes a chart comparing the performance of every gubanatorial and senate candidate in a competitive race, specifically among independent voters and Republican voters. Spoiler alert, you are ranked number one. Um,

so it was a good memo, I guess, right? Although, you're smirking, so I can't wait to hear what the question's going to be.

It's an interesting chart for someone who is just focused on governing Pennsylvania. And I'm wondering,

am I There's the smirk right there. All right, I got it. Am I right to assume the intention was to um send a message about your potential strength as a 2028 presidential candidate?

First off, I I think what candidates were able to pull off in Kansas, in South Carolina, in Texas, I mean, these guys ran incredible races and and I couldn't be more impressed with what they did. I'm excited to get to know them. I'm excited to work with them. And I think what they are showing and I think what I showed in Pennsylvania is you got to build a big broad coalition in order to win, have a mandate to get stuff done and to be able to deliver on people's hopes and also address their fears. Uh look, I I would also tell you that it doesn't matter if you voted for Trump or Harris in the last election in Pennsylvania. They're all dealing with higher prices. It doesn't matter who you voted for in the past. You're disgusted by the corruption that is not only enriching Trump and his spoiled kids, but it's meaning less money in your own pocket. And so what I tried to do in my state was speak to that. Not in a

judgmental way about who they voted for in the past, but to try and show them a path forward where we could actually speak to meeting their needs, to addressing their challenges, and to making their lives better. And now the burden is on me and those other governors and the senators and the members of Congress to go deliver for them. I I would just note one other fact. I'm not sure if it's on that chart. I haven't read the memo, but I appreciate you reading the memo. Great.

Um if you look, we're going to end up winning somewhere north of about 40 seats um in the Congress of the United States. Roughly 2/3 about 60% of those wins are from districts that Donald Trump won by eight points or more. So you can look at the senators and the governors. I think that tells an interesting story, but go look at those members of Congress. People like Paige Cognetti who won in Scranton. I love Paige.

Love Paige. And that's a district Trump, if memory serves me correct, I think Trump won that by eight and a half for nine points. and we won that district this time. It is imperative that those members of Congress are not one hit wonders. They got to come back. And the way we get them to come back is by making sure the things they spoke to effectively in this election. How to bring down costs, how to end the war in Iran, how to make sure that there is a check on this corruption. They've got to be able to legislate effectively that way and show their constituents that they are going to deliver for them. And if we do that effectively, then we can build that durable majority and we should be thinking as a party about 370, not 270. And that's our path forward.

Um, might you be one of the people thinking about 370 as a potential candidate? I was just going to try again. Right.

I'm thinking about I'm thinking about right now governing with a Democratic trifecta for the first time since 1978 in Pennsylvania. I was um was actually texting with Katie Hobbs last night in Arizona, great governor. She got a trifecta for the first time I think since 1960 something. So, she beat me by a few years there. But I'm excited about that. And I'm also uh I think looking forward to making sure that as our party thinks about the direction we want to go in, that we are focused on a party that is looking at doing big things again. We're focused on significant reform, not rebuilding what is in the past, but building something big for the future. And I think coming from the, you know, the swingiest swing state in America, we got a little bit to say about that. And I definitely intend to be part of that conversation about what our party looks like going forward.

Well, it is it it you laid out a 100 day agenda. First 100 day agenda. So that would that would definitely So you're going to be there for that? That would take you into the spring.

I'm going to be there for the whole thing. The whole thing. The whole term. Come on.

I have to try. Yeah. All right. You're doing great. Um, we talked on the last panel about, uh, what the new Congress is going to do. Uh, everyone was in agreement about, you know, like what you said, doing everything possible to reverse the Medicaid cuts. Um, to also reverse the cuts to uh, ACA subsidies or at least to try to extend the ACA subsidies as we had before. Um, Primila Gyipol uh, and other progressives have said that they really want the Democratic House to vote on Medicare for all. Um, I know you helped elect Bob Brooks in Pennsylvania.

He campaigned on Medicare for all. Do you think that's a good vote for Congress to take and and how do you think about actually bringing down costs in the long term and and building a health care system that that everyone can count on?

Yeah. And look, I didn't hear the congresswoman's um comments, but look, they will decide what bills come up for a vote and the leadership will determine what the best way forward is. I think what is clear is our health care system is completely broken. Where President Obama did a great job of creating access, right? Trump has rolled back so much of that access and has driven up costs over the last decade. Part of the reason why costs have skyrocketed is because we've allowed too many middlemen into the system who are just draining costs out of the system. We did some real reform on PBMs, those pharmacy benefit managers that from my perspective have no business being involved in our health care system. All they do is drive up prescription drug prices. So number one, we got to get these middlemen out of the system. We've got to make sure that there is some sort of real competition in this private

system with call it a public option, call it a buyin on Medicare, whatever you're going to call it, there has to be real competition and there has to be access to that public option. We also have to get back to some basics here. If a doctor prescribes something, if a doctor says you need something, the damn insurance companies can't stop it. Okay? Like common sense stuff like that. So, I want to see Congress put all that in a bill. Call it whatever you want. Put whatever label you want, whatever slogan you want on it, but we need to show as a party we are for fundamental reform that brings down prices, gets rid of all the people getting rich off our system, and instead makes sure everybody's got access and affordability across the board.

Um, I want to ask you about AI. um since it could be the biggest issue over the next year without it could be the issue in 2028. Um

it's the issue, pardon me, right now. I was going to say right now. I mean, so you've had a lot of experience with this. You know, I know you announced a a $20 billion data center investment from Amazon last year. Um you've more recently put a lot of restrictions on on data centers. Um

like what what do you think you underestimated about what these projects would mean for the communities getting them? Yeah, look, I I think there's kind of two public policy conversations for now and there's probably going to be five more just over the course of the next six or eight months. That's how quick it's moving. The first thing is what does the infrastructure look like in America? So, in Pennsylvania, I put through an executive order the strictest guard rails in the entire nation. Number one, it says if a local community through their board of supervisors or whatever, votes down a data center, it's dead on arrival. They cannot do an end around to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania for our consideration.

Period. If a local community wants it in their area, they got to do a few things before you even get to the state. You have to have local labor building it. You have to have a local benefits agreement where the companies are going to invest millions and millions and millions of dollars in that local community. And then you get to come to the state where we have an even higher bar that you've got to get across. You got to generate your own power and a significant amount of it has to be clean energy and you have to pay 100% of your power costs so that there's no added cost to local consumers.

And then we've got very strict requirements on protecting air quality and water quality. But the key to my executive order is the local communities are in charge. We're not going to let these rogue developers run rough shot over communities. We put a stop to that in Pennsylvania. I mean, fun fact, since my executive order went into effect, not a single data center project has made its way to the Commonwealth for our consideration because local communities have not uh embraced it. So that's sort of conversation one, the infrastructure and I'd love to see at a national level a mirror image of what I've done um or mirror image is that the opposite I don't know the same thing of what we've done um in in Congress. The other conversation is how the hell to regulate AI and to me this is very simple like they are making a product that could have some benefits for us could also have a lot of challenges I'm not a

doomer but I am a realist and I understand that there are very real challenges as a result of this technology being built without any oversight like we don't let a pharmaceutical company make a prescription and tell you it's good for you go ahead and take it no it's got to go to the FDA first for their approval, for their review. We don't let like an airplane manufacturer build a plane, then you go fly to Detroit on it. You've got to go through the FAA for their approval. We need a similar federal initiative, a similar federal agency to test these models before they go out.

And the reason we don't have that is because Donald Trump and his kids are getting rich off of the fact that there is no regulation. This goes back to the corruption and why the corruption is so insidious. Our lives are being compromised. Our communities are being hurt because Trump is looking to make a buck off this as opposed to actually regulating it. We need responsible regulation at the federal level. And I believe we can still beat China. We can still move quickly and responsibly with federal oversight. So I think both conversations need to happen now. And then we also have to have some really serious conversations about the social effects of this, about the workforce effects of all this. And that's something hopefully we can start under this new Congress.

Um, do you think on the development of AI, do you think we need to slow it down? Do you think we need to There's been proposals uh bandied about on banning super intelligence. uh this idea that you know there's recursive self-improvement which is suddenly the AI is building the next AI and you hear people at the companies including the people running the companies um expressing some concern about that and so I think on one hand there's like regulation let's make sure there's guardrails but it's moving really fast and you do wonder if you at least need I mean you know Dario called for a you know they called for a pause right uh in in in the development of super intelligence. Do you think that government needs to step in there?

Government has to step in there. I mean, it is insane to me that we are leaving it up to these CEOs to determine whether or not they should proceed with something, that something's helpful for the world, harmful for the world. You know, if you think about it, their job is to build these models. Their job in some cases of the public companies is to deliver for their shareholders. Their job is not to be the regulators. We need regulators. We need responsible adults in the room who are making sure this technology is developed in a way that doesn't harm the American people. And the reason we don't have that is because Donald Trump continually stands in the way of regulation. And I believe the reason he stands in the way of regulation is because he's making a buck off this. And that puts us all at risk.

I think this federal oversight needs to happen not two years from now when hopefully Democrats control the White House, but over the course of the next several months. We cannot rely on the CEOs of these companies to do what is in the best interest of America. There has to be a regulatory environment, a regulatory structure to do that. And I believe to the first part of your question, you can do that and still move swiftly, still beat China, still ensure that communist China is not dictating the rules of AI, which I don't think anybody wants. So, we can do all this in a responsible way, but is going to require us to build this oversight structure immediately.

Um, you uh you said in 2020 that um the electoral college should be abolished. You now have a Democratic legislature. Um, would you push to join the National Popular Vote Compact? Uh, which for people who don't know would award the the participating states electoral votes to the national vote winner once enough states join. And now that after Tuesday, there are now enough Democratic Democratic trifectas um to actually get to that point.

Yeah, look, I I think the national popular vote makes sense. My views on that have have not changed. Um, I'll work with lawmakers to figure out what the right mechanism is for moving forward on that. But look, we're the ultimate swing state in Pennsylvania. We're the the biggest swing state. We're proud of that role we play. I think Pennsylvania can still play a massive role even in a national popular vote. And to me, the most important thing is that the will of the people is heard and respected. And I think popular vote is a way to do that.

I was going to say, yeah, because are do you have any concern that it would reduce the role of Pennsylvania in this

because we still have 13 million incredible people with diverse interests, diverse backgrounds, and if you want to win a national election, you sure as hell better show up in Pennsylvania and and hear the people of our great Commonwealth.

Um, you helped stop two ICE detention centers in Pennsylvania. Um, Two massive ones, by the way. They wanted to house 9,000 human beings in Burks and Skookul County. I said, "Hell no. We fought back. We won. We drove them out of Pennsylvania."

Yeah. What um what do you think should happen to ICE under the next Democratic president? Reform it, rebuild it, replace it.

I I actually think your question is too limited. And I mean that respectfully. I I think

I was going to get to asylum policies next. if you Oh, I mean I think the entire Department of Homeland Security is broken. I think it is outdated. I think it was built in response to 9/11. By the way, built by a friend and a predecessor, Governor Tom Ridge, um you know, a patriotic American, but it was built to deal with threats from 25 years ago. And I think the threats are completely different now. And I agree with uh with Michael Tridoff and Jay Johnson, one who served Obama, one who served Bush. The entire agency needs to be overhauled, ICE included. But I think we need to focus on the threats that exist today. I think we need to build an immigration enforcement office or whatever underneath that that is compassionate, that is focused on actual proper law enforcement tactics. I I I was a former chief law enforcement officer in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania as the attorney general for

6 years. I know what it takes to have a successful law enforcement agency. It's not about the guns. It's not about the the machinery or the weaponry. It's actually about building trust with a community. And ICE has completely eliminated all trust with communities across America. Cannot continue to exist as it is. But I would say just focusing on overhauling whatever the word is, ICE, is too limited. We need a complete overhaul of DHS. Period. Um, you called for an end to the Iran war. Uh, do you think Democrats should refuse to vote for a funding bill u that keeps funding the Iran war?

Absolutely. Period. I mean, I you know, the senators and the members of Congress up here, they'll tell you what the mechanism is for which vote or what have you. I'm not going to get into that. But the idea that we would give Pete Hegs, who is like an 8-year-old playing with toy soldiers, completely incompetent, that we would give him money to continue to prosecute a failed war, a war they had no business getting into. You'll remember the president never explained why we were going into it. He has no earthly idea how to get out of it. And anyone in a freshman political science class would have told you first thing they're going to do is shut down the trade of hormuz. And they had no plan for that. Um I I think this is a moment where our party needs to stand firm and use the power of the purse strings to stop them from going forward here.

Um and by the may I just add one more thing? I I think we can all agree no one here no one here has any sympathy for the IRGC. No one here wants Iran to have a nuclear weapon. But what is clear is that Donald Trump does not have a plan to stop them from developing that nuclear technology. And he doesn't have a plan to manage the crisis that he's created in the Middle East.

Uh some pretty interesting and and rather sudden shifts on Israel from the Trump administration in the last week. Uh,

by the way, we made it 20 minutes before he asked me about Israel, right? That might be a record here for me. How about that?

Uh, well, some news. Trump announces on election day that he's ending annual aid to Israel.

JD Vance uh posts a 600word Twitter essay about the election. Um, I didn't know that was possible that you could put that many words.

It's a very annoying shift now. Now people think that they're we all want to read your thousand word tweets. We don't.

Um JD Vance listed the need to change our relationship with Israel is one of the top four reasons Republicans lost the midterms. Do you agree with that

on the JD Vance thing? I mean look, American people spoke very clearly. Stuff costs too much and they're too damn corrupt in Washington. And JD Vance wears both of that. I mean, I I had to laugh that Vance now is uh he's trying to like brush the stink of Trump off of him with this, I guess, 600word tweet. It doesn't work that way. He made his bed. He's with Trump. He stuck with Trump. And no matter how much he tries to distance himself from Trump and the failed policies and the corrupt actions, it's not going to work. People were fed up. Look, I I I traveled to communities that voted for Trump and Vance overwhelmingly. I I was in a county in Pennsylvania. Trump and Vance got 80% of the vote against Kla Harris back in in 2024. And you know what those folks voted for? These are good and decent people. Even though we've got differences of opinion on who they voted for for president, they voted for lower

costs. They voted for an end to the wars. And they voted for, as Trump loves to, you know, say, to drain the swamp. And what do they have? Higher costs, more wars, and far more corruption than existed before Donald Trump got here. And so they sold him a bill of goods. And I think folks voted in this election in a way that they instinctively understood that what Trump and Vance promised them, they've not only failed to deliver on, they've made those issues ma worse or they've made matters worse. And no matter how many tweets Vance puts out, he's stuck. Vance showed himself to be a profoundly and pathetically weak human being when he sold his soul to Donald Trump and now he's stuck with the stink of Donald Trump on it.

Um I I know I know you've said that we should change our military agreement with Israel. What would your policy actually be and and where would it differ from what Trump announced and what Trump is doing right now? Yeah, I mean, look, I think what what Trump and and you know, many members of Congress on the left and the right have said is we should stop this military aid, the subsidized aid. I agree with that. I also believe that America has a national security interest for ourselves in having a stable Middle East that extends not just in Israel but in what I hope would be a Palestinian state and throughout the entire Arab world. And I think it is important to make sure that nations have the ability to defend themselves against attacks from rogue actors, from terrorist actors. But that is different from the military aid that we have seen over um you know over really decades now stretching back to

your time service in the White House. Would you restrict weapon sales at all? Well, I think we sell weapons, America does, to lots of countries, and it's done in a way where there are very strict requirements on those sales, what it can be used for, how it can be used, and should those nations violate the terms of the sales, they would no longer be permitted to purchase those weapons. And I think Israel should be treated as other nations are.

Um, last question, very important question about the next administration. What do we do at the ballroom?

First off, I got a whole bunch of building trades from Philly who would love to show up with a hammer and a chisel and scrape that gold off the white house.

Get it off. I mean, are we keeping it? Are we tearing it down? Are we turning it into a cheesecake factory? What?

I mean, it is nuts. I did think that was a funny line. Did you write that line?

I I don't take credit for those kind of things. um president writes all look there there is a serious point here I mean whether it's the Kennedy center whether it's the ballroom whether it's that reflecting pond or any of that stuff there has to be congressional oversight of what this guy's doing you know to our national monuments to our historic places and so before they even build this thing I know they got sort of a scaffolding up or whatever Congress has to exert its power here and it has to make sure that whatever is built there is in keeping with I think our standards and in keeping with something that is appropriate for that venue.

Sounds good. And the building trades are going to go scrape that off the walls in two years.

Thanks everybody so much for joining Crooked Con. Thank you. Appreciate it. That's our show for today. Hope you enjoyed it. We'll be back in the feed on Tuesday with two more conversations. A panel I led on the Democratic brand and Love Its interview with Senator Alyssa Slotkin. Then Dan and I will be back on Friday with a brand new episode. Talk to everyone soon. Positive America is a crooked media production. Our show is produced by Austin Fischer, Saul Rubin, McKenna Roberts, Michael Goldmith with Reed Cherlin, Elijah Conn, and Adrien Hill. Our team includes Matt Dgro, Ben Heft, Jordan Caner, Charlotte Landis, Kenny Moffet, Adam Liipper, Joseph Dudra, Desmond Taylor, Dan Farrell, David Tols, Mia Kelman, Ryan Young, and Naomi Single. Our staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "Top Political Strategists Debate How Democrats Can Ride The Blue Wave Through 2028"?

John (Guest), Carlos Odio (Guest), Rebecca Katz (Guest), Sarah Longwell (Guest), Adisu Desi (Guest), Josh Shapiro (Guest).

What is "Top Political Strategists Debate How Democrats Can Ride The Blue Wave Through 2028" about?

A panel of leading Democratic strategists analyzes the 2028 political landscape, highlighting unexpected outcomes from the recent elections, including rural affordability pressures, voter trends, and strategies to sustain a Democratic surge. Key contributors discuss what happened, why it happened, and implications for future campaigns.

What is mentioned in this Pod Save America episode?

139 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Democratic Party, Donald Trump, Congress, 2026 United States midterm elections, Pennsylvania, Republican Party. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Top Political Strategists Debate How Democrats Can Ride The Blue Wave Through 2028"?

The episode runs 1 h 39 min; the transcript is about 18,901 words in 192 timestamped sections.

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About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated November 8, 2026.