Trump Faces New Washington Reality

0:02Will President Trump meet Washington's new reality with an olive branch or an iron fist? Well, his words signal compromise, but his pick for chief of staff suggests otherwise. I'm Dana Bash. Let's go behind the headlines and inside politics.

0:23It is a new chapter here in Washington on both sides of Pennsylvania Avenue. On one end, newly elected Democratic majorities are already flocking to the Capitol, the new members for orientation. Democrats are on track to have one of the biggest House majorities in decades. Could end up with 56 seats in the Senate. And on the other side of Pennsylvania Avenue, 1600 to be precise, it is Stephen Miller's first day as White House Chief of Staff. Miller has been with the president since Donald Trump first launched his campaign back in 2015 and is the hardest of hardliners, especially when it comes to immigration.

1:06Miller's appointment signals one word, fight, despite the emphatic rebuke from the American people on Tuesday last week. Another signal the president's post this morning now casting doubt on the election results that he seemed to have already accepted. Quote, does anybody really believe that this, quote, election, end quote, was honest? How could the polls be so wrong? They weren't. That's me, not him. It's all about the machines, which are far more important than ever. I'm joined by a terrific group of reporters. Elena, it's like the five stages of Trump grief. And now we're into the election denial phase.

1:47We'll see what happens afterwards. words. But what's going on inside the White House today on day one of Stephen Miller? There's a lot. And on that post, just to bring up as well, I will say, I remember talking with my sources who were with the president, some on the outside who were talking with him that night when he was in the reception room as the results were coming in, watching just how bad the midterms were for Republicans. He acknowledged, and other people in the room acknowledged, that it was likely too big of a win. Too big to rig. Exactly. One of his advisors said that to me, that it was too much of a win for them to expect any kind of sweeping challenges of the certification process or any calls of fraud.

2:29We're now almost a week later and now the president is returning to that. So I definitely agree with this as part of his grieving process almost with what happened. As for what to expect today, look, it is going to be a different kind of West Wing now under Stephen Miller's leadership. But one thing I think is really important to note is just how powerful Stephen Miller was before he was elevated to this role. Yes, Susie Weil was the White House Chief of Staff. The president looked to her for everything. But Stephen Miller was almost right there with her with how much power he was wielding. And that will continue.

3:02And I think, obviously, he has this immigration background. I'm sure you're going to want to talk about that 60 Minutes interview. But I think that this hire with Stephen Miller was not necessarily about immigration. It was he is someone who has been with Trump from the beginning. The president knows he's loyal to him, trusts him, and believes that he was the kind of person that could step into Hillary Clinton. I totally agree. It's not necessarily about immigration, but immigration is, you can't think of Stephen Miller without thinking of the policy that was in place that he directed from the White House, the quotas that he put in place, which led to these mass deportations that the president himself on 60 Minutes said maybe went too far.

3:44Let's watch. So you think your deportation policy went too far? It was too tough. I think it might be too tough, yeah. What would happen? What does the deal look like with the Democrats? I think ultimately that hurt me. Manu? Yeah, I mean, there's been no sign of any sort of course correction post last week. I mean, Trump's been blaming everybody else but himself and elevating the hardest of hardliners, someone who has virtually no bone of compromise in his body. Stephen Miller is not known to cut deals with Democrats. But that's exactly what he's going to have to do or have to have some movement towards Democrats if they want to get anything accomplished.

4:26And pretty much the only thing they're going to have to get accomplished with Democrats in charge is keeping the lights on for the federal government, which is going to be an issue they're going to have to deal with time and time again over the next two years. But, I mean, Trump's post is just today denying the election results when he had clearly accepted them, everyone else has accepted them. It's just a sign that he is showing no efforts to try to change course at all post-election, which is obviously much different than past presidents have done when they have suffered such shellacking. Let's listen to the way that Hakeem Jeffries, who is very likely to be the new House Speaker come January, the way that he reacted to what's going on in the administration, especially Stephen Miller's promotion?

5:10We can work with the administration to the extent that they are willing to do things that make life more affordable for the American people. Without having to work with someone who is so clearly unqualified and absolutely in the context of being the architect of the violent mass deportation machine, it is fair to say that Stephen Miller has blood on his hands. And just to walk not that far down memory lane, here are just some examples of what Stephen Miller has said about the Democratic Party. The Democrat Party has embraced the platform of individuals who fundamentally hate America and hate Americans.

5:57The Democrat Party is not a political party. It is a domestic extremist organization. But let's work together, everybody. Well, I feel like what Manu said, there's no indication that President Trump is going to try to work with Democrats. I feel like putting Stephen Miller here is a sign that he wants someone who's going to fight. But it's also an indication that President Trump still has not learned the lessons of the election. And I wonder if it's ever going to sink in. I wonder if maybe Republicans in Congress or somebody's going to say, hey, we have got to course correct because this trajectory, not only is it like not it doesn't pay off, it's not working and we are losing badly.

6:43And quite frankly, it can get worse in 2028. Like, I don't know if the president thinks that, you know, maybe we fight for two years and get it back. But that's not necessarily what might happen. I think that you're on to something because, I mean, you're all basically saying different versions of the same thing, that there's no course correction. And he's going back to what he knows best, which is to fight and to double down. And if somebody investigates him, well, I'm going to investigate you back or in the private sector, I'm going to sue you back. A prime example was Todd Blanche, the attorney general, who came on with me yesterday.

7:18Let's watch. They are talking about investigation as part of their oversight role that is prescribed by the Constitution, which which, you know, is very well laid out. Is that what you're concerned about? Sorry, you're concerned about something else? Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. No, no, no, no, no. They have a very unique role in oversight. I agree. Have you been listening to the rhetoric the past couple of days? You honestly think that all they're doing is talking about their oversight obligations when they're talking about going after basically every member of the cabinet. They're talking about impeachments.

7:53They're talking about going after companies, private companies who happen to have made investments in this country over the past couple of years. That is not oversight. I welcome oversight. So oversight is exactly something they should be doing. So are you saying that you are going to investigate them? And what you just described, is there a crime there? Well, what I just, it depends on what's said. So yes, there could be. And then I had Robert Garcia, the incoming House Oversight Chair, saying we're not going to be intimidated. Yes, and I think everyone put Stephen Miller's appointment in the right context.

8:25This is not somebody who you elevate to deal with Congress. You're not expecting to get many deals with Congress in the next two years. It's somebody who, like Russ Vogt, was in the first administration, got a PhD in how to use executive power to get things you want, even if Congress has not come along with you, and is very happy to confront Democrats and pick political fights. But you saw it from that clip. He could have picked from hours of clips. His political instincts this year were terrible. The fights he was trying to pick with Democrats over DSA, over immigration, over he was very invested in the Senate race advancing what was awful messaging, what gender is James Tallarico, etc.

9:00So he's combative. And I find worry about Miller from kind of larger Democratic policy world, think tanks who worry that maybe he'll go after their finances or go legally will todd blanchett's doj make problems for democrats online they're congressionally they're less worried about it because they think they're going to confront somebody who doesn't have good instincts and they have the oversight tools to fight back uh if if it's tit for tat garcia maybe showed a little bit more leg than every democrat was comfortable doing but they want that message out there okay if you there's nothing that we're afraid of investigating because you're clearly that afraid of announcing an investigation in alaska or minnesota right before the election so we can do that too what the republic democrats are suggesting here is not unlike what other majorities have done coming in, like Republicans when they were taking the House.

9:41They made very clear they're going to investigate Joe Biden, and they very much did. And I also think we just can't ignore the fact that that's part of what voters told Democrats at the polls this year, is that they are concerned that there is this air of corruption surrounding President Trump, the White House, allies, people aligned with him, everything from reports that people are paying for pardons to who gets contracts and they want it investigated. All right, everybody stand by. Up next, we have brand new CNN reporting from our colleague Ted Barrett on Capitol Hill on a Democratic senator who may be eyeing Chuck Schumer's job.

10:17Plus, don't fight it, everyone. The 2028 cycle, it's here. We have results in from the first Democratic primary straw poll.

10:33Hey, I'm Anderson Cooper. On my podcast, All There Is, we explore grief and loss in all its complexities. My guest is Lil Jon. He's a rapper, DJ, and producer known for hits like Get Low and Turn Down for What. In February 2026, his 27-year-old son Nathan went missing near Nathan's home in Georgia. Three days later, his body was found in a pond nearby. eye. Lil Jon has a memoir that just came out called I Only Shout So You Can Hear Me. It takes time to heal and I kept myself busy that I didn't let myself mourn. I needed to laugh again. I needed to be silly and interact with people and feel other people's energy and make people happy too.

11:17We have to share so other people can see that they can get through it too. Talking grief, building community. That's what the podcast is all about. This is all there is. Listen and follow wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Dr. Sanjay Gupta, host of the Chasing Life podcast. You may have noticed gambling doesn't require a casino anymore. You can just open up your phone. It's designed to keep us coming back or maybe never even leaving in the first place. We're going to talk to Dr. Timothy Fong, co-director of UCLA's gambling studies program. You're going to learn what your brain is really chasing when you place a bet, and also importantly, how to keep the game from playing you.

11:58Gambling addiction, gambling disorder is the hidden addiction. You can't smell it, you can't taste it, you can't see it, you can't have a urine drug test. Who are we talking about here, Professor? Who's the most likely demographic to be affected by this? Literally any single human on earth. Listen to Chasing Life, streaming now, wherever you get your podcasts. This just in new reporting, a source tells CNN's Ted Barrett that Maryland Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen is considering challenging Chuck Schumer for the role of majority leader. This is according to a person familiar with Van Hollen's thinking.

12:35Quote, the senator has received an outpouring of calls on running for majority leader and is now in active listening mode. The door is not shut. An interesting development, right, as multiple incoming senators are saying it's time for Chuck Schumer to step aside. I'm looking for fresh ideas, but I'm also looking for somebody who's going to bring people together, bring Republicans and Democrats together, as opposed to further dividing us. And I think whether it's fair or not, Chuck Schumer is seen as a more divisive figure by many people. I think it is time for new leadership. Who wants to be the leader who's going to make sure that we deliver on the mandate that we just got?

13:12I want to see who else is in the running. I still very much believe that it's time for a generational change on both sides of the aisle. Manu, give us a reality check here because they're saying that and there's certainly going to be defections. But it is also true that Chuck Schumer helped deliver a pretty big majority, whether it's 54 now or ends up being 56 or 55. Yeah, what we're not hearing are that senators are voting for him and the vast majority will. And it's virtually assured that Chuck Schumer will be the next Democratic leader. This is a secret ballot election. This is about loyalty and what you've done for me lately, raising money and the like.

13:53But certainly, this is the most amount of dissension that Chuck Schumer has had in his tenure as Democratic leader. He is a polarizing figure on the left flank of his party. He's vulnerable if he runs for re-election in a Democratic primary in 2028, which is why a lot of people suspect that he will not run for re-election. He has not announced what he will do at the moment. and a lot of those folks from the left flank, but also Adam Hamilton, who you talked to yesterday. I talked to him on the campaign trail, too. He made very clear he was not going to support Chuck Schumer as leader. There are those new senators coming in who do want change.

14:22This is not unlike other leaders. Mitch McConnell had some dissension late in his tenure as Republican leader. Harry Reid had the same thing. Chuck Schumer is kind of going to that same grumbling that's happening internally. And Dave Weigel, I know you spoke with Van Hollen. I want to play, first of all, some sound from Van Hollen And also Alyssa Slotkin from over the weekend. I don't want to talk to you about it. Nobody should get a blank check without a full understanding from the caucus as to where we're going to go. Democrats in the sophomore class, the freshman class. I think there's a quite a bit of upward pressure.

14:55I don't have any big announcements to make, but those conversations are happening right now. The pressure she's talking about. I mean, after my conversation with Adam Hamilton, I got a text from an activist who has been working with a lot of progressives who said, this is not done yet, and said, we're pushing Van Hollen. Yes, and I've talked to strategists who are working on this, and they had machinery ready to go after the election. This is a bigger Democratic result than they thought, which changed things. But their expectation is that Jeffries is the heavy favorite, low chance of humor, but it's worth having the fight.

15:31When I talked to Van Halen at Crooked Con, that was his language, kind of repeating what he said on stage. But people want to debate. He wasn't saying, I have a strategy to expand this majority. It's that having won the election, we need to convince voters that you didn't just bring back in the people from the last Biden administration. I'm paraphrasing a little bit, but it was less about electoral strategy. It was about what do we owe people. And I asked him, how much credit does Chuck Schumer deserve for funding all these campaigns got majority? And he said, well, this is about people power over money, this election.

16:01That's what the left is saying, is that not that they would have won instantly anyway, but they want to get the details of the decisions Schumer made. They don't like the control he has over Senate recruitment and the decisions he makes in those races, but it is framed as a change question right now. It's framed from Van Hollen's perspective or Slocken's perspective as let's have the fight in public because the country just said we don't like the party that takes all of its dictation from the top. This is something Slocken's very consistent on. They voted for Democrats. maybe they're okay with a party that's going to have a fight in public.

16:31Let's listen to what Schumer himself said on The Daily over the weekend. Do you expect to face any kind of challenge in the election for Senate majority leader? No. You do not? No. I mean, look, our caucus is focused on now moving forward. Everyone's very happy with what we all did unified in the last two years. But the focus has to be, as I said before, and I'll say it again and again, to my caucus, to the country, to everybody. If we don't deliver, all this will go away. This is just the first step. Yeah, I mean, I think there's a lot of chance that ultimately that's what happens and the progressives just want a conversation and they might be placated by that and then they let it play out.

17:16Schumer wins and so be it. At least give them two years. I do think what's interesting is the fact that, you know, a lot of times in Congress, especially in these last few years with the rise of like the populist voter, that they come up against what voters want that doesn't necessarily jive with like the political realities of how things work. So now voters are like, you know, well, let's just have an election and pick the best person we think will lead. Well, that's not really how Washington works because you reward the people who helped you, helped get you there and helped you raise money, was on the ground with you campaigning.

17:52And people at home don't necessarily get all those nuances. And then the other thing that I think is also interesting is the fact that you do, yes, you have some on the left, which are, you know, some of those progressives that are coming in and saying, we want someone who's going to be more of a fighter, new generation. But then you have others who are going to be like Senator-elect Hamilton, who's like, I actually want a leader who doesn't have the baggage and can work better with Republicans. So where do you meet at the middle? That's probably where Chuck Schumer says, just keep me here. One of the things that Schumer said, which is the same thing that Hakeem Jeffries says, and really anywhere you are on the spectrum in the Democratic Party is we got to figure out a way to deliver here, which is not easy considering the fact that there is still a Republican in the White House and they're not going to have a filibuster filibuster-proof majority.

18:39But it's accountability and affordability. On the accountability side of it, I talked to Robert Garcia, who's going to be the incoming, is the incoming oversight chair in the House, and listened to what he said on that. So Republicans want to play games. They want to play rough and tumble. They're coming in with all of their arsenal. We got to do the same thing as Democrats. The days of us not fighting back are over. This idea that we're every single time not going to actually take on that fight is over. We've got to be in the fight and be aggressive. Talk about signaling to the base. I mean, that's what he's doing there.

19:19Absolutely. And I think there's this idea of, they feel like you mentioned it, accountability. This idea that a lot of voters are looking for Democrats to step up and hold a lot of these people in positions of power accountable for what has been going on in the last two years. But there are questions as well. And I hear this. You know, I saw a lot of my sources from Capitol Hill who I talk to. And I know people in the White House think this could happen, too. Is there a question going too far? And you've heard some centrists and moderates on Capitol Hill argue, you know, yes, let's hold them accountable.

19:51But let's not make this retribution. I think that's the argument you're going to hear them make toward Todd Blanche, the attorney general, in that interview with you. People saying there's a difference between retribution and accountability. And so it'll be interesting to see how they kind of thread that needle, because I don't think there's a question either that a lot of the investigations we saw, particularly those when Trump was out of office, did help his rise into 2024. And so could that be something where they're repeating history ahead of 2028? So they have to walk a fine line. All right, everybody stand by.

20:24Up next, we have the latest results from the nail biter in Mississippi. That Senate race there still not called. we have brand new reaction from voters who are pushing to make sure their ballot is counted.

20:43The 2026 midterms aren't done delivering suspense, especially in Mississippi, where the Senate race remains too close to call. Democrat Scott Colom leads Republican incumbent Cindy Hyde-Smith by about 2 ,600 votes. But officials still have thousands of ballots left to count, and tomorrow could add a lot more to their pile. It's the final day to receive absentee ballots and for voters to resolve any ballot issues. CNN's Annie Greer is still there in Jackson, Mississippi. Annie, I know you just met with some voters who've had some issues with their ballots. How'd that go? So, Dana, I actually drove to the county office behind me with a voter who was really concerned that her vote was not counting because she got mixed messages when she tried to vote early before Election Day.

21:32All of a sudden, she was told by election workers that she wasn't registered in the system, she wasn't in the poll book. She was very confused because she has voted in every election past and hadn't had any issues. And we actually went inside the office with her where she patiently waited with her ID, very nervous to find out the results, and found out that after everything, her ballot was counted. So take a listen to the relief that she felt after what's been a very, very stressful process for her. My vote has been counted. It's been accepted. And it's very pleasing because the last time getting a phone call after the election saying that my vote didn't count was very disheartening and discouraging.

22:14But I'm yet still going.

22:19So that is just one voter story. and what is thousands of people who have today and tomorrow to figure out if their ballots are counted. If there are any issues, people need to go to their local offices to present the proper identification. Maybe it's a driver's license. Maybe it's other identification to make sure that their vote is counted. And there's something between 15 and 20 ,000 affidavit ballots known as provisional ballots here in the state. And in a race this close, that really could be the ballgame. And Democrat Scott Colombe says that as more votes are counted, he expects his lead to only grow.

22:54He doesn't believe Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith has a path to victory. We haven't seen the Republican senator in public, but she's also projecting confidence and has deployed lawyers across the state in case this turns into a legal battle. Dana. So fascinating. It's just so nice to hear from that voter that her vote was counted, because I'm sure it is incredibly stressful in any situation, but particularly in a situation where you know your vote actually counts. Annie, thank you so much. Appreciate it. Coming up, could Health and Human Services Secretary RFK Jr. face impeachment? Senator Bernie Sanders answers that question next.

23:39Senator Bernie Sanders wasn't on the ballot last week, but in many races across the country, his brand of economic populism was. and for the most part, it won big. I spoke with the Vermont Independent about that victory and what he thinks Democrats should do with their newfound power. Here's part of our conversation from State of the Union. For as long as I've been covering you, and I'm sad to say for both of us that has been a very long time, you have been sounding the alarm about economic inequality. This election cycle, that message really caught on with voters. In the past, a lot of Democrats in Congress have been an obstacle to that economic vision.

24:17Do you think it's changed now? I do. Look, the American people are looking around. They're seeing millions of their fellow Americans struggling to put food on the table, pay for health care, pay for housing, pay for the basic necessities of life, worried that their kids will even have a lower standard of living than they do. And at the same time, the people on top have never in the history of the United States ever had it so good. Mr. Musk himself now owns more wealth than the bottom 53 percent of American households. It's not just me who thinks that's insane. It's what the American people believe.

24:58We are the only major country not to guarantee health care to all people as a human right. 66 % of the American people, Dana, now say we've got to pass Medicare for all. You've got millions of workers out there working for starvation wages. Got to raise the minimum wage to a living wage, make it easier for workers to join unions. People are scared about AI being pushed by these big tech oligarchs. They're worried about their jobs, their privacy. They're worried about the mental health of their kids. They're worried about what happens if AI becomes independent of human control. We have to deal with it.

25:39Bottom line, right now, this country faces enormous crises. The new Democratic majority has got to be bold, work, take on the oligarchs, and fight for the working class of this country. You mentioned one of your top priorities, and that, of course, is Medicare for all. And you will be the chair of the Senate Health Committee. You put out a video this week calling on Democrats to pass Medicare for all legislation. Just a few moments ago, Democratic Senator-elect Adam Hamilton of Kansas told me he doesn't think Medicare for all is the right approach. He doesn't think it will pass, though he did say he wants to ensure everyone does have access to affordable health care.

26:20Will you have enough support from Democrats to pass it? I think we will. As you know, there are well over 100 Democrats in the House and I support Medicare for all. We're getting more and more in the Senate. But most importantly, it's what the American people want. People understand that the function of a health care system cannot simply be to have the insurance companies and the drug companies make billions and billions of dollars in profit while 90 million people are uninsured or underinsured. And we don't talk about this too much. Some 60 ,000 Americans die every single year because they don't get to a doctor when they should.

27:03Half a million people go bankrupt from medically related debt. This system is broken. It's got to change. And in the first year, it's a four year transition program. I know people are worried, oh, the world is going to change. It's a four year transition. First year, lower the Medicare eligibility age from 65 to 55. Expand Medicare to cover dental, hearing and vision. cover all of the children. Next year, go from 55 to 45, 45 down to 35. Everybody is in. It is something that we can do, something we must do, something the American people want. Another part of your job, if you will, on the HELP Committee is overseeing the Department of HHS.

27:46I want to ask about the HHS Secretary, RFK Jr. You said that he is, quote, using his authority to launch a full-blown war on science, on public health, and on truth itself. How are you going to approach that and deal with that when you are chair? How are you going to try to stop him? And I just want to say that Senator-elect Dr. Annie Andrews of South Carolina says she wants to impeach RFK Jr. Well, at the very least, look, I think, as I said, I think he has been the most dangerous secretary of HHS in history. He has got to be held accountable, questioning whether vaccines work or do not work endangers the lives of so many of our kids and other people.

28:33So we're going to hold Kennedy accountable and end this business of reaching out, him reaching out to fellow conspiracy theorists. How are you going to do that? Well, we're going to bring him before the committee, that's for sure. That's for sure. And ask him some tough questions that have not been asked of him previously. And what about what the incoming senator from South Carolina said, that she wants to see RFK Jr. impeached? I am absolutely open to that. The bottom line is we need a secretary of HHS who is concerned about the health and well-being of our kids and all Americans not involved in crazy conspiracy theories.

29:20So I'm open to all ideas from Dr. Andrews or anybody else. And coming up, a southern moderate, a Democratic socialist, a swing state governor. It sounds like I'm starting the beginning of a walk into a bar joke, but I'm not. These are people who won the first 2028 presidential straw poll. We'll tell you more after a break.

29:52This was the headline in The Onion last week. Nation watches helplessly as 2028 election cycle begins. We don't make the rules here at Inside Politics, but I can promise you that there are some two dozen Democrats, maybe more, already making plans to run. The first primary debate is probably, I don't know, six or seven months away. And over the weekend, the first big cattle call of the cycle was right here in Washington at Crooked Con, including two newly reelected governors. What Congress should do, the Democrats in Congress, is put one by one, start with raising the minimum wage. Put that on Donald Trump's desk.

30:31Make him veto it if he's going to veto it. we ought to put on his desk universal paid leave for every worker in the United States. 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. At the end of the weekend, a presidential straw poll was taken. Senator John Ossoff came first. He wasn't there, by the way, followed by Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Pete Buttigieg.

31:12Far behind them were governors J.B. Pritzker, Andy Beshear, and Josh Shapiro. Luckily, we have the famous reporter from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution who has covered John Ossoff for a very long time. What's your reporting on this? So my, and I have not talked to him one-on-one in a little bit of time. He's been a little busy. But I will say that when he says he has zero interest, and that is his quote, zero interest in running for president, I believe him. And we've talked on the, on this show before about he has young children. He's really concerned about the privacy of his family. We know you give all of that up the minute you decide to run for president.

31:54And I don't think he's interested. That being said, all of them, you know, if you get the right pitch with the right people and the numbers look like they make sense, they're all persuadable. But I think Ossoff needs to be persuaded if he's going to move forward. I think he's totally fine kind of going back into his bubble, focused on constituent services in Georgia and not being like in the national media kind of vision the way he's been for the past few months. Well, if he gets stories like the one I'm about to read you from an unlikely place from Rich Lowry in the National Review, perhaps that will change some people's minds.

32:36So this is what Rich wrote about Ossoff. He has proven success in a swing state, isn't aggressively woke, is a forceful communicator and is a fierce Trump critic on the safest possible political grounds of corruption and the president's out-of-touch obsessions. Youthful and good-looking with a taste for soaring idealistic rhetoric, the 39-year-old Ossoff could activate the reflex of the Democratic Party to always look for the next JFK. That is a good assessment of what Democrats say they look for. I think there's also a little bit of gaming going on because Republicans are much less happy about their draft picks than they were a week ago.

33:14They're much less confident about J.D. Vance after going all in for Vivek Ramaswamy and that ad and kind of burning his image a little bit in the campaign trail. They'd like for Democrats to be in a very messy situation. Good news, they are. It is going to be a very messy democratic process. The cattle call, there are states that are new to this, but also each cattle call is different. The point of Crooked was to gather what used to be called the professional left. I think it's changed a lot since Robert Gibbs used that term. But people who are progressive activists who are very interested in dumping Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer and moving in kind of a Warren Sanders direction.

33:50And next week when they go to Denver, that's a different group of Democrats. Majority, yeah, that's majority of Democrats who say the model for this cycle, and this is what's so funny about this aftermath, since so many people won, they're saying, well, our margin was nine points, their margin was seven points. So you have to factor that in. But they want to have a, what they're worried about, all Democrats, is going back to 2019 and having the process and the questions be directed by only progressives and moving everybody to the left. Crooked's a little bit more in that category. I'd expect majority Democrats to be, what can you run on that's an 80-20 issue?

34:20Yeah, and there's already a draft AOC. There's a draft Rahm Emanuel. There's a draft Ro Khanna. I mean, it's all happening. Let's talk about the Republican side. Let's listen to what the president said about that. I assume you're going to endorse someone for that. Probably. Not necessarily. Not necessarily. What would make you, what are you thinking about when you decide whether or not to endorse someone? We have a tremendous bench. I mean, I have so many people that I have great relationships with and, you know, not necessarily. Who would be on the list besides the vice president? Well, I think Marco's great.

34:54There are many others and I'd rather not mention their names. Look, that lines up exactly with what I've been told. And this was actually even before the midterms. when I would ask, you know, White House officials, the president's advisors about his thinking on 2020, which he is more willing now to discuss than he, I mean, you couldn't ask him in the first few months of his second term. He's obviously starting to think about it a lot more. But from everyone, everyone says as of now, they think he wants to stay out of it. He wants to see how the process plays out. Obviously, who does that benefit or not benefit?

35:27J.D. Vance could be one. But I also think his endorsement is a little less intriguing and valuable to a lot of Republicans now after what they saw last week in the midterms. I will say as well for Vance and some of these other folks who I cover very closely, they're not even sure what they want to do. I think for some people who believed that it was a sure thing that someone like the vice president would, of course, take this moment to run, they're rethinking everything at this moment. There's a lot of people who don't think Republicans can win at all and that launching a campaign could be very damaging.

35:58So we have to see how all this shakes out. It's still very in the immediate aftermath of that reckoning they faced. How damaged is Vance post midterms? That's obviously the big question, too. And a lot of people see a clear opening after the way he handled Iran, the Vivek Ramaswamy ad, and the like. And will he run as a de facto third term for President Trump if he does decide to run? I mean, no question. Any vice president does that. Stand by. Because coming up, forgiveness may be divine. But President Trump suggests his political grudges probably last an eternity. Stay with us.

36:33Let's have I got news for your ears. The podcast. I am your host, Michael Ian Black. We are talking about the final polls going into the midterms, the hot races getting the most attention. Trump's final argument. Have I got news for your ears? Check us out on Apple, Amazon Music, wherever you get your podcasts. Even better, you can watch the podcast on Spotify.