Trump Hemorrhaging Support In Historic Fashion; His Last Ditch Effort To Stop The Blue Wave?

0:00Honey, what are you listening to? Mom! Your teen might not share everything with you, but teens share everything with each other. And certain everyday behaviors, like sharing food, drinks, or kisses, could mean sharing bacteria that can cause meningococcal disease, known as meningitis. Although meningitis is uncommon, about 1 in 10 who develop it will die. Ask your teen's doctor about missing meningitis vaccinations. Learn more at meningitis.com. Vaccination may not protect all recipients. Sponsored by GSK. Your team just added its 67th AI tool and also your 67th security blind spot. The good news?

0:36The Vanta agent works like a GRC engineer in the background, finding every app your team uses, scoring the risk, and drafting fixes for you. Vanta is the platform used by over 16 ,000 fast-moving companies like Ramp, Cursor, and Harvey, who are shaping the future with AI and staying ahead of AI risk. Get started at Vanta.com. Welcome to I've Had It Weekend. I'm here with one of my favorite guests. I could literally talk to her all day. Of course, I'm talking about Paola Ramos. Paola, how are you today? I'm doing well. Thank you for having me again. Thank you for coming. This week, little Senator Boosterbox, because of course, you know, I like to browbeat MAGA men.

1:14And the MAGA men listen to you. I have seen Ted Cruz literally tweet at you. Yeah. Wow. It was fantastic. And I love that these MAGA men have now moved on to being scared of the liberal white woman. I know. that must make them so angry it really does and that's when you know there's a problem and i just love i love how they advertise their fear of things all of the time while at the same time we're so tough also we're scared of drag queens books spanish people mexicans and now liberal white women i mean pretty soon they're just gonna be it's just gonna be them yeah okay but anyway mark wayne mullen senator booster box because he has when he makes these tough guy messages which I'm about to play for you.

1:56He has to stand on a box when he's acting like a tough guy. So here he is on his box, trying to be a tough guy now that he's in charge of ICE. Let's play the clip. We're there to enforce specific threats. The only reason why we would be at polling places if there is a threat to that polling place or we're serving a warrant on someone that we have been actively tracking down. Okay, Paola, is this an acknowledgement by the Trump administration that the Latino support for Trump has cratered? So I do think they're still counting on the Latino vote, but I do think what we're seeing now is the heart of the entire, entire immigrant agenda, which is relying on fear and uncertainty.

2:48So it's the not knowing. It's the not knowing if one can expect ice at polling locations, at the soccer stadiums or in the World Cup. That uncertainty is then the fear that cripples families to stay home. It's the anxiety that then tells you unconsciously that your voice at the end doesn't really matter that much and it may not be worth it to go out and vote. And that's old. That is literally at the heart of how they would in 2024. It's the fear. It's always the fear of this, you know, specific boogeyman that is always out there, that perhaps there will be election fraud. And so that's what they rely on.

3:27Now, I think the backlash to this when it comes to Latino voters, black voters, whomever, is that the only thing that is stronger than fear and uncertainty is the anger that people are literally feeling right now. Whether you voted for MAGA or not, what you're seeing is so in your face. And if you're a Latino voter, a voter for Trump, say you're from Cuba or Venezuela, that statement that Mark Wayne Mullins said is one that is reminiscent of what you hear in Venezuela. when they are not allowing you to go vote. The image of seeing military folks roaming around your streets and that sort of omnipresence is always there to deter you.

4:04So I think once Latinas start to piece together what is happening, which I think they're slowly doing, the backlash may be that they will vote to precisely prevent that from happening. So that familiarity of that will cause them to say, oh, this is why we came here. This is why we left. Because I think for a lot of the white rule voter, the familiarity of having a figure, an authoritarian figure is familiar to them. Their pastors were that way. Their parents were that way. So they fall prey to authoritarian governments, even though it doesn't benefit them. But I think that's really fascinating component.

4:49The Latino vote is somebody who they're so courted. And in a lot of spaces, it's treated kind of like as a monolith. Always. And it certainly is not. I mean, it's such a diverse vote. Of course. I mean, the Cuban-American vote in Miami is so different from the Mexican-American vote in the Rio Grande Valley, from the Venezuelans that are all across the country. you know, but I think the through line now is that we don't know. And I think it's really hard for pollsters to acknowledge that we don't know who Latino voters are right now in the sense that for decades, now we've counted on Latinos as this community that is part of this multiracial coalition that Democrats have always counted on.

5:34Now the idea was always that when this country reaches majority minority, that Latinos would always be at the heart of that. Barack Obama used to say that all the time. Fast forward to where we are, we now know that Latinos too are capable of voting for someone like Donald Trump. 45 % voted for him. Latino men predominantly voted for him. He won Latino men. So I think we're now kind of in this uncomfortable but good space where we understand, and I think this is being reinforced now, that Latinos are up for grabs. They're politically homeless. They have the capacity to do both, and they have to be courted, which is what typically both parties have not done.

6:13So I think what you're seeing now is this deep disillusionment, which is true with both parties. You see a block that resonated so much with Trump's anti-immigrant sentiment. They believed him when he told them that he would protect their American dream. But I think what's happening now is very profound, which is that Trump is making them feel like foreigners in their own country, like strangers. and that, that to a Latino person that has been here for years, whether you're documented or not, whether you're from a mixed status family or not, in that feeling that you're this kind of perpetual foreigner, like that I think is, is kind of what's like awakening a deeper sentiment of like, wait a second, what did I just vote for?

6:53Honey, what are you listening to? Mom? Your teen might not share everything with you, but teens share everything with each other. And certain everyday behaviors like sharing food, drinks, or kisses could mean sharing bacteria that can cause meningococcal disease known as meningitis. Although meningitis is uncommon, about one in 10 who develop it will die. Ask your teen's doctor about missing meningitis vaccinations. Learn more at meningitis.com. Vaccination may not protect all recipients. Sponsored by GSK. And that awakening, I would think that, you know, the Supreme Court, they call it the Kavanaugh rule.

7:28that a nice officer could say, oh, that person looks illegal. Yeah, just looks. And then they can pull them over. And Trump pitched this initially, even when he came down the escalator in 2015, 2016. He's only going after the bad immigrants, right? And now it turns out that a lot of these people that are in custody, the overwhelming majority of them have zero criminal record. And I want you to speak to this notion that if somebody is here and doesn't have the correct paperwork, that they are criminal. They have been branded as criminals. And in a lot of MAGA world, a criminal is a word that they use to dehumanize somebody.

8:14And I see these issues as paperwork issues, not criminal offenses. And so this dehumanizing, they're illegal, they're criminals. What are the stats on who's in custody, who they pulled over? Humanize this group for us. So the latest stats that we know from July, right, is that there was this record high arrest. They arrested over 50 ,000 people. And the Guardian did this exceptional report where they found that the majority of those that were arrested in July were not criminals, had absolutely no criminal background. And so I think if you are a, say, a conservative mother in the Midwest, and you're looking at this group of people, they're telling you that they're criminals.

8:54I'll take you to the places where I've literally migrated with folks that have come to this country. In the Darien jungle, I've crossed the Darien jungle with many migrants, Cubans, Venezuelans, Haitians. And we're talking about mothers and fathers that are literally leaving everything behind, carrying children in their backs, crossing one of the most dangerous forests in the entire world, full of paramilitary groups and wildlife and gangs, risking their lives from a purely maternal and paternal instinct, which is to protect your child. No, because and that's where that's where I think things get like very dangerous because that idea of the American dream is so strong.

9:39Like you really have to believe in it so much to risk everything to cross that jungle. In the same way that I've met thousands of people and migrants that are living in limbo along the southern border, literally at the hands of the Mexican cartels in the most dangerous situations and some of the most dangerous Mexican border towns. Because once again, they cannot go home. No one wants to leave. No, no one wants to migrate. No one wants to leave everything behind and come to this unknown land. You really need to want it. And so the majority of people that are in this country are that. It is people that were driven here by a dream and that want something better for their children, that are facing death threats in their homelands.

10:19And that for decades, because this is an old story, for decades have been completely intertwined with the social fabric of this country. The majority are good people. The only difference between me and a lot of undocumented people, my mom was a Cuban refugee, she was a Cuban exile. That's to your point, that small paper. She was fortunate enough to have that paper, but it's a matter of luck. But to your point, when you start to label this group for so long, ingraining in Americans' mentality that they're criminals, that they're criminals, it is really easy to dehumanize someone. Because it's a science.

10:52The more you dehumanize, the more you dehumanize, the human brain starts to believe it. But I do think that we're now in this kind of awful but interesting place where everything has been so vile and cruel that if you're a mother and you're seeing what's happening, like you understand that it's wrong because you're seeing moms and children. And so I think I'm really fascinated to see how the American public will react this way. So I know from my life spent in Republican Christian Oklahoma, in white circles, how the white Republicans think about immigrant labor. I've also heard language frequently that they what you just described, a mother who has a choice.

11:42I can stay in this country and I'm probably going to die, get raped. My child's going to get killed. and puts a child on their back and crosses the border. This is difficult for people to understand, but in the South and probably in other places too, I've heard people say, well, they shouldn't have broken the lawn, come over. We just have rules and that makes that person a criminal. And that's why this dehumanizing that Trump does, it catches on with the people who, I call it recreational cruelty. They feast on this idea of recreational cruelty and seeing that, you know, you've seen the White House make this ASMR videos of chaining people up like that, somehow soothing and putting them on.

12:27And I want, obviously, for our country to see all people and welcome immigrants. And of course, we have to have rules and the proper way to do it. Every country has to have that. But the dehumanization, the way that this regime has done it. And I heard, like, you know, we talked about this last time we were on the Cuban lady, I will vote for Donald Trump. And then I think her nephew or somebody got deported. Are they feeling that spread, that it was never just about illegal immigrants? It's about getting all out. I mean, if you listen to Stephen Miller, it sounds like that's what he wants to do.

13:09Yeah, and I don't know that many Latinas have voted for Trump will articulate that. I think the conversations are based on what they're seeing in front of them. He promised that it would be easier for us to get by. The economy isn't getting better. And he promised that he would only go for the bad guys. Well, they just got my aunt. And he promised that it was also about my American dream and why am I suddenly being racially profiled. And so I think, I guess I think they're thinking of, you know, of how to survive every single day. So I, so I, no one's really putting together the more like profound questions, which are when Trump promised, when Trump said they're taking away your American dream, to your point, he was also talking about they being Latinos, every Latino.

14:00And I think slowly what you're seeing, whether people understand it or not, is a Stephen Miller that is orchestrating a mass deportation. And you've talked about this all the time, closing the borders, making it incredibly hard for any legal migration to happen. And it has one goal, which is to resemble a type of America that they feel is being taken away from them, that is being lost. And I do think that unconsciously a lot of Latinos are realizing that. And I think I'll take it even a step further. What I've been doing in the last couple of months reporting is that I think that the real backlash is one that we can't really grasp right now, which is that a lot of Latinos are actually letting go of that initial American dream that we were talking about.

14:43Like this idea of like, wait, is it actually worth it? Like is 20 years, 40 years of this? If you're a dreamer, how much longer can I live in limbo? If you're in a mixed status family, how much longer do I have to like hide? And maybe you're in Florida right now, and they're literally telling you that undocumented immigrants no longer can apply to schools and go into schools. Is it worth it? That question, I've seen it in my own reporting, is leading a lot of Latina families, sure, mixed status families, to reckon with something even deeper, which is, can you find the American dream elsewhere?

15:20And there is a pattern of reverse migration. Like people are leaving. People are sure they're being deported, but some people are choosing to self-deport. Migrants that were going northbound are not going southbound. So I think there's something like bigger happening. And that's always my concern. Like if we don't figure this out soon, things may change 10, 20 years from now. And I do think we're looking at like a very different type of America. And like that doesn't scare me, but it saddens me. There's the part of me that everyone sees. I'm Howie Mandel, the comedian. Apparently, I know what funny is.

15:54Funny bought me a house, but I also know what isn't funny, OCD. I've lived with OCD my entire life, and people throw the term around like it's no big deal. But OCD is severe, often debilitating. It's a mental health condition that involves unrelented, unwanted thoughts that can make you question your character, your beliefs, even your safety. General therapy can help with some things, but for OCD, it can actually make things worse. That's why I want to tell you about NoCD. NoCD is the world's largest treatment provider for OCD and is covered by insurance for over 155 million Americans. Their licensed therapists specialize in ERP, the most effective treatment for OCD.

16:37If you think you might be struggling with OCD, go to NOCD.com to book a free 15-minute call. They are here to help. Do we have concentration camps in this country right now? Yeah. I mean, I think if you're a child and you're in a detention center right now and you're in Dili, you're talking about still to this day, there's over 100 children that are still in Dili. What do we know? We know that they're not getting proper health care. They're not getting proper medication. We know that there are mothers across detention centers that have cancer and that are pregnant and that are living in horrible, horrible conditions.

17:17The point is the same one. It's to make it as unbearable as it possibly can be in order to force you to give up and then force you to self-deport and force you to do what they call a voluntary departure. culture. And so yeah, I mean, you know, we can, there's only so many ways to call it. But yeah, no one deserves to live like that. I completely agree. And the way that the children are being treated is so horrific. And as a person who had to live around MAGA Christians my whole life and hear them talk about life and children and wanting to take away rights from women and see that they're okay with children being treated this way and children living in the conditions you just described children they're still okay you think they're 100 okay they're 100 okay with it because of that dehumanization that their parents committed the crime their parents shouldn't have put them in this situation their parents were criminals their parents weren't good parents and it's if these children were blonde haired blue eyes yeah um i don't know that they would feel that way but this is it goes to something that the country's been reconciling for so long but yeah there's a definite dehumanization for others um but this is the message that republicans are going with in the midterms let's listen to it eight by our count there's almost 40 openly avowed marxist communists Socialists, they're all in the same camp.

18:51Marxism, you understand, in Marxism, socialism is a step to get to communism. OK, communism, Marx thought would be the utopia, the perfect society. He's absolutely deadly wrong. So I think they've kind of moved on from they've realized that dehumanizing, they can keep the cult. 30 % is all in on that. So scaring people about drag queens and scaring people about immigrants isn't working as much. So they're going all chips in on trans athletes, which there are zero in the WNBA goose egg. And now they are on to socialism and communism, which is a failed play that Americans have done before during the McCarthy era.

19:33Does this resonate? This fear mongering to the latino base is this are they speaking directly to them there so historically it has resonated historically you know it's like an old tactic the red scare and so why because a lot of latinos and i'll include like my grandfather's generation that fled fidel castro's cuba that old generation of cubans of venezuelans of any latino that has fled sort of the left-wing authoritarian regimes of latin america which is a real thing for for decades republicans have always been doing this which is essentially label the Democratic Party as a scary communist party.

20:10It's an old tactic. You hear it a lot in Miami, every election cycle. Now you're hearing it everywhere. What's happening though now is, remember, in 2012, Barack Obama in Miami was almost the first Democratic presidential candidate to win the Cuban-American vote, which would have been his story. He was very close to Robney. What that tells you, and what we're slowly seeing is that there are the younger generations of Latinos that are further removed from that trauma of communism, which I want to be very clear, it's a real one. And that's why I think Republicans are very brilliantly exploiting a very real political trauma, which is fleeing from authoritarianism.

20:47But they're exploiting that. And they're creating falsehoods and false narratives because, of course, Democrats and DSA, they're not communists. Anyway, we're not even going to get into that. But it is an old tactic that works. But you are seeing a younger generation of Latinos, including myself and the younger ones that are further removed and that beyond that are simply looking at DSA and really resonating with some of those simple ideas that are in there. And the most interesting thing is that in a place like Miami-Dade County that is full of Latinos and Cubans that voted for Trump, it turns out that a lot of those counties have some of the highest rates of enrolled folks in Obamacare, right?

21:26And if you look across the country, people that are so fervently against these like social welfare policies, they end up being the ones that are benefiting from it. So I think we're kind of at a place where like, sure, this may work, but the contradictions are like so in your face at this point. And we're talking about Donald Trump literally took out Maduro. Fine. A lot of people and a lot of Venezuelans were like applauding it. And at the same time, he still has reinforced the very same communist, what they like to call apparatus in Venezuela under Delcio Rodriguez. Like she's still in power.

22:03So I think people are kind of like watching and observing and trying to make sense of what they're saying. So all this to say, I don't think this attack will be as powerful as it typically has been because it has worked. So obviously, all of the framing that I'm doing here so far in this interview is Republicans, because the Republicans, despite only having a 30 percent approval rating, are controlling the narrative. Of course, they have a major, major supermajority. But I want to focus on right now, what could the Democrats be saying? Like if I were a strategist, I'd say, number one, they said Obama was a commie and that he was coming for your guns.

22:44They said was a commie. They said Joe Biden was a commie. But as you speak to Venezuela, Trump, of course, he took Maduro, whether you're for it, against it, whatever, whether it was good or bad, leave that there. But now he's stealing their natural resources and he wants to set up a state run oil company. Right. And so where are the Democrats messaging this? And if I'm a Latino voter in Florida or in New York or down on the border, wherever, I'm not hearing the DSA is they're organized and they're working hard. But what is the counter message here? Because it always seems like the bad messages and the fear mongering is controlling the news cycle.

23:32Yeah, I mean, I think what you're seeing that is working is a good candidate. Yeah. You know, it's like, forget the labels for a second. Yeah. And Trump was a good candidate because he had the charisma. I'm sure he had a message. Great liar. Great liar. Yeah. And so I think when you look at from a Tallarico to a Zoran to Abdul, which I saw your interview with him was amazing. It is, it doesn't, the labels, if you close your eyes, the labels don't matter. It's, it is the message that is resonating. And we saw it here and I've met Trump supporters that suddenly saw something in Zoron in the Rio Grande Valley.

24:14I have met people that voted for Donald Trump that are now seeing something in Tierra Rico in Michigan. It's the same thing, which is, it's, it's, it's the very simple underlying message of the underdog deserves to win. The bottom deserves to climb. The status quo needs to go. And like we were talking about before, everything right now is so full of fear and uncertainty. And the anger is a driver, but also the hope. And I think people, I know it sounds cheesy, but like people have not felt that in so long, like the last like six years. And so I think suddenly for someone, if you're a Ladino in Venezuela that is seeing what's happening in Venezuela.

24:56You're seeing an administration to your point that at the beginning was talking about regime change and now it's full on, like, I just want your oil. Right, they're stealing it. And so when you're feeling so hopeless and disillusioned, which again, it's both parties have contributed to this, these words from maybe even like an Angie Nixon, right? She's awesome. Yeah. And so the fact that a democratic socialist in Florida could go this far, like that's pretty unprecedented, right? For someone like her to like to to rise the way she is, it's pretty unprecedented. So I think all this is a people need good candidates.

25:32It's a great answer. And it's simple. Sometimes the best answer is the simplest one. And these, you know, one thing I'm seeing right now is we have one can make an argument. there's a uniparty that you have the democrats and republicans and the ruling class of them that are servicing corporations and a lot of the democratic establishment candidates service corporations um inside the democratic party right now i'm most excited about these progressive candidates like angie nixon who i just had on a couple days ago she's phenomenal uh obviously Zoran, Abdul El-Sayed, and others that are winning their races and taking on big money.

26:15But do you think these candidates in these messages, I think they have broad appeal because they're so inclusive. Donald Trump's exclusivity, you have to do a lot of mental gymnastics. as a woman, I know his policies are going to fuck me. Yeah. I know that. And I'm white. I am from the South. You know, I don't know how many generations on both sides have been here, but it's a long fucking time. And I know that they're coming for me. So I can't imagine as a Latino voter that you wouldn't feel that. I think what the more quote unquote progressives have to offer is, I mean, is what Zoran did, right?

27:01Which is, again, whether you like him or not, whether you're a conservative or not, it's a populist message that is for everybody. They don't get into the nitty gritties. And that has also been criticized now. But what about trans people? What about it's all baked in the same message? It is a very simple one, which is all of you deserve the same thing. You deserve to be as rich or have the same equal opportunities as everyone else. And so I think people want to feel like they're part of that, like they're part of that dream, like they're part of that coalition. And sometimes, and sure, and like you can get into the back and forth as to like, well, do you have to start naming everyone?

27:38No, but what about trans people? No, it is already understood that everyone is part of that vision. And so I think that kind of message of inclusivity is gaining a lot of attraction. my fear is always the same one that I fear every election cycle we usually feel it more in the presidential cycles which is then there's a moment in which the grievances that were once there come back up again the people that were once crying when zero tolerance was happening and everyone was bawling and there was this moral crisis people forget about that the ice raids are now becoming normalized the dehumanization is not part of our normal routine I'm now so used to every time I see my sister seeing the National Guard like walking around so like we're starting to like normalize Trump's America and so it's like what what will it take for us to understand that like this isn't normal again no and so that's that's where I'm like cautious about so let's let's I know let's talk about Texas so um the Hispanic vote in Texas is an absolute force.