Trump's shutdown gambit gets fully exposed

24:42We can just lie to our supporters until the end of the year. It worked for him after January 6th. I mean, like after the 2020 election, lying to your supporters, there was never any introspection. And he continues to this day to lie. But more broadly, I mean, like they lost in 2025 in every seat. We saw swings that were, you know, on average, what, like 15 points to the left. And so something's got to give. Does he just ignore it and keep barreling forward? Well, I think he can lie to his supporters till the cows come home and he'll probably succeed at that. Right. Like, you know, January 6th.

25:10if, you know, his supporters even know he's wrong about prices, but they don't care because they support him. The fact is, and the reason we had this big shift is there is a swath of voters who don't really like Donald Trump. They told voters at the pollsters they disapproved of him in 2024. They think he's probably kind of corrupt, a bit of a buffoon, but they did believe that Donald Trump would do a better job of lowering their costs than Kamala Harris did, either because they thought Trump was a businessman or they thought Kamala Harris was too associated with the Biden economic record to do something different.

25:41And he's failed those people. And those people voted against him this time. And so that's the swing. And you just, you can BS your way through a lot of things in life, but you cannot BS your way through high prices because voters see it every single day. They go to the store. That's an issue that plagued Democrats. Yes. And you know who's economic message he's doing? Joe Biden's. Right. Everything's fine. Don't ignore the pain you have. Look at all these other good things that are happening. That's just not going to work. You can't, well, I mean, it's even worse to say, to tell people the prices aren't high.

26:11Like they know they're high. They're not going to, you know, we've solved eggs, right? With a, he's tweeting people right now for how they're going to pay for Thanksgiving dinner. He's truthing out the fact that your Thanksgiving dinner is cheaper than what's last year. No one is going to believe that because that's not what they're going to experience. He doesn't understand the difference between the actual price and the rate of growth. The rate of growth, price growth has come down since he's taken office and certainly at least much to the work that Biden did before he took over. But the prices remain high, right?

26:40And that's just like, that's reality. And he's not gonna be able to deal with that. So nothing changes, nothing gives. And the Republicans continue to run a campaign where they just pray at the altar of Donald Trump and head into 2026 with the same lack of messaging that led to them getting demolished? Well, this is the question, right? Which is the election on Tuesday changed a little bit about how I'm thinking about Trump. In my head, I think myself and a lot of us have been thinking that this was the first year of his presidency. That's not the right way to think about it, right? This is not Barack Obama in 2009 or even down Trump in 2017.

27:17This is George W. Bush in 2005. He is a second term president. This is the fifth year of his presidency. And this is an indication that he's headed towards lame duck status. And you can see the evidence of his lame duck status everywhere. It's in this election. It's in his suppressed poll numbers. it's in the fight that his coalition is kind of breaking apart left and right over various issues. And the question will be, will Republicans stick with him to the end in 2026? They definitely want to get through the filing deadline so that he doesn't endorse a primary challenger to them. But will they find a way to break from him?

27:53And the thing is, Trump, the other reason he can't fix his problems is, one thing you would do is you would cut a deal with Democrats on something they agree on that deals with prices. The most obvious thing being, oh, I don't know, the giant premium increase you're instituting. But he doesn't know how to compromise with Democrats and is unwilling to do it, so he has no out here. Will the Republicans distance themselves from him? Maybe. Certainly people like Susan Collins, who have done it already, might do it. But it's a really interesting question because they have stuck with Trump because they needed him when he was on the ballot.

28:24He's never going to be on the ballot again. On the issue of affordability more broadly, we have seen some instances where Republicans have come forward and just, I mean, it feels very contrived where they're like, you know what? I'm focused on affordability. I mean, like right in the aftermath of an election where Zoran and Mikey Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger all were focused on this stuff. Now Republicans see that and they're like, oh, yeah, I do that too. And so there is some worry that as we head toward 2026, that if everybody's learning the lesson, if Democrats learned the lesson from 2024, which was not to focus on nebulous issues, but rather to home in on these affordability issues, Republicans now learned in 2025 that that was responsible for all of the Democratic wins.

29:05If everyone's saying the same thing, how does somebody stand out in an environment where both candidates are basically learning the only lesson that we needed to learn from both election cycles and kind of parroting the same talking points? Well, one party's in power when prices have not gone down and one is not. That's ultimately how the Republicans want. And if you're a Republican, it's going to be hard to have any leg to stand on if you are right now presiding with full control of government. They can't even point to Democrats screwing them over in the House or something like that. They have full control of governments.

29:33There's nobody they can point to. Yeah, it's a very challenging position for them to be in. What I think they will likely do is they'll say, like, they want to talk about affordability, but instead they will try to, as they tried in 2018, when the main issue was health care, is they will try to change the subject. Remember the caravan in 2018 that was coming? Like, there is going to be something like that that will – I don't know that it will work. It's kind of hard to convince people about something that's more important than affordability. but that's more likely that they will try to change the subject to a more favorable issue for them than to actually change their positions on the economy.

30:05Does the 2025 Tuesday, November, you know, this past Tuesday, does that inform how you're thinking about what 2028 presidential candidates might do as we move forward? Not yet. I think, like, those are huge wins. Those are all, other than the races in Georgia, those are all wins that happened in states we absolutely, that we they're blue states right they are you know they're states that kamala harris even election she lost one by seven points i mean well pennsylvania five two uh supreme court retention that's a trump one but yeah i mean nobody really thinks of pennsylvania as a as a red state yeah but also the other than one time in history no one's ever lost a straight retention vote and so i don't want to over read that like one like i am so excited about these i am really and the thing makes me most excited is that there is real evidence that it's not just turnout that where we won is we actually persuaded Trump voters.

30:557 % in Virginia and New Jersey, 12 % in California, 9 % in New York City. Like there are actual people who voted for Trump a year ago who voted for Democrats. And that is a super positive sign. I do worry that just like in 2022, we will say, look, stop all your worrying about the party brand and trust on issues. We won anyway. It's solved. In 2022, we looked at that election and said, and it gave us a reason to not deal with hard questions like Joe Biden's age and electability. We cannot let these elections, as wonderful as they were, defer us from those longer conversations. Because Mikey Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger were well-funded statewide candidates who were running for governor.

31:38Governors can often survive a toxic party brand. Because it's sort of a little bit less partisan state issue than some of the offices in the Senate and House. And even in the Senate, our candidates will have enough money that they can show where they're different than what people think of the Democratic Party. party brand. But in the House, those are largely generic Democrat for generic Republican races. And if the Democratic party brand still sucks, that is going to limit the ceiling of what we can actually win and what could end up being a very good year. So I think we have a lot of work to do here.

32:06If you had a magic wand and could do one thing right now to fix the brand, what would that be? I'll give you three things. One is I would develop a Mamdani-like affordability agenda. It doesn't mean his policies per se, but simple, bold, quasi-controversial ideas. We need like four ideas, right? I think the controversial part is very important. Kamala Harris had an amazing first-time homebuyer tax credit. She did a press event for no one ever talked about it again because it didn't generate controversy. The beauty of Mondain's ideas is they generated controversy, and therefore people talked about it and people heard it.

32:43So that's one. The second is a similar anti-corruption political reform plan, right? We've got to get big money and corporate power out of politics. We've got to deal with the lobbyist problem. We have to show voters that we are going to change the broken political system, not just defend it. And the third thing is that we need younger faces at the forefront. It is not a surprise that the new mayor of New York is 34, the new governor of Virginia is 46, the new governor of New Jersey is in her early 50s. Like we need people who are younger faces, who can relate to people who have energy and are in tune with sort of the culture in the conversation in this country.

33:23Why do you think that there are still folks in the Democratic Party who presumably want to help the party, want to move this whole process forward, who are kind of sticking begrudgingly in their seats that would otherwise give way to younger, more dynamic candidates? I mean, we just saw Nancy Pelosi a couple of days ago announce that she's not seeking retirement. But look, how many times have Democrats faster died in office than dare cede an inch of power? I mean, there are entire generations who are being skipped because Democrats in office have never ceded power. And we're seeing the potency of a political class, of a millennial political class and Gen Z political class.

34:02But millennials have been shut out of power. And when you have someone like Zoran, like this could have happened earlier if not for boomer candidates who decided that they wanted to be. Boomer, heck, we got silent generation candidates hanging around there. Like who wanted to be in office for 40 fucking years. Look, I think that the people who are sticking around are doing it because they believe they have the seniority and experience to deliver for their voters. I think they're missing the big picture. right and there's just a point where you certainly don't have the energy to or even the cultural relevance to do the job particularly well um and so but we like that's why it's important that younger candidates are challenging these older like the primaries are good and and look you were going to have a generational primary in massachusetts between ed markey and seth malton and maybe some others and if the voters look at both those candidates and they decide that ed markey's the guy then that's great they said at least there was democracy right like that's the That's the whole issue that I think was plaguing Democrats before this.

35:00If it feels like somebody was anointed, that's where a lot of the issues are. So I think the primaries are good, and that's part of the process here. Well, look, I highly recommend for anybody who is not yet subscribed to PodSafe America's YouTube channel. I'm going to put that link right here on the screen and also in the post description. Dan, as always, it's a pleasure to talk to you. I appreciate your time. No Lies brought to you by Shopify. So when I started this podcast, it seemed like I kind of had to figure everything out on my own. I had to figure out scripts and setups and filming, logos, all of which was very overwhelming.

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36:36Sign up for your$1 per month trial and start selling today at Shopify.com slash BTC. Go to Shopify.com slash BTC. Shopify.com slash BTC. I'm joined now by a co-host of Raging Moderates with Scott Galloway and also co-host of Fox's The Five, Jessica Tarlov. Jessica, thanks for joining me. Yeah, it's so good to be here. So you have one of the most important and yet also one of the most unenviable jobs by sitting with four conservative co-hosts on Fox. So first and foremost, in the aftermath of Tuesday's election results, is there any begrudging, though it may be, is there any acknowledgement from folks who you work with that something has gone terribly wrong with how this administration, the Republican Party more broadly, has kind of comported itself up to this point?

37:24There have been flares of it. I mean, if you spent all day watching conservative media, you would see pockets. Certainly like, you know, Brett Baer and Martha McCallum talking about it. Dana Perino was talking about it on The Five. And then people, I feel like, go to their corners sometimes and say, well, these were blue states and this was expected. And then I reminded people we're talking about a Mississippi statehouse. We're talking about public commissioners in Georgia. We're talking about Ohio, Texas. Pennsylvania, yeah. Pennsylvania school boards retaining Supreme Court justices, New Hampshire, you know, all the things.

37:55And, you know, some eyes then glaze over. But I do think that it is being processed because the way that the Republicans have ended up in this position is going straight through the main argument that they always make, which is that we're better for the economy. Right. And most of them are inherently anti-tariff. and Donald Trump has kind of shoved that down their throats. And it's having this huge effect on cost of living and morale in the country, our allies, all of it. And so I feel like there are all these different tentacles that are actually intertwining or coming together with an election night set of results like that because it wasn't just winning or getting by.

38:37Like people thought, I don't know what your expectation was in New Jersey, but I thought, okay, maybe Mike Echero wins three to five points. That was my expectation. Right. She'll get by. Yeah. But I was worried that she would win the same margin as Phil Murphy or the Kamala Harris did. And I don't want that to be our benchmark because 2024 was such an underperformance. Well, totally. And New Jersey should be a blue state. Like we're talking about the tri-state area. I'm a New Yorker. You're a New Jersey guy. Like we're supposed to be a certain way or we have historically in the two states that trended the furthest towards Donald Trump were New York and New Jersey.

39:11So there was a lot of work to do. Counties that had never gone red that went red. And so when I saw 13 points and it wasn't even that they could blame the candidates, some of them said that, well, we ran bad candidates. Winsome Earl Sears is a bad candidate. Jack Ciattarelli is actually a pretty good candidate. He got close to Phil Murphy. He had support. He was flipping some group support that I was surprised at. I thought he closed terribly by just saying like by doing Kamala Harris on The View, actually. Like Donald Trump gets an A and I wouldn't do anything different even though he's taking my infrastructure spending.

39:43Like, did you learn nothing from what happened to us? Yeah. But seeing 13 points and then 15 in Virginia for Abigail Spanberger, I was like, that's a real walloping. Well, the part I think that's most striking about all of this, especially kind of doubling down on this idea that, oh, these were just these were just blue states, which suggests that there's not going to be any course correction. And granted, that's been a longstanding theme in the Republican Party after Trump won in 2020. There was no course correction. They all just pretended that Donald Trump won. So so. But it worked out for them.

40:15I mean, it ultimately did work out for them. But in this situation right now, the irony is that the reason that Trump got so far ahead and that Republicans got so far ahead is because the Democrats, and I include myself in this, were trying to convince people that the situation was much better than it actually was, the economic situation in this country. And when you tell people that actually know everything is fine and they're feeling like it's not, there's going to create not just like not just this disparity, but they're not going to trust you on anything else you say, you know, economics notwithstanding.

40:46And so do you find that kind of weird that Republicans are right now doing the same thing that they were able to capitalize on just this past election cycle in 2024? Totally. Like as if they blacked out the whole experience. And I've said that multiple times on The Five. You guys rightly so told me that showing up and touting a great GDP number or inflation coming down is not enough to get people to support you on Election Day. Like, it's a great talking point. Pointing to a stock market where in a country where most people don't own stocks. Or certainly not the stocks that are making them bazillions of dollars, right?

41:22Like maybe their pension fund is invested. So it's felt very strange to me. And another element of that, and this is actually a bit of a pat on the back, I think, for our party, which I feel like we rarely do, Democrats were very self-reflective. Starting from the second that Donald Trump—it was a lot of self-flagellation. Yeah. I mean, it lasted for until—I mean, it's still going. And it's not done. I mean, we're here at Crooked Con and every panel is infused with an element of how do we do better and how do we make sure that we don't repeat those mistakes, like telling people not only about the economy, but that the border doesn't matter.

42:01Because everybody is happier right now that the border is closed from a messaging standpoint, for sure. But once people, I guess, feel safe to talk about it, they're like, I want a better working functioning asylum system. But we couldn't have a quarter of a million people coming in here on a monthly basis. And Joe Biden acted too slowly. And I think especially if you're trying to talk to people who you disagree with, which is how I spend most of my time. Being able to admit those things gives you space to then be able to say something contrary to what they're doing. So the lack of self-reflection in that sense, like not meeting us where we were, because I think that we set a very good example for what you should be doing after you lose, which is saying like, oh, this happened.

42:47I wonder why. Let's do a lot of research. Let's try different media things, you know, whatever. I mean, it was that or Storm the Capitol. Which is just not our vibe. My husband was saying to me, he's like, do you think we have to get a gun? And I was like, I don't know. What would we do with it? He's like, someone could teach us, right? A bunch of liberals. I mean, look, where you work, I'm sure anybody would be glad to teach you. I could find a teacher. No, but that's the kind of mentality that I think a lot of people have about this feeling that we're teetering on the brink of something. And so we're in this happiness moment from the election.

43:23But I don't know. It's still tenuous. And granted, this was an election like this was an election about New York and New Jersey and California and Virginia. I mean, I'm sorry, and Virginia and Georgia. But at the same time, you know, there are there is a really important election coming up in 2026. On that point, you know, the difference between the right wing media ecosystem and the left wing media ecosystem is that the right was largely successful at insulating its viewers from a lot of the reality of what was going on. I mean, the whole idea of being able to convince people that an election that was free and fair was stolen because there is ballot dumps or because there is, you know, like some foreign dictator was interfering or bamboo ballots or suitcases.

44:10I mean, the conspiracy theories went on and on, but they were successful. And continue to. It's still nearly 60 percent. Right. To this day. Yeah. And so given that point, that they are able to convince some folks of an alternate reality, how are you thinking about that in terms of what we're seeing right now, which is these Republicans continue to try and convince people that an economy that is not doing better for people somehow is? And where is that disparity? Like, why isn't it working right now in the same way that it worked, you know, leading up to January 6, 2021? They're so good at gaslighting people.

44:45They're so good at convincing them that they live in an alternate reality. Why is it breaking down right now? Well, I mean, a lot of the people who ended up switching are in that kind of swing voter group. Like I was just listening to Sarah Longwell on her panel, you know, talking about this and she emphasizes as she does on the bulwark, swing voters actually exist. And these are people who are open to hearing opposing ideas and the mood right now. I'm sure you saw that on the exit poll. Like, what do you think of Democrats? They suck. Who did you vote for? Every single Democrat on my ballot. And, you know, this is an electorate that's super tuned in.

45:20Right. It's not even a midterm election. It's an off year election. And these are the people who are showing up to vote. So, you know, that's very meaningful to them. But they are harnessing something and they're seeing something about Donald Trump's popularity. It's like, you know, I've been talking about it extensively, how unpopular is, how unpopular the policies are. But the real manifestation of that is obviously an election night. And that's the only poll that matters in all of this. So you can point to that. But one thing that I try to emphasize, and I think it's important for liberals to do more, is that you can't change their reality.

45:54And I don't even really try anymore to say, like, you need to stop thinking what you do about January 6th. Like it's not worth it to have a fight about whether it was an insurrection or it wasn't an insurrection or when, you know, if Jack Smith had the goods on the Mar-a-Lago documents or whatever. Like you have to work with this, the reality that you have because these are the people who are going to show up to vote. And so I try to kind of mix reality into my commentary while also making it clear that I'm not being disparaging or looking down on anyone. Like we have to, I guess, do better at opening people up to the idea that we're not those caricatures that we saw in all of the exits, right?

46:33Like preachy and – Right. Scoldy and – yeah. Right. Because people will choose someone who doesn't think that they're an idiot. Right. So I think that that factors in a lot to how people are receiving information about what's actually going on and also just using quotes from other people. That's like my favorite thing to do. And I mean you do tons of research for your show. But when you say like CEO of Walmart, don't take it from me. Right. CEO of Walmart. I literally say that almost every day on my channel. It's like, hey, and don't take it from me. Take it from me. Right, I'm biased. Right, right.

47:02Like Andy McCarthy says blah, blah, blah. It's not the same. We both love Mark Elias. Yeah. Fox audience doesn't care about what Mark Elias thinks, but Andy McCarthy or Jonathan Turley was out there on Mar-a-Lago documents. You have Marjorie Taylor Greene coming out and saying the Republicans have no plan for healthcare. I feel weird about her though. I think that there is - She's fun to use. There is definitely a bit of opportunistic, you know, like she's clearly angling for something. Nobody nobody turns that that quickly without openly that openly without having some ulterior motive. But but that notwithstanding, I am curious because in the lead up to the 2024 election, it was a lot of those culture war issues.

47:41And and that's really what Republicans were able to exploit in their victory. Do you think that there's some sense of buyer's remorse now, given the fact that like this was an entire election where the biggest ad spend was about gender reassignment surgeries among prison inmates and like and trans athletes of whom there are 10 in the NCAA? Do you think that there's a sense of like, oh, maybe we got duped by ushering in a political party on the back of an issue that impacts 99.9 % of people, zero. And yet, you know, when it comes to issues that actually impact people, like that's that that's not that was not talked about in the lead up to 2020.

48:23Well, they had no option in 2025 to run a different campaign besides preying upon culture war issues because the economy is doing really badly. Yeah. And the border is secure now. And that was a great thing for Trump to be able to run on. You know, that's why he squashed the bipartisan bill and, you know, made James Langford cry. He was like, no, no, I need this for the election. I mean, pretty openly, too. Yeah. I mean, the guy, to his credit, I guess, he doesn't hide these things. Right. So when you can't tell people you have more money in your bank account, your groceries are cheaper, you know, you're going to take a second vacation this year, you have to go to something else.

49:01And they were also working with, at least in Virginia, a very bad candidate who I think was not coachable towards any other talking point. I mean, she had said on the record so many inflammatory things about Doge. You know, she said, like, why is everyone so upset about the cuts? It's like, you're the lieutenant governor of Virginia. You know, everyone in your state works for the federal government, basically. So I think that they were out of options, which makes me wonder about how they'll tackle the midterms. Yes. Because that's the real test of this. Well, now, I mean, is there some sense that like there is a really small cynical part of me that's like, OK, we kind of we kind of, for lack of a better phrase, kind of blew our load on this one because now like the cat's out of the bag.

49:43Everybody understands the potency of affordability. There were quite a few Republicans who ran on affordability. Granted, it was in bad faith because Trump had no intention of making housing or rent or groceries more affordable. Electricity prices are up. Food prices are up. Housing prices, rent prices are up. All those prices are up because you wanted to engage in a trade war. But but, you know, they were successful in 2024. Democrats were successful in 2025. And so what does it look like as we head toward 2026 when you have both parties saying the same thing, a winning message from the last two elections?

50:12And how do you stand out? How do you how do you overperform when both candidates are going to lean in on on the same exact message? I think quality of candidate will really matter. I've been heartened in seeing that we're trying to redux the 2018 camo wave because that was some of the most exciting. I mean, Mikey Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger are now governors, right? And they can't. I mean, Alyssa Slotkin is the senator for Michigan. I love Pat Ryan. And he has kind of been spearheading this with Jason Crow getting out there and recruiting people who talk like them and have those kinds of experiences.

50:45is. So I think that that's really smart and the candidate quality is part of it. I think it's under discussed in the wake of the win that the DNC did some good things here and that we need to let up on Ken Martin a little bit about it. I'm not close to that world. I get the emails, but I'm not embedded necessarily. But they seem to have taken the approach that Nancy Pelosi always had and was so successful, if you want me there, I'll be there. If you don't, I'll send you some money and you go about your business. And those are the races that are going to be winnable for us. That's why losing a Jared Golden is so tough because I don't know anyone who can pull off that seat.

51:28To me, we're kissing that goodbye at this point. But when you're hearing it coming from both sides. I think it's going to be the person who is really out there campaigning hard and spending time with you and asking you about how you're doing. That's the Mom Donnie thing, right? Just what's wrong? Like, how can I make your life better? Getting back to basics of not necessarily big government, but effective government. And our panel this morning that Lovett was hosting was like called, Are We Having Fun Yet? But it was about, or it was supposed to be about, but I got very sidetracked. It was a crazy cast of characters for one panel.

52:04But it was supposed to be about, you know, how can we make the Democratic Party cool again or politics cool again? And I felt very sad about the fact that young people in this country don't know what it feels like to love politics or to be excited about a political figure like Obama. Like I grew up in the Obama era. I remember being at college organizing buses to go to the polls for Obama in 2008. And then the Affordable Care Act passed. And like, I graduated and I had healthcare because of him. And also he's like, you can't not. He's just awesome. He's awesome. And you can't not watch him and just be inspired by what politics could be.

52:40But like Gen Z's are growing up in a political era. They've only known Trump. They've only known Trump. And they've only known school shootings. They've only known COVID. And so like politics only has negative associations for them. I totally agree. I mean, I it was interesting for me. I'm a total Hillary Clinton diehard person. So, you know, I know that she doesn't do it for everybody. But there was this moment at the DNC. You know, she spoke on the Monday night. You were there, too. It was incredible. I thought it was one of the best speeches that she's delivered. the room's totally electric about it and i'm talking like in the hallway with some young girls who are there from all over the country and they say to me i didn't know that she was that great and i was like it's sad to me that you don't know but i understand people become in the minds of of viewers and americans they become the caricatures that that people portray them on or that the media portrays them as well especially because right-wing media is so much more powerful and left way.

53:39And I think we're doing better. I think, you know, chorus is helping a tremendous amount of people going on each other's pods and crisscrossing and trying to have difficult conversations. But we are still so far away from having a comparable pull, I guess, not just in eyeballs, but in, I don't know, like power to sway opinion. Well, you know, you probably above anybody else maybe in the United States of America have the ability to talk to that. Like, I know that for my audience, my audience is largely liberal. And of course, very grateful for my audience, but also grateful for a sliver of people who are independent or who are Republican.

54:18And I hear from those people every once in a while as well. The majority of your audience doesn't agree with you. And so there's a really only upside because it's only the ability to bring more people in. I'm sure most people are closed off, but if you have some segment of people who are not. So can you talk about that a little bit? Like, have you spoken to the Fox audience who see you? Have you heard from people who were all the time? So talk. Yeah, it's a lot of people who are in conservative households who are kind of more moderate. And also, you know, I'm on the moderate side of our party.

54:53So my politics don't seem wacky, really, to anyone. I mean, online, I guess you could find many people are calling me a communist, but no one is really being serious about it. And, you know, they're very thankful that there's a dissenting voice, at least in the conversation, that their family members are not only ingesting, but happy to ingest. Because our families, and you know that, I mean, holidays coming up, all the things, our families are complicated. Like, this is the first year I have a Trump voter in my family, a liberal Trump voter who voted on the issue of Israel and everything else about Trump's platform, not into, but he was like, he's going to be better for Israel.

55:33And he feels vindicated at this point with all the hostages having come back. So I think having this understanding that all of our communication has to be centered around shared humanity. Like if you watch The Five, the entirety of the episode, which most people who might be consuming your channel have only seen clips of me. You see people who are real colleagues and even friends, people who see each other every day. You're showing up to work with these people, know about their kids and their dogs and all of this. And I think that that's a formula that is so resonant with the country that we have not been able to replicate on the left.

56:13I mean, there are panel shows, obviously, but it's still like commentators that are kind of smushed together versus this wacky family vibe. And I think that that's a really big part of it and something that I try to center in it, that like winning an argument is not about a takedown or being able to get, you know, have a viral clip. Like all of that is all well and good. But I want to emphasize, and I did on the panel, that the point is that this is an ongoing discussion. It's not a drop in, drop out situation. And that's how you can actually change people's minds. And I'm sure for the ones who you do, they watch your channel repeatedly and they get to know you and who you are as a person.

56:54Right. I think it's important, A, to build up that credibility because without that, like, again, like you said, it's not going to happen in just one moment. You're going to land a gotcha and then, you know, change people's – I hate that even when I see it where people will text like, oh, I'm going to go on and I'm going to blow things up and do whatever. I'm like, you're not going to get invited back also because that's not the system. Yeah. Well, and also when I think about how Democrats, at least up to 2024, have used their money, it's like we see ads in like September or October of an election year and like that's it.

57:25And you're not going to convince people, especially in an era where they're consuming media all day long. They're watching podcasts that may be an hour long, but maybe four hours long or five hours long. Or they tune into the five and watch you guys every day. Listen to you and Scott on Raging Moderates. But like these are long form, this is long form content and people listen to you and they build up their political ideologies and their worldviews from that. And so the notion that you can just drop some ads in October of an election year that lasts 15 seconds and think that that's going to have pull or persuasion power in an era where people are consuming so much content.

58:04Constantly. And have parasocial relationships with these trusted messengers who are doing the work 365 days a year is so backwards, so anachronistic. And I mean, look, look what happened in 2024. That's the direct result of that. Republicans have embraced independent media to a degree that that it was previously unheard of, certainly on the Democratic side. Yeah. But but they built up that ecosystem largely because they weren't getting what they needed from legacy media. But they did it. And up to this past election, it's like, I mean, I know I know that now it feels like politicians are on all the shows, all the YouTube shows, all the podcasts.

58:38They're going on TikToks. And that's great. But prior to this, it was like it was like MSNBC and CNN. And so, of course, of course, you're not going to like this is this is not a strategy built toward persuasion. It's not a strategy built toward reaching people where they actually are. Totally. And I'm still I'm thankful for everybody that wants to, you know, take a leap and do an interview that they might not necessarily have done a couple of years ago. But most of the politician interviews are still just that. They're interviews. And I'm sure you notice this, you know, because we talked when I was launching the YouTube channel for Raging Moderates, you know, what works, what doesn't?

59:12Because I'm not a YouTube creature, right? I'm a cable creature. and we were talking about what guests resonate and what guests don't and what that's all about and you see this moment sometimes when you're in interviewing a politician where like something clicks in them and they're like oh shit i haven't done my stump speech yet yeah and then suddenly it's like the cost of energy is too high and it's so frustrating and i don't want to say it out loud because i don't you know i don't want to embarrass anyone but inside i'm saying we were having a good time. People are actually getting to know you.

59:45And they're going to vote for you because you're someone that they can hang out with who would like come down to the bar. You know, we don't even talk anymore about which politicians would you want to have a beer with? Yeah. Yeah. You know, I had a politician ask me once about like, how do we how do we get back? Like, how important is it to stay on message? And, you know, if you look, they had pointed out the fact that Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were always super on message and look how successful they were. And how do we weave in this new media environment our basically stump speech into responding to all these questions?

1:00:21And I say, you don't. The credibility comes from being able to show that you're a normal human being. And once you've built that credibility up, then you have that. Then they're interested. Then you're interested and they trust you and you're a trusted messenger. And then when you do the stump speech, when it matters, then that's how you can sell it. But you don't get that without some trust that you've built up with audiences, especially when they're sitting with people now who they do watch every day. And so you feel the transactionality of all of this. 100%. I have two questions for you. One, do you feel like politicians in our party now understand how important you are to us being able to do well in the midterms and in 2028?

1:01:06And then the second question is, in terms of the content of that stump speech, because I went back, I was looking at old Obama speeches, and there was soaring rhetoric. But he was saying stuff like, we got to educate our kids. We got to save our farms. We got to make sure that you feel safe in your house of worship. We need to pave the road. He was like a potholes guy. Yeah. Right? We've got to keep good immigrants in and get bad immigrants out. You know, he's a deporter in chief. And like Donald Trump fantasizes about being able to deport as many people as Barack Obama did. And I feel like that's so missing right now that people are not getting that combination.

1:01:54That you've got to sound good, obviously, and inspire. But really, what is the deliverable? Like Mikey Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger, they're walking deliverables. You just trust them as like, I mean, a CIA agent and a naval pilot, right? What are they going to do? They're going to help you cut red tape and build more affordable housing. You're going to have a state of emergency on energy. That's what their campaigns were. I don't remember anything that made me get out of my seat and go like, yeah, this is what America is. It was like, I serve you and I heard you. So sorry, that was annoying that there were two together.

1:02:26I don't know. Yeah. So to answer the first one, I'm going to remove myself and just say. Or create. Creators with huge followings, though. Yeah, and I think the answer is yes. I mean, I have seen everybody everywhere, which is great. And that's what I want. That's what I've been fighting for. And look, even leading up to 2024, I was lucky enough to be able to have discussions with a lot of these people. But the broader creator ecosystem was not. And I think that that is completely on its head now. The door is open, too. The door is wide open, which is what I've been advocating for. I mean, I wrote a book in 2024 about the importance of embracing independent media.

1:03:00This is not for me. Again, I have access. I had access to all of those people. This was for them to embrace all the creators. The work I do with Chorus as an incubator program to build up the creator ecosystem, that is so that this ecosystem can spread. I want everybody to go on these shows wherever they are, on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, on all their different verticals, talking to people that are black, white, brown, gay, straight, conservative, moderate, whatever it may be. So the answer to that question is yes. And it's a long time coming. But I think that that moment is finally here.

1:03:34But to answer your second question, I think that this past election cycle is going to be so instructive for other Democrats moving forward. And we hadn't seen it up until this cycle. Like from Spanberger and Mikey Sherrill to Zoran Mamdani, laser focused on deliverables, laser focused on like regular people shit. And this was the first election cycle where it didn't feel like it devolved into progressive versus moderate and like a spectrum infighting. Like and I think that's important. And I've heard a lot of people say, including Barack Obama at the Pots of America show last night. I'm so bummed he wasn't here today.

1:04:12Barack Obama said, like, this is good. Like, we can have – it doesn't matter where you lie on the ideological spectrum because for wherever you're running, that's going to be – that's going to work for those people. It's that the through line between everything that Democrats are selling is that we're focused on regular people, focused on making sure you can afford to do all of the things that you want to do, that you have some dignity in your life. And that doesn't, by the way, that doesn't need to be that doesn't need to be differentiated based on where you lie on the ideological spectrum. Like like at its core, whether you're a progressive or whether you're a moderate, like if you're not just here delivering for people like that, that's what politics is.

1:04:52That's what public service is. And so and so I think that moving forward now, if you're not doing that, if you are focused on a campaign where it feels like you're talking about like these national culture war issues, it's going to feel really old. I know it's not that old because it's the lead up to 2024, but everything moves so quickly and it's going to feel really, really old as a campaign. Absolutely. I mean, I am conscious of the moment when a great candidate, but it was in a close race, one of these people who wins swing districts. And I always love when you see flying around social media.

1:05:31If you're one of these 10 representatives, you could say whatever you want. Like if you want to go after whoever and that's what you need to do to win your district, do it. But, you know, the right is very good at energizing a media narrative. I'm not saying necessarily voters, but a media narrative around one niche event. Like the super random thing that happened. And I don't even want to say that, like, you know, there are 10 trans athletes in the NCAA out of 500 ,000. Right. So I don't even that statistic. It's real. And I thought that it was really important that the head of the NCAA made that point when they testified in Congress.

1:06:14But like the trans stuff is a little different than that. But like, you know, you take a I don't I shouldn't I want to reverse. It's not niche because I don't want to diminish like what happened to Lake and Riley, which obviously set off like a huge, you know, not only a bill, but a real kind of come to Jesus moment, I think, for our party about how we have to start treating immigration. But the right is so good at knowing the names of everybody that you want to mention in those conversations. and, you know, we have our people that we would bring to the State of the Union, but we wouldn't bring, they call them angel moms whose kids were killed by undocumented people.

1:06:57Or you have, you know, Joe Biden backtracking when he said illegal alien and then has to go back to saying undocumented and those kinds of things. And they may seem like minor in the moment, but they live forever in the lore in the conservative ecosystem. And that's what I say up at night kind of panicked about because it becomes embedded in everything and their perception of us as a party. And I think right now, we're did well in an election, but the brand is still in the toilet and it's going to be very hard to rehab. Maybe we don't even need to. Well, look, I think the brand problem will solve itself in the sense that we can't just, you don't just fix the brand.

1:07:38Like you can't just say we're changing the brand. Like Cracker Barrel goes back to the other brand. There's no sign. Like you don't put a new sign up and you're like, the brand is different now. I hereby proclaim. Like you change the brand by running people who connect with more people. Like Zoran Mamdani changes the brand. Yeah. You know, like there's a there's a cultural element to this where where but but you only need those new people. And frankly, a lot of the Democrats who are in office right now, their unwillingness to leave is actually what's doing the brand harm because it's entrenching the same problems that that that we've had before and so you know you you can try and like tweak around the edges and teach some of the people who but by the way like some of these like 70 or 80 year olds who've been there forever how to like get so get more social media but like that's not gonna do it like you fix the brand by getting by the brand is a reflection of the party and the party is the people who are who are in it who are running these campaigns and so that will happen over time and I think that as we get this 2026 slate you know I'm really excited about it because these are candidates who are younger they're more dynamic they have grown up in an era where digital doesn't feel like something that you have to refashion uh your existing um comm strategy into like this is not like oh well we have our we have our mailers that we do and our tv hits that we do and like let's figure out something that we can throw into digital.

1:09:00Like these are digital first. Zoran Mamdani is digital first. Newsom's Prop 50 campaign was digital first. And so I think having these candidates who are more comfortable in these spaces, who did not grow up in an era where, you know, you did C-SPAN hits and CNN hits, that's going to fix a lot of the problems that plague us right now. Yeah. I'm curious or how you're feeling about, you know, there are going to be some contested primaries um i always hopeful we win a texas senate seat always disappointed but you know looking at james tallarico and colin allred in there and i think they're both very compelling i think james tallarico is obviously more compelling on your phone you know like whatever ads you're seeing from him or we had him on and i was blown away and you know i love that this new crop also is so faith first that they're comfortable talking about their faith because I feel like we've run away.

1:09:54We've seeded so much like patriotism, nationalism, faith, whatever. James is especially adept at that. Oh, but, you know, the moderate versus – Tallarico is not like a progressive in like the AOC sense, but definitely, you know, to the left and we're all right. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, but he's – I'm curious how those kinds of contests are going to play out because we're all – We all got the memo. This is a big tent. And I think even the last few weeks have done so much good in accepting that. The last week has done good. I think prior to that, there was still a ton of infighting. But I think the last week has been effective at saying there's not one ideology that works.

1:10:37Like if it was only progressive candidates, everybody progressive would say, this is the way moderates are like the way of the past. But because we had moderates win in moderate districts, progressives win in progressive districts, then I think that that hopefully there is a world in which everyone's like, we can we can do both. We can do both. And I think another credit to the party when they released that ad on the Democrats accounts that had all of the candidates. And Mom Donnie was prominent in there with Gavin Newsom and Abigail Spanberger and Mikey Sherrill. I think that's a step in the right direction.

1:11:07But it will be interesting. To see what the kind of the left and the right side of the party in these primaries, what that ends up looking like. I mean, there are a lot of people here at Crooked Con who are like, oh, hi, Jessica. I'm blah, blah, blah. I'm primarying so-and-so, right? Because they're wrong on Israel or they're not standing up to Trump well enough. And there's going to be some real infighting ugliness coming our way. There will. I think overall, there's a part of me that's like, obviously, we don't want to relive another Bernie Hillary. I mean, it's never. It's so just like I think everyone is so, you know, like injured from from that whole era and traumatized from that whole era.

1:11:52But at the end of the day, I think that is less important than just doing democracy, like having these having these primaries and getting as many people in as possible. I think it's good. Like the biggest problem with the Democratic Party is it feels like people were anointed. I mean, that was the problem with Kamala. That was the problem with Hillary. That was, you know, it felt for a lot of people like like there were even instances of that with Joe Biden when everybody dropped out so that he would, you know, start winning the primaries there. But but I think having yes, it might be some semblance of a redux of like what we've seen in past election cycles.

1:12:29that pales in comparison to not to like getting these primaries doing them and like doing democracy and like finding the candidate who's the strongest to to prevail and and i think as long as you do that and you don't engage in a system where it feels like both sides didn't have the ability to make their case like like just do democracy and at least that there won't be an excuse you know what i mean i totally agree i i guess my my worry is a having a message around it, right? When you see, like, if the more lefty candidate is doing well, then the right will write the story of, oh, like the Seattle mayor, the guy who won, who was not the DSA guy in the end, but it's like, and we might be on the precipice of like another DSA mayor in Seattle.

1:13:15What do you care? You have like right wing lunatics in offices all over the country. I'm less concerned about positioning ourselves in such a way that would preclude the right from being able to attack us because the right you don't have my job i don't have your job yeah but also the right attacks everybody anyway well that's the thing they called joe biden a fucking socialist joe biden so at this point if if you're gonna get called obama yeah it doesn't matter if you're gonna get called a socialist anyway run these candidates and by the way they they ran all of those attacks against zaron mamdani and and this guy changed politics in new york he brought out a ton of people in new york who wouldn't have been engaged in the political process he pulled over a bunch of people that I'm sure voted for Trump when he ran on a populist platform in the previous election cycle.

1:14:03So I think that will kind of take care of itself. If somebody wins, they're obviously doing something right. And so I think that that's more potent than whatever attacks are going to come forward. And the attacks are going to be inevitable anyway. And so I think that trying to position yourself in a way to preclude those inevitable attacks is kind of a losing battle. I hope that you're right. Just because I'm also uncomfortable with internal. I want healthy competition. I think the primary system is really important. But at a certain point, party apparatus gets involved in things and they have to pick their candidate or who are we backing?

1:14:37You're seeing it in the Michigan primary for the Senate. But, you know, I think I think that has less potency. I think people know. No. And I think it's honestly a strike against you. Correct. Correct. And so if I was Stevens, I'd be pissed, frankly, that Chuck Schumer liked me. Yeah, I agree. I think, too, that, you know, in rebutting those attacks, insofar as this is helpful for what you do on Fox, like there have been there have been so many election cycles where we've heard Republicans say that, you know, that this person's a socialist, this person's a socialist. We had eight years of Bill Clinton, not a socialist country.

1:15:09We had eight years of Barack Obama, not a socialist country. We had four years of Joe Biden, not a socialist country. And in fact, not only did we not descend into socialism or Marxism or communism or whatever labels they throw out, but in my entire lifetime, we have never had a Republican administration that's built more jobs than a Democratic administration, that's had a stronger economy than a Democratic administration, that's had lower unemployment than a Democratic administration. Never. Like, I haven't seen it. And it continues to this day. And so when you actually put the facts in front of these people that despite the fear mongering that's happening, when you actually look at the results, and we have a lot of results since this era, since this Newt Gingrich inspired era of like, let's attack the other side as if they're our full blown enemy and call them socialists and Marxists.

1:15:55Since that era has begun, the results speak for themselves. And so at some point, you just got to look at what the results actually are. And that tells the story for you. Totally. And we even had it like on a little social cart. You know, you can put on all of your accounts where it's like, you know, the 50 million jobs that have been created under Democrats and like 1 million under Republicans or whatever. And James Carville is out there talking about it. But it loops back to where we started, which is people's reality is people's reality. Right. And I think a lot of our language, and I don't like being a language police lady about these things, but the fact there are even words in our ecosystem like around equity and things like that have hurt us so severely.

1:16:38And being able to communicate that message where they think like, well, what kind of jobs were they? Right? Were they just like DEI jobs or CRT? I don't even know what a CRT job is. But like, and I think that we still have a ways to go, I guess, in the plain talkingness of it. And I don't think also that talking up past accomplishments is the way forward. I do. I think talking about your own record is important. And like for Mikey and Abigail, like they were in the top 5 % of most bipartisan Congress people. I think that's really important to say like, you voted for Trump? No problem. I collaborate with people who lean right all the time.

1:17:18But our tendency to look to the past, to buttress how great we're - And tout metrics. But I think you're exactly right. I'm saying that in the sense of like when, you know, to rebut that argument. It's important. But for these candidates who are running right now, it cannot be past focus. It's like nothing has happened. Right. Like you were just born and you have these ideas. Like you have your experience, but you don't have the political baggage that we've had. And that's what the right does very well. If something's inconvenient, it didn't happen. Yep. Yep. And it's divorced from reality sometimes, but it's compelling to people because, you know, they don't want to look backward.

1:17:59Everyone does want, they have no faith in politics, but if they're going to get it back, it's because it's going to be forward looking. Okay. Last question here, and I'm going to try and channel the question that I know that most people have. Does it ever get too frustrating slash how do you do it? But I would imagine, especially as people kind of retreat into their own ecosystems in their friend groups, insofar as we can, in our families, whatever it may be, you put yourself, affirmatively put yourself in scenarios where you are surrounded by people who are ideologically unaligned with you. And so in your mental state, how does that feel?

1:18:42You know what I mean? I mean, like, how do you, I guess the question is, like, how do you do it? So one thing that I think is really important to it is that I know no other media life. Like, I have only ever been at Fox. I'm not someone that was, like, on rotation around a bunch of places. Like, my old boss worked at Fox. He said you should start going on TV to build your media skills because you've got to be able to talk for yourself and called a booker at Fox. And then I started a relationship and got hired a couple of years later. So I think that that's part of it. It's also, like I was saying, about the consistent relationship.

1:19:21Like, they're my colleagues the same as if you work at any company, right? And I really – well, I get excited by the idea of trying to figure out the most compelling or the perfect argument for something. and it's this, it's not a game, but we know each other so well that you can kind of think, okay, well, Greg's going to go this way. Jesse's going to swerve this way. Like what, you know, what have we got to do? And Greg Gottfeld has said in interviews, which is very sweet. He's like, Jessica is my muse. Like I, when we're prepping for the show, I'm thinking, where's Jessica going to be going with this?

1:19:55And likewise, I'm thinking about it too. But what makes it even better or more exciting is that I know that the people that I'm talking to are channeling the ideas of the most important people in this country now, politically speaking. And I feel like there's such incredible opportunity that I would be an idiot to think, oh, I should, but I should go and do this. And I get to have my podcast, which is fabulous, and talk to Scott and have a whole hour where we're mostly in agreement about things and I can finish all my thoughts. But we've left so many good opportunities on the proverbial field.

1:20:33And I think that being a strong liberal that can hang in conservative places has been that because the caricature has always been, oh, if you show up, you're supposed to just like, you know, like bend over and take it. Which is not how I do it and not how any of my colleagues would want me to do it. and modeling civic discourse. I mean, sometimes it's messy, obviously. But the fact that we are still kind of united by the fact that we're having similar conversations and that these issues matter to all of us is really animating. And also, I split the chair. So Harold Ford Jr. does it half of the week.

1:21:09I think five days a week, it's a lot, one on four. But we have like three and a half to four million people that watch every day. I mean, you have that many subscribers, but - It's important because of who those people are. And a lot of them are persuadables. Yeah, you have the opportunity to speak to a lot of people that most people in the left of center ecosystem don't even have exposure to. And so I think what you do is important. And look, I know that I speak on behalf of just about everyone watching this right now and listening and saying thanks for getting out there and not just doing what you do, but being so effective at doing it.

1:21:45Well, I so appreciate it and the opportunity to chat. And also, you know, you guys in the independent media and creator space have given a tremendous amount of lift to the work that I'm doing. Like, it wasn't honestly until two, three years ago that I feel like DC would even speak to me. Like, I couldn't, you know, I would be on a normal email talkers list, but like a press secretary or no one would ever have had my phone number to say, like, can I clarify, you know, is there, what are you guys talking about today? Like, if you need numbers on this or, you know, I'd love to have an off-the-record chat.

1:22:17And then it took a few kind of rogue-ish people in the Biden administration who were very savvy online that were like, hey, this girl's clips are going viral all the time for our accounts. Maybe we should try talking to her. And I think the Democratic Party is much healthier for having these conversations with all of us, no matter our politics, and also no matter where we work. So that's a bright light. Well, I'm going to put the link to Raging Moderates right here on the screen and also in the post description of this video. If you're listening on the podcast, it'll be in the show notes. Jessica Tarlov, thanks so much for what you do.

1:22:52Thank you for having me and for what you do. I mean, I've been watching you forever. Thanks again to Governor Wes Moore, Dan Pfeiffer, and Jessica Tarlov. That's it for this episode. Talk to you next week. You've been listening to No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen. Produced by Sam Graber, music by Wellesley, and interviews edited for YouTube by Nicholas Nicotera. If you want to support the show, please subscribe on your preferred podcast app and leave a five-star rating and a review. And as always, you can find me at BrianTylerCohen on all of my other channels, or you can go to BrianTylerCohen.com to learn more.