1082: How Do We Push Back on Authoritarianism? (Crooked Con)

24:43that we have accomplished at this point, if you compare. And we are largely doing it without elite law firms doing their share of the pro bono work, right? Because so this has been a real collaborative effort. But what it looks like is what you think it looks like. One, there's a playbook. And so those things we can prep for, we can plan for, we can work with each other, We can share information and make sure we know which communities are going to be affected. How can they get into court? Do they know that they can get into court and line that up? And then you have the Trump factor, which is sort of whatever just happens on a given day.

25:20And that does require a lot of caffeine and a lot of amazing lawyers on our teams, amazing lawyers who truly do work through the night to get into court the next morning to ensure that the American people have their voices heard. And then the other thing we have, which we are really starting to focus on, and we want all of you to focus on, is what we call the kind of non-shiny object stuff. So not everything that this administration does is happening on Truth Social or at a big signing ceremony in the Oval Office or bulldozers at the White House. There are a number of things that are happening throughout the federal branches of our government and agencies throughout the government and communities that the administration actually doesn't want to answer about and they don't want to even say that they're doing.

26:08And so we do a lot of work to detect what those things are and then to make sure that we can also get into court, not just to challenge what's happening, but also to expose what's happening, which links back to your question about investigative journalism and making sure that people know what their government is up to. Norm, did you want to?

26:30The secret is not to sleep. Sleep and you're dead, right? It has been very good. The litigation economy has been very good for Diet Coke and Red Bull.

26:47Some of the cases, we drafted our birthright complaint, which was the first of the complaints filed on day one. And then when the Supreme Court ruled, oh, you've got to have a class action, we had a class action on file two hours later. and now we're back at the Supreme Court. We drafted that complaint over the summer of 2024. So some of it is having cards up your sleeve. Some of it is having this incredible, as Sky says, it has been an extraordinary coalition. And I should also shout out, they operate in parallel to the democracy groups, the democracy litigating groups. The AGs have been absolutely superb litigating partners.

27:37We're often, we did a Doge case, they did a Doge case against Musk. We did an AmeriCorps case, they did an AmeriCorps case. Sky did the SNAP case, the AGs did the SNAP case. Occasionally we work together, we're in a case together. So the AGs have been wonderful partners and I think it is part of the reason that you have multiple groups that are ready at all times. You know, no one org could have met, flood the zone with rule of law shock and awe. But having a large coalition and clients and the labor movement ready to do that has made the difference.

28:24You guys have had a lot of wins. you're also facing a very conservative Supreme Court majority, much of it appointed by Trump himself. Frequently when they offer a limited or temporary ruling in favor of Trump comes via the shadow docket with no opinion. I think this leads some people, you know, who casually pay attention to politics to think, well, since we don't have the court, like what's the use here? Are the courts really holding up because maybe we win in some of the lower courts, but then when it gets to the Supreme Court, we lose. How much of an impediment to your strategy is the Supreme Court, or have you found the Supreme Court?

29:04You want to start? Yeah. I think that the birthright case is a good example. The Supreme Court is tilting the playing field. It's not a sheer playing field. You don't have to do rock climbing. You've got to pump your legs harder. It's terrible what they've done with the shadow docket, but you can win there. The Lisa Cook case proves that you can be successful at the Supreme Court. I think we've learned how to bring cases to the Supreme Court. So in that birthright case, there was the safety valve, multiple safety valves, including class actions. And in one of the big, this story will illustrate, I think, how you deal with the Supreme Court in this day and age.

29:58In the tariffs case, we represent a large group of conservatives and Favs. You and I were Obama people from early on, much earlier since we were in law school together when Favs was still enjoying his elementary education. We, in the tariffs case, represent a coalition of two dozen conservatives. Many people who I had fought my entire professional career. Bill Kristol, I debated the Iraq war. He's now on my board. Joe Walsh, who founded the Freedom Caucus. He's the treasurer. So we put together this coalition, and they wanted to, we filed a brief with the Supreme Court. They wanted to convey the message to the court, this is not a liberal issue.

31:03This really is a conservative issue, and it is. So you have to do things like that, and I think it's working. Yeah. Yeah. The thing I'll just say is a few things. One is we just need to remember our history that but for some decades in the last century and a smattering of winds in this century, the United States Supreme Court has not been an institution that has easily promoted our democracy and the equality of all people. And I say that with a love for the court and judges and the legal process and as the person that leads an organization that's in court all the time. But I do think that we need to remember that all of the fights in this country, the fight for abolition, the fight for women's rights, the fight for civil rights, the fight for LGBTQ rights, these wins were not handed down by the Supreme Court.

31:58They were hard-fought wins that went up and down the court system many times before you achieved the ultimate thing that you sought to achieve at the court. And we're trying to make sure that people understand that. And that legal work was incredibly important in shaping the law and building movements and ultimately in prevailing. But in this moment, we want folks to know a few things, everything that Norm just said. But then also, there have been about 500 cases in the last 260 or so days against this administration because of the extreme activity. The vast majority of those cases will never go to the Supreme Court, whether on the shadow docket or whether on the merits docket.

32:40And so part of the work here is to make sure that when this administration oversteps and it harms people and communities, people in communities can access a lawyer, and we do all of our work pro bono, as do many of the organizations that we work with, that they can access a lawyer and that they can get into court. The second thing is, is that this administration has actually been backing off many times when we go into court. Before even a case goes up on appeal, the administration either declines to appeal it or walks away because they don't want the public pressure. That is how there is now $7 billion in the public school system this year that the president impounded.

33:17Because we and the AGs went to court and they did not, they backed off. So there's a piece of that. And then there are the cases that will reach the court. And I think what Norm said is correct. It's bringing forward the salient voices that we know will mean something to the court. It's working to construct our cases in the best way. And then what I say to people like you guys is that the Supreme Court tomorrow upholds our rights. the next day you got to be out marching because this president and this administration is still going to find a way to violate your rights and if the supreme court tomorrow does something terrible and doesn't uphold your rights you better be out in the street marching because this administration will take that decision and try to do something worse so the net of it is we all have got to be engaged we've got to be supporting each other building community out marching, doing things like this.

34:14That's what we've got to do, kind of regardless of what the court does in this moment. And that's what we are really trying to hope that people focus on. On that note, yes. I'll be marching with a sign that says term limits for Supreme Court justices. That's my sign.

34:35Last question. People are used to being asked to march, to organize, to vote, to donate, to run for office. Is there anything people can do to help with the legal battles that you guys are fighting? I know you're always looking for plaintiffs. What can people do? Well, I know Sky appreciates contributions to Democracy Forward, so I mustn't be shy about asking them for the Democracy Defenders Fund. I will say we also have an outlet. It's no crooked. It's no Pod Save America. But we do have the contrarian. All profits from the contrarian go to fund the litigation also. And the most important thing you can do, I'll end where, and then let Skye have the last word, but I'll end where she began.

35:31We won't be saved without the litigation. but the litigation alone will not save us. And the ultimate salvation of American democracy, and I'm hopeful, my teacher, President Havel, when I was a diplomat in Prague, the great dissident, Vaclav Havel, told me, you Americans, you're too optimistic. Don't be optimistic, but be hopeful. And I am very hopeful because of the people power that we saw just on Tuesday, growing and growing day after day, that the litigation is helping, but that ultimately the American people, every one of you, all your friends and family, get them out there in the streets, peaceful protest and vote, vote, vote.

36:29Yeah.

36:32And I'll just say the thing that I say often. I mean, you can go to our organizations and support them. We love that. Sign up and get updates. But the number one thing that an autocrat uses is not redistricting. It's not a PAC Supreme Court. It's not any of those things. It's people giving. It's people believing that they have no power. And so what we've been doing at Democracy Forward, in addition to the litigation, is really focusing on building community. Because when we're in community with each other, when we defy isolation, when we come to places like this and say, I'm going to get together with some folks and defy isolation, even if I want to go be alone, we can overcome.

37:12And at Democracy Forward, we've got some programs called Dinners for Democracies and Coffees for Change and ways that you can engage in your own community with those that may not be ready to get out in the streets. And then we obviously want everyone out marching and demonstrating and protesting as well.

37:32norman sky i just want to say um you two and all the lawyers and everyone on your staffs that have been working so hard you guys are heroes of this movement unsung heroes and i'm really glad we got to talk thank you for singing well because i i'm won't you sing to us i'm always singing for you guys um but we are we are on behalf of everyone we are just so so grateful for all the hard work you're doing and for what you're doing to help save this democracy. So thank you so much. Thank you.

38:27Here's why. The Trump administration and Congress have defunded Planned Parenthood. It's a devastating blow to patients, to our country's already broken healthcare system. Planned Parenthood health centers are committed to providing care no matter what, but they need your help to do it. Whether you give a little or give a lot, your gift says something about who you are. Someone who shows up for what's right, who believes people who need care should be able to get it. Please don't wait. Go to plannedparenthood.org slash defend and give today. That's plannedparenthood.org slash defend. This episode is brought to you by ZBiotics Pre-Alcohol.

39:01Got to tell you about this game-changing product we use before a night out with drinks. You've heard it before. It's pre-alcohol. It's the best. ZBiotics Pre-Alcohol Probiotic Drink is the world's first genetically engineered probiotic. It was invented by PhD scientists to tackle rough mornings after drinking. Here's how it works. When you drink, alcohol gets converted into a toxic byproduct in the gut. It's a buildup of this byproduct, not dehydration, that's to blame for rough days after drinking. Pre-alcohol produces an enzyme to break this byproduct down. Just remember to make pre-alcohol your first drink of the night.

39:34Drink responsibly, and you'll feel your best tomorrow. It's important that you make it the first drink of the night. You don't want to be two drinks in and then be like, oh, shit, I forgot the Z-Biotics. No, you want to take it early. And also, if you're listening and thinking, do I need this? Here's my question for you. Are you 22 or younger? No? Try Z-Biotics. Yeah. Trust me. The older you get. If you are 22 and under. The harder it is. Go have your good time. kids okay the adults here who are listening you need a prebiotic before you have a drink if you have more than one if you're doing on a school night you're really really going to be happy that you did yeah oh does it make you feel old you know what's going to make you feel old waking up the next day up with the antibiotics bad make the most of every toast tailgate and touchdown this holiday season look at that alliteration just don't forget to bring pre alcohol along for the ride go to zbiotics.com slash crooked to learn more and get 15 off your first order when you use crooked at checkout zbiotics is back with 100 money back guarantee So if you're unsatisfied for any reason, they'll refund your money, no questions asked.

40:29Remember to head to zbiotics.com slash crooked and use the code crooked at checkout for 15 % off.

40:38All right. Live from Crooked Con, I'm Tommy Vitor. I'm thrilled to be joined by some of the smartest, winningest strategists in the Democratic Party who are just coming off huge election victories in New York, New Jersey, and Virginia. Alex Ball was Mikey Sherrill's campaign manager. She's also worked on The Hill, the DCCC, Emily's List, tons of campaigns. Morris Katz was a top strategist and ad maker for Zoran Mamdani. He's also worked for Dan Osborne's Senate race in Nebraska. A bunch of other stuff. And Samson Signore was Abigail Spanberger's campaign manager. He has also led statewide coordinated campaigns and done a bunch of hotly contested elections.

41:19So we're going to talk about how they won, what works, what the future of the Democratic Party looks like based on these elections. And we're going to have some fun. So first question to everybody. What's like the 60 second version of why you won? Start with Alex. Yeah, thanks for having me. Thank God we all won. This would be really bleak. Excited to be here. Yeah, I mean, I think this isn't going to shock anyone in this room, but affordability. I think having a disciplined message and also having the right messenger is really how we got it done. I mean, we were just relentlessly focused on talking about driving down costs for New Jerseyans, how what was coming out of Washington was going to make matters even worse, and why Mikey was the effective, trustworthy, and competent leader to be the one to deliver going forward.

42:06Worse? I think it's two Pod Save America appearances over the course of the campaign is the key to... No, I think, you know, similarly, a laser focus on an affordability crisis and also a real willingness to name the villains who are responsible for creating this moment of gross income inequality. and then I think just on top of that kind of a refusal to allow ourselves to be confined by what politics has been and a relentless pursuit of investing in what politics can be, bringing young people out, immigrant communities, communicating in ways other people have disregarded and all having that around this laser focus that government can do more, government can do better and government can address this affordability crisis.

42:48Absolutely and thanks for having me Tommy. me. Abigail Spanberger won because she was laser focused on costs while Republicans in the Commonwealth of Virginia were focused on divisive culture wars. And I think that Virginians and Americans broadly are tired of chaos and division, and they want a return to normalcy, a return to the basics, and they want to focus a little bit less on politics. And in Abigail, they had a steady, pragmatic, focused leader who was laser-focused on what matters most, lowering costs, boosting the economy, and keeping communities safe. And that's one of the reasons, and I have to do a quick brag here, that we had a 15-point margin on Tuesday.

43:31The largest margin in Virginia since JFK was the president. And we won the LG, AG, and we flipped 13 statehouse seats, delivering the biggest statehouse majority since the 80s. And I think as of right now, we have the highest winningest margin of the three. So I'll be talking about the future of the party later. We're going to talk more shit. Don't worry. That's just the beginning. So Donald Trump has blotted out the political sun for like the last decade. How did you guys think about the way to divide your messaging between reacting to whatever he did that day versus what you wanted to talk about, which was obviously affordability?

44:12Jump ball here for anybody. Yeah, I'll take the first one. We were less focused on Trump and more focused on the consequences of Trump. Because, again, we were laser focused on lowering costs across the board. And the times that we spoke out against Trump is when he roiled Virginia's economy. So you saw Doge, federal workforce cuts that just gutted jobs across Virginia. You also saw the gutting of health care that spiked premiums for folks across Virginia. And just a couple of weeks ago, shuttered three rural health clinics. So from our perspective, it wasn't about Trump's personality. It wasn't about, you know, the destruction of the East Wing.

44:52It wasn't about the latest truth social thread. For us, it was staying laser focused on the consequences of Donald Trump to Virginia's economy. I think we took this approach of the idea that we weren't going to treat Donald Trump like the end-all be-all of the problems that New Yorkers were facing. And that viewing his power, his election, as a result of a fundamentally broken political system. And one of the first things Ron did after the election was he went out to one of the areas that flipped most dramatically towards Trump in the entire country. and interviewed people on the street who had voted for Donald Trump and talked to them about his platform, his affordability agenda, and by the end of it, persuaded many of them to support him.

45:34And we ran this campaign kind of going right at the center of what Donald Trump claims to have his kind of political brand be. He ran an entire campaign centered on lowering costs and did nothing to lower those costs. And I think you can kind of have your cake and eat it too by going at him in that angle. Alex, you guys, like there's a bunch of data that Nate Cohn at the New York Times wrote up that showed that you guys persuaded a bunch of Trump voters to vote for Mikey. How did, like, what did you see in your data? How did you target them? Like, how did you think about trying to get those crossover votes?

46:07Yeah, I mean, so historically, Mikey's always won over about like 25 % of Republicans, 60 % of unaffiliated voters. So we knew she had that crossover appeal. I think for us, we were incredibly proactive on issues around the economy. So we saw energy rates spike this summer and we were hot out the gate with a state of emergency where we said we were going to freeze utility costs. We got there probably three or four weeks before Jack Cittarelli did, which was just a huge misstep on his part in my mind. And we also we went on offense on taxes. So we had our outside expenditures signaled to them to go after him for raising property taxes at every level of government.

46:50So by the time we got to the end of the summer, we saw Fox polls showing that we were leading on traits of lowering taxes, lowering costs, who you trusted most to tackle the problems of the economy and utility costs, which are just historically traits that Democrats are not going to win on. And I think a lot of that had to do with the fact that Mikey's service background, people saw her as someone who was coming at problems from a place of service and wanting to deliver for people and not as a place of partisanship. And I think that was also kind of proven by the fact that she stood up to leaders in her own party time and again.

47:25And I think some of these Trump voters were just looking for something new and not a 30 year career politician like Jack Cittarelli. Also, I mean, you guys ran change elections, right? I mean, not necessarily this different party with Eric Adams, but it was a it was a change message. The look, the feel, everything about the election. You had a tougher job, in my view, which is running for a third term, the Democrat, you know, after two terms of Phil Murphy. Was that a headwind? How did you deal with it? Yeah, I think it was. I mean, New Jersey, while our federal delegation is pretty blue, we like to swap back and forth on parties when it comes to the governor.

48:02and it hadn't been since 1961 that we elected a third term of the same party. So that was certainly a headwind. And also, you know, we had to walk a fine line. We couldn't just go out and rail on Phil Murphy because why would you want to elect another Democrat? And, you know, he had done some good things for the state in terms of funding the pension and our credit rating. So we focused on the pieces where, you know, it just came back to costs and affordability. And, And I think our opponent tried to talk about a change election. But again, 30-year career politician, it just didn't land. Morris, you guys had some unique ad strategies, ad buys, seem to be very digitally focused.

48:47Do traditional TV ads work? And what did you do different? You're asking a TV consultant, Tommy. I know, but you guys, like, I think when people think of Zoran's campaign, it's like, oh, there's the dude who walked to Manhattan, right? Yeah, I think it's an all of the above. And I think so often we still have this approach of political consultants pretending that the only kind of thing that matters in a campaign is how many points are we going to have on broadcast TV over the final six weeks of a race. And I think that era is over. I think New York might have gotten there a little bit sooner than other places.

49:20Like there's more of a social media presence in New York than there is in other places. It's more expensive to buy ads, but I think we're all headed in this direction. It's never been harder to communicate consistently with a large group of people than it is right now. And people like to ask, is it the social media? Was it the TV? Was it the field? It's like, it's fucking all of it. You can't leave one part of it out. And for the ad campaign, we thought a lot about the kind of emotional experience that people were going to be having. And so we first went up on TV during the Knicks playoff run with the idea and vision that at a moment of hope for the city, if you could believe that the New York Knicks fucking Boston fans but the idea that if you could believe the Knicks could win a championship maybe you could believe that a 34 year old Muslim socialist could be mayor so sorry but that was the general kind of vision Sam you guys had like how many million dollars of attack ads run against you focused on an anti-trans message why do you think 40 million a lot of people think that the The messages that the anti-trans ads run against Kamala Harris were effective.

50:30Why do you think that they were clearly not effective against you guys? Yeah, so I think that I think a couple of things. One, I think Virginia or Republicans in Virginia were trying to run a tired playbook. I think they got way ahead of their skis on culture issues. They ran a campaign entirely devoid of anything focused on the economy, lowering costs or coming up with any types of solutions to make life better for Virginians. So I do think, first and foremost, they got way ahead of their skis and those ads fell flat. And I think that from our perspective, we knew that these were likely attacks that were going to come.

51:07We had different ads cut and ready to go to be placed as soon as we knew that that attack ad was going to be put down. But I think first and foremost, we spent a lot of time at the beginning of the campaign credentialing Abigail, former federal law enforcement officer, former CIA case officer, mother to three girls. This is not somebody who wants to hurt children. This is someone who literally, whose job it was, was to protect children. And we also credentialed her as someone who was laser focused on the economy from the very get go. So I think when you had the Republicans try to put these ads together, I think what the Republicans were relatively effective at in 2024 was convincing voters that these were issues that Democrats really cared about and that they're out there proactively campaigning on, which just wasn't the case.

51:57From our perspective, by laying down a really solid foundation of us being laser focused on the economy, on strengthening jobs, on lowering costs, and on keeping communities safe, those ads that they ran fell relatively on flat ears because it just wasn't believable by the time that they put down this deluge. Another thing, just from a media strategy standpoint, you know, Morris touched on this. A lot of times people are looking at, oh, how many points are you running on broadcast TV at the very end? We took it and we stretched it. We started our paid media strategy much earlier than most campaigns do, certainly the earliest that has ever been done in Virginia before.

52:37And part of the reason for that was to lay down that strong foundation of Abigail as someone who's a federal law enforcement officer, a former CA case officer, who's laser focused on lowering costs and on making your life a little bit better. So that when Republicans did come at us with those culture war issues, there's already a lot of inoculation that was done there. So, I mean, what tactics did you guys try that were new that you think worked? And what sort of campaign tactics of the past need to go in your view? I'll give you one. Please. It's a little spicy. spice it up. Questionnaires need to be jettisoned from the party.

53:16Can you tell folks here what these questionnaires are? You can clap. Sure. So, and I do want to confirm, there's a lot of awesome national and partner groups who do have a place in our party. And I think that questionnaires largely come from a position of good faith and trust. And questionnaires, oftentimes, very simple, easy ones that just want to, they get sent to candidates for candidates to fill out that talks about different positions to take. And on its face, that's fine. But the problem is when we have these highly, highly intensive questionnaires that go to candidates that, especially when you're looking at state house candidates, ones that don't really know much better, and what they see is a potential endorsement, potential door knockers, potential campaign contributions, and they say, all I have to do is go down and just check yes in all of these boxes.

54:07Sure. Sounds great. Easy. But then what happens, and we saw this in 2024 with probably the most notorious campaign ad that existed, that you get backed into a corner and you set your candidates up for not for success. So what I would say is if you are someone who works at a national organization, leads a national organization, I would look very hard at doing away with questionnaires and look more into, you know, coming at it from a position of, you know, candidate interviews. That was something that we did on our end. We filled out the questionnaires that we wanted to. We filled them out the way that we wanted to.

54:48But we also worked very closely with the state house caucus to make sure that candidates were not getting backed into a corner unnecessarily. So that's one tactical change that I would say. I think it's a pretty easy one too. Any tactical things you guys want to talk about? Yeah, I mean, I don't like talking about this with Morris right here, but influencers are a thing. And we just got them in New Jersey. So it was really this untapped market that campaigns in New Jersey just haven't used. I mean, New Jersey's pretty old school. And I think we did some really innovative things for the state in terms of building up an actual political influencer class.

55:27there's about like 35 of them that have kind of formed their own ecosystem in the state we do events with them we give them special access and really unfortunately the media in new jersey is very much dying and we really struggled with legacy media taking our momentum seriously i can't tell you how many headlines there were that mikey shero has a momentum problem she has this problem She has that problem. Why was the polling so off in New Jersey? And are there any specific people you want to dunk on that tweeted about your demise over the summer now? It'll take too long. You know, there was definitely some polling that was right.

56:07Like our independent expenditure had us at 12 points in the last couple of weeks. We are inching towards 14 points. The RCP was like three. We're inching towards 16. Yeah. All right. But no, there was a ton that were incredibly off. And it was clear in the methodology that they were off. We had one poll that had us plus one, but it had Cittarelli winning black voters 60-40. We won black voters 95-5. We outperformed Harris in Essex County that has a large black population by eight points. We won back Latino voters in Passaic County to win that county by 15 points that Trump won by three. And yet we had a problem with Latino voters.

56:50So it was ridiculous. But if you looked at the data, you saw that Mikey was winning on affordability. She was winning on utility prices. She was winning on taxes. And Jack was underwater every single time. And yet it was neck and neck. And it was anyone's race. So I don't know. But, I mean, there's just so many, like, random people in, like, their parents' basement running polls these days and putting them on the Internet. I'll say Atlas Intel missed it big time. Al-Mate, fuck Atlas Intel. that's the headline coming out of this thing fuck Atlas Intel I think we had this exact conversation on the pod Morris you are infuriatingly young for being as successful as you are as is Zoran who's 34 years old right your opponents tried to make age a weakness how did you think about like making it a strength obviously there's internet fluency but how did you guys deal with people who are like can a 33, 34 year old really run the city coming from you guys dude I'm washed I'm 45 no I think we it fit into the message framework and I think often times like you try to run every campaign with the same universal message framework and it's kind of the boilerplate like consultant approach and we were running a change campaign and Zoran looked like change and he felt like change and I also think he fit into this moment uniquely for a city in which there's so many young people who love this city who can't imagine a future in it because they can't afford to raise a family here.

58:19They can't afford to buy a home here. And having someone who kind of was of the age group that is dealing with, frankly, an existential crisis in the city fit nicely. And we were never, you know, I think Zoran mentioned in his speech that it was like, you know, I'm young, I'm Muslim, I'm a democratic socialist, and worst of all, I refuse to apologize for any of those things. And that was kind of the ethos of the campaign.

58:54Along those lines, I mean, you know, Spanberger and Mikey Sherrill, they are the types of kind of backgrounds and bios that the Democratic Party loves. You know, like 2006, Rahm Emanuel would have recruited the shit out of both of them to run. Right. National security, military members, CIA. Zoran was not the plug-and-play. Are you saying Rahm Emanuel wouldn't have recruited Zoran Mondani? Zoran was not like your plug-and-play candidate, right? He's like interesting background. His parents are academics. He's a younger guy. How did you think about like that bio? Was it liberating to not have to kind of play a part?

59:34I think this applies to Zoran, but I also think this applies nationally right now. Some of the kind of Senate stuff happening with Grand Platinum, Iowa, with other places. there are no people I think right now who have a worse read on what electable means and less of a pulse on voters than the Democratic establishment in D.C. And the Mamdani coalition is not just, I think, what it's easy to be kind of viewed as on social media and other places. You know, over 10 % of Trump voters voted for Zoran Mamdani. Zoran flipped multiple neighborhoods that went for Donald Trump in a general election with more votes than Donald Trump got in those very places.

1:00:13He reshaped the electorate. He won back immigrant communities that had left the party just a year ago. And that wasn't, I think, you know, it sells voters short to pretend that they're not going to be able to see past someone named Zoran Mamdani. And it's a lesson that we seem like we're just not able to learn. Yeah, I noticed that myself. So Democrats, we constantly fight about whether the way you win is turnout versus persuasion. I would argue it is a false choice. But certainly in a campaign, you have a finite number of resources, and you have to allocate them in the way you think is most likely to help you win.

1:00:53How did you guys think about that kind of allocation, and whether you needed to just turn out the base, or convince all these crossover voters that you got? Jump ball here. I'll say something that sounds really obvious, but I think it's a little less obvious to folks. driving turnout gets you one vote persuading a voter gets you two because you have taken it from the other side and put it into yours i would say that from from our perspective our victory was was a combination of persuasion and turnout but morris touched on something that that i think is important and i think that our victories across the board were not just landslide victories but coalition redefining victories.

1:01:33Across the board, we had Abigail Spanberger flipped counties that went for Trump in 2016, 2020, and 2024. If you look at, we are looking at the overperformance compared to 2024. And broadly, we overperformed almost every county across Virginia when you compare it to 2024. But most interestingly, the precincts that we overperformed 2024 the most by are also the ones with the highest percentage of Latino voters. In addition to that, Abigail brought back in a huge swath of non-college white voters to the table, and that was by visiting rural Virginia, right? We were just in, she was just in Lee County last week, which fun fact for folks that are less familiar with Virginia geography, is so far into the southwest of the Commonwealth that is actually to the west of Detroit.

1:02:28She was just out there last week in a diner. And I know that that sounds basic, but a lot of it was just us showing up and us showing up with a message of lowering costs. And that led to what, in my opinion, was a shattering of the Trump coalition that he has put together. People have reported that he made inroads with communities of color, with black and brown voters, with non-college white voters, obviously. And what we went out there and did, and I think what we all went out there and did, was shatter apart that coalition and take a bunch of people back into our frame because they're tired of the chaos, the division, the culture wars, and they saw a Democratic Party that was actually united under one message, which was lower your damn costs.

1:03:06Yeah, I think, obviously I agree that it's kind of a false choice. And we were dealing with, in New York, you're capped on what you can spend because of public matching funds. And so we were just getting, like, it's$8 million, which is nice, but in the New York media market, it goes very quickly. Yeah, and we had about, like,$45 million spent against us. So a little under match or overmatched. But I think that it speaks to a broader issue kind of in the party of if you have the right message, you're not having to choose between turning people out and persuading people. It's the same thing that excites all of those people.

1:03:38Did anyone care that Chuck Schumer didn't endorse? Who? Fair answer. Alex, you guys also, I mean, speaking of breaking the Trump coalition, you guys had considerable success winning back Latino voters the Democratic Party had lost. Was that something that was part of a wave? Was that part of deliberate targeting and choice? Like, how did you approach it? Yeah, there's a lot of signs coming out of 24 that we were going to have a lot of ground to make back, particularly with Latino voters. I think, like, all of the national press was watching Passaic County in particular because there's a large Latino population there.

1:04:12So we did invest heavily on the ground, hiring people from the community to go and talk to their neighbors. But we also spent a lot of money on Spanish broadcast, cable, digital, mail, all of it. And I think New Jersey is a really bilingual state. So you could try to get away with just doing general population messaging, but it's not enough. And I think our opponents in both the primary and the general made a mistake by not making that investment. And I think also we tried to overprescribe what we think, you know, some of these constituency groups want to hear from Democrats. but we didn't change our message.

1:04:48We talked about affordability and we knew that that was the message that was going to resonate because that's what we were hearing from people on the ground as Mikey went in and talked to these voters sometimes in some broken Spanish, but you know, connecting with them with where they were. And I think it went a long way. So when I think back to the OA campaign, I like remember the good days. You don't really remember, but I remember like where I was when I first saw the Reverend Wright video, which imploded our race for like four months. It was like my JFK being shot moment. Do you guys have, sort of, do you guys have like a worst moment, a biggest mistake you made on the campaign that you're now emotionally able to talk about in hindsight?

1:05:30I'll say one thing, it's less a mistake and one thing that really scares me about the future that we saw on our end. And that is these fake AI videos. Yeah. We saw a lot of them and I won't name names, but we there was one that there were the republicans put out and it was just a ridiculous ai video i won't get into the details but we had a couple top national level democratic consultants and operatives call me and say what the hell kind of video you guys putting out there this is ridiculous because it was meant to look like it was from our campaign yeah and the other thing is it was put on x and um people know that at grok is the is the ai bot that you can tag and ask questions about tweets and people are asking grok is this really a a campaign ad and who's coming back saying yes this is in fact an ad uh that the spanberger campaign put out and and put out there and that was something that scared the shit out of me because it's something we as the campaign had absolutely no control over so we had a digital team that quickly reached out to twitter and say hey like or x and said hey please readjust grok this is totally false we did political calls on iron to make sure that people knew that this is a ridiculous ad and we're smart people and we never put something like that out.

1:06:38But that is something, just looking into the future of campaigns, that I think that, one, there's hopefully some kind of legislation to help, but also that we, as campaign and campaign workers, need to be prepared to help candidates and campaigns respond to. That's terrifying. That's also why we need a younger consulting class. They're like, look at this ad. Oh, my God. I also won't name the ages of the people that reached out to me either. Yeah, I guess.

1:07:09Mine, which is like a half cheat, but it is, I think, obviously it's all worked out well. But I won't forget seeing so many in the Democratic establishment, the Democrat donor class, embrace Andrew Cuomo in the primary. and seeing someone who everyone universally demanded resign from office just two and a half, three years prior, who covered up the murder of seniors in nursing homes, who sexually harassed his staff and then intimidated and bullied the victims, was then being funded by Donald Trump's biggest donors and seeing so many fall in line behind him because it was politically convenient.

1:07:49I think it's just a real, real indictment in a lot of ways. And I'm glad we won. I'm glad we're moving past it, but I think that kind of that looms large. It's gross. Alex, any trauma? I too will talk about mistakes other people made. You guys are all like, I just care too much. You know, that was my mistake. The bedwetting that happens in our party has got to stop. Yeah. Like the Republican side, like while their candidate was like continuing to underperform and frankly, like, lose on things that he should have been winning on. They were so rock solid in their support of him on Twitter, on Fox News, in the New York Post.

1:08:31They were all aligned. And I get who owns all of those media sources. And it's like all the same people. And so we don't have that luxury. But I will just say, like, our enthusiasm could have taken off a bit more if people in our own party stopped being unnamed strategists who want to talk about all the issues we're having. Whereas like I will give credit to the Republicans because they are all on the same page and we need to do the same thing or else we're going to just keep getting in our own way. Name names, Alex. And they're unnamed. I know, I know, I know. Cowards. Morris, for a while, it seemed like Zoran was running to be U.S.

1:09:07ambassador to Israel. It was like all you guys talked about. I noticed on like Election Day, maybe the day after Jonathan Greenblatt, the head of the ADL. He went on Morning Joe and he said that he's going to hold Mamdani accountable. And he launched something called the Mamdani Monitor. And then something, a tip line to track anti-Semitic incidents in New York. Curious what your reaction to that is, like how Zoran wants to work with groups like the ADL to like, you know, have conversations with people about the legitimate problem of anti-Semitism, but not play into this idea that Greenblatt is promoting that Zoran is going to lead to a spike of incidents.

1:09:44I mean, to be clear about Greenblatt for a second, this is someone who's lied repeatedly about Zohan throughout the race, that he didn't go to synagogues when he'd gone to multiple synagogues, that he wasn't meeting with rabbis when he was meeting with rabbis, that has really flamed or fanned the flames of division across the city. I think that there's a bit of a kind of social media issue around this issue specifically, where Zohan will be at a presser about free buses, and he's going to get asked eight questions about Israel. And then those are going to be clipped and kind of fed into an algorithm that's meant to feed division.

1:10:18And then it's, well, Zoran, why are you always talking about Israel? And it's like, well, no, I'm trying to talk about free buses. And then it becomes this kind of echo chamber. But I think he's been relentlessly clear throughout the race of the urgency to fight anti-Semitism. And with a deep kind of commitment to it, a list of policy proposals to do just that. And I think what you also saw is a lot of Jewish New Yorkers showing up across the city who reject the kind of Cuomo-backed notion that criticism of genocide is the same as anti-Semitism. And I think that was far more dangerous. All right.

1:10:53I could have gone on for twice as long, but we've got five minutes left. So I'm going to do what I called my brain-dead cable news lightning round. Who is the face of the Democratic Party? Mikey Sherrill. Mikey Sherrill? um Tommy Vitor Doug Schumer

1:11:14Abigail Spanberger and all Democrats were committed to lowering costs there we go uh what's the winning strategy DSA or CIA

1:11:25you don't really have to answer these uh all of your campaigns were successful but which one was correct this is just a bit I should let you guys all three good bet all three easily but like this this is the this is the like you guys all you rank them you rank them on your favorites from one through three oh this sucks

1:11:51i love you all i mean like this is the fight right like the democratic party you saw it on twitter the twitter warriors were out with their their you know shields and swords election night being like, we got to go left, we got to go right. I mean, obviously, the middle ground is state by state, but I don't know. Do you have a theory of the case? I mean, I think they're just applying labels to completely different electorates. Like, we all had landslide victories. Sure, we all talked about affordability, but we all did it in very different ways. So to say that we all have to follow the same blueprint, I mean, it just doesn't really make sense or match up at all.

1:12:29I think, like, we should be a big tent party, and I think like this is a great example of it's like we should be a party that can elect Zoram and Donnie in New York and Mikey Sherrill in New Jersey and Abigail Spanberger in Virginia and I think too often we use the big tent as it's like it is a big tent that can go as far to the right as you want it to go but there's a very rigid edge on the on the left and I think it doesn't it doesn't have to be like that and I think too one thing that's really important because because I agree, I'm not big on the labels. I know I've always thought of Abigail as a pragmatist.

1:13:06She's been put into moderate or centrist buckets before, but always thought of her as a steady pragmatist. But I think one thing that's different this cycle that hasn't always been the case over the last 10 to 15 years is that regardless of the spectrum of the Democratic Party that you are from, we are all united behind the inherent challenges facing Americans, and that is that life is too expensive. And regardless of where on the political spectrum you're from. And the big tent of our party comes down to the kind of approach and ideas and the way that you message lowering costs. And that can look like it's a lot different in Bedford, Virginia versus Bed-Stuy.

1:13:42But as long as you are united around the need to lower costs, I think that we can have a big tent party. Can I also, I agree. And I would also add that we're all united in the fact that government has a role in lowering costs for people and delivering for people. And that's the difference with the other side, I think. the last question I wrote down was MJ versus LeBron, but I don't know that's going to play. LeBron. Okay, that's it for our panel. I just want to say thank you to Morris, Alex, and Samson. These guys are not only just coming off massive winning campaigns, they're also now doing the transition, which is doubly hard because you have to staff up the entire government.

1:14:22So I'm really grateful to all of you. First of all, for kicking ass, because this whole thing would have sucked. We hadn't won. but also for being here and being really thoughtful and smart and successful. So thank you all. Thank you. Thank you guys. If you want to listen to Pod Save America ad-free and get access to exclusive podcasts, go to crooked.com slash friends to subscribe on Supercast, Substack, YouTube, or Apple Podcasts. Also, please consider leaving us a review. That helps boost this episode and everything we do here at Crooked. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. Our producers are David Toledo, Emma Illich Frank, and Saul Rubin.

1:15:00Our associate producer is Farrah Safari. Austin Fisher is our senior producer. Reid Cherlin is our executive editor. Adrian Hill is our head of news and politics. The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan Cantor is our sound engineer, with audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Matt DeGroat is our head of production. Naomi Sengel is our executive assistant. Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Haley Jones, Ben Hefcoat, Mia Kelman, Carol Pellaviv, David Tolles, and Ryan Young. Our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.