Trump's Revenge Leads to Republican Revolt

25:27and all this comes as Iran is reviewing the latest U.S. peace proposal, which Trump says he'll give them a few days to do. He also said that the U.S. and Iran are, quote, right on the borderline between war and peace and that he's, quote, in no hurry to make a deal as the price of gas inches towards$5 a gallon. What do you make of the latest developments in Iran and the shift of Republicans now being in favor of the war powers resolution? just the cycle uh it's every week we wake up on monday there is a either a true social or an axios post with multiple sirens that tells us that we're on the verge of a deal we are right there they're circling around it that reality lasts like five hours then we are on the verge of war trump is right we really are on the verge of both then we are making war plans we're threatening to bomb people we're ending civilizations and then at the moment right before the bombing is set to begin things get tacoed and we are back to stalemate and it's just we've been on rinse and repeat of this cycle for weeks now i will say that each with each and each new draft of the peace proposal um looks less like peace and more like a meaningless extension of a ceasefire yeah well The latest one is just like, this will be like a memo that gives 30 days for peace negotiations, but like nothing happens within those.

26:53Like the straight doesn't open in those 30 days. It's basically just where we are right now, but a more formal ceasefire for another 30 days. Well, what have they been doing for the last 30 days? I know. What's different? I don't even understand what the point of the memo is. Theoretically, people are talking somewhere, right? People are talking somewhere. People are talking somewhere. Well, and it seems like the Iranians, of course, have every incentive to continue to kick the ball down the road without having to give anything up because they don't want to get bombed again because Trump keeps inching closer to resuming just hostilities.

27:25And Bibi is reportedly pushing him towards that as well. Apparently, there's like a tense call between Trump and Netanyahu where Trump was like, give peace a chance. And Netanyahu obviously was like, no, let's bomb the shit out of them. And so, yeah, like, would I be shocked if this time we actually get some kind of a deal this weekend? No, but I would be shocked if it was actually a meaningful peace deal that ended the hostilities and actually permanently. What do you think is more likely this weekend? We take a step towards peace, and not peace, but even like some agreement on a memorandum or something.

28:03Or we invade Cuba. Oh. I think Cuba's highly more likely. Oh, I think peace. I think, I mean, not peace. Can I just say the memo? I say memo. I say memo over Cuba. But Cuba, who knows? We're doing rapid response three hours after this. Rapid response in the middle of its wedding about the Cuba invasion. Yeah, I will not be doing rapid response there. Tommy has to do it. He's got to speak to the people. Yeah, well, you know what? We'll be at the bar. We can wave to Tommy. Are we having mojito? All right. One other rake Trump stepped on this week that we got to talk about. You mentioned this. the president has endorsed scandal-plagued Ken Paxton over incumbent John Cornyn in the Texas Senate primary runoff, much to the delight of Democrats and dismay of Senate Republicans.

28:47Trump called Cornyn, quote, a good man, but said that he wasn't there for him when he needed him, when times were tough. And then he dubbed Paxton a true MAGA warrior who would presumably vote for all the ballroom funding and insurrectionist payouts that Trump asked for. And the SAVE Act, that's the big one. The SAVE Act, right. Remember the SAVE Act we talked about forever, and then that's just, that's dead. Yeah, I guess Ken Paxton would revive it in the next Congress. Runoff is Tuesday. What do you make of Trump's decision? Insane. A truly insane decision. It's in the immediate aftermath. Let's just go back in time a couple months to the Texas primary, which honestly feels like 10 years ago.

29:28But Cornyn did better than anyone expected. The assumption was that Trump said he was going to make an endorsement. Everyone assumed he was going to endorse Cornyn. If Trump had done that, Paxton would have probably had to drop out. His campaign would have dried up and Cornyn would be the nominee. Instead, he invaded Iran instead of focusing on this, dithered for a long time, could have just stayed silent, and then endorsed Ken Paxton with a week to go, almost ensuring that Ken Paxton will be the nominee. Ken Paxton is by every measure less electable than John Cornyn. We've seen this in the polling.

30:03there is a slice of Republicans who will vote for Cornyn over Tallarico, but will vote for Tallarico over Paxton. And just like he is so like this is the example. He's so focused on vengeance that he decided to go after John Cornyn. We were already just talked about the the the consequences in the Senate. And just even more practically, like this day, I think the I think the Cook Political Report moved this to lean Republican. They said they will if Paxton is the nominee. So they probably still have advantages here. But the NRSC, all the super PACs are going to have to spend ungodly amounts of money in this race to try to just win a state that they should have already won.

30:53All because Trump just could not help himself. Could you make a political argument? I realize it wouldn't be a good one. and it's not one that I favor, that it's possible John Cornyn would be a weaker candidate than Ken Paxson because the Trump, like the hardcore MAGA base would be pissed and maybe stay home if Cornyn was the nominee. And so you would sort of, and you need turnout in a midterm. Like, is that a thing? Maybe we would have made that argument if Cornyn wins the primary on Tuesday. So stay tuned. Hey, that's not what we do here, Dan. Tune in to next week's polar coaster. That's not what we do here.

31:28I think that argument is hard to support. I mean, look, all the polling shows that Tallarico does better against Paxton than Cornyn, but only by a point or two in some of this polling, which in Texas could be everything, of course. Probably would be everything. He's not winning by more than a point or two, FYI. Right, right, right. But I thought that the delta between the two in the polling would be bigger than it has been. now there haven't been that many polls but you know and then there's also uh in these polls there's you know like 10 to 12 undecided and we have to look and see who makes up that undecided but then if you are in texas i just i think that it just is it's like let's not overcomplicate this ken paxton is a man who is an absolute crook a serial adult or a fucking lunatic and he's terrible at raising money his own staff called the fbi on him his own staff that to me is That's my favorite thing.

32:26It's like, how many people have their own staff called the FBI on them? No one here, right? Nice. Checking. They're all the way down left. But Paxton is such a perfect foil for Tallarico. This nice, thoughtful guy who talks about his religion, is faithful. They're the exact opposite of each other, and that it really helps Tallarico in a way that is – it's not just Republican Democrats. It's like a good person and a bad person, and that is going to help Tallarico. We can pretend like Cornyn because he sucks as a politician and isn't very good on the stump. And it's kind of a – he puts on a cowboy hat every year for an ad and it looks fucking ridiculous in it.

33:05It looks like it's basically photoshopped on his head. But Paxton – running against Paxton is way better for Tallarico than Cornyn. Yeah, I mean you make the argument that Cornyn basically is generic Republican in a ballot. And Paxton is less – is more vulnerable than a generic Republican. because he, again, has committed bribery and corruption and adultery. But think about how close Beto came to beating Ted Cruz. Yeah. Tommy and I talked about this on OnlyFriends, which I was like, there's like three factors here, right? It's three questions for does Tallarico win. Do you think the overall national environment is bluer than it was in 2018?

33:44Do you think Tallarico is a better candidate than Beto? And then do you think Paxton is a worse candidate than Ted Cruz? I think on all three measures, this is better for Tallarico than it was for Beto. And Beto came within three points. Yeah, I think that's probably right. But now those last three points, that is a long fucking mile to cross in Texas. I also said that. That's where I came down. I'm like, and he could do better than Beto and still lose by just a little. But, you know, I think he's a special candidate. I have for a long time. I know you do too. And like, I think, you know, everyone should.

34:15If anyone can do it, it is James Tallarico right now in this environment against Ken Paxton. Yeah.

34:27Jon Favreau:This episode is brought to you by the Obama Foundation. Democracy doesn't defend itself. It needs people willing to fight for it. That's why the Obama Foundation is committed to training the next generation of leaders, building communities, and strengthening our democracy. This summer, the Obama Presidential Center opens as a global hub for change, providing emerging leaders with the tools and resources they need to make a real difference in their communities, our country, and our world. But none of that happens without you. These leaders need support now, and your donation makes that possible.

34:56Jon Favreau:Years from now, when you look back on this moment in history, you'll want to say you stepped off the sidelines, so don't wait. Join the movement for change. Donate to the Obama Foundation at Obama.org slash pod. This Memorial Day, shop one of Avocado's biggest mattress sales of the year and fall in love with sleep again. At Avocado, better sleep starts with better materials. Our certified organic mattresses are crafted without compromise, using high-quality organic materials that bring comfort and support into perfect balance. No polyurethane foams, no shortcuts, just a cleaner, more natural sleep experience that your body will appreciate night after night, so you fall asleep more easily.

35:40Jon Favreau:Stay asleep longer and wake up feeling refreshed and ready for the day ahead. That's sleep with purpose. This Memorial Day, discover what it means to truly sleep well. Upgrade and save up to 20 % on our award-winning mattresses. Shop the Memorial Day sale now and get up to 20 % off at avocadomattress.com or select retailers nationwide. Visit avocadomattress.com. That's avocadomattress.com.

36:11All right, Dan, some breaking news this morning on the 2024 DNC autopsy. Ken Martin finally agreed to release the full text of the report, which CNN published after the uproar that followed his interview with us a few weeks ago. This is from Martin's statement. Quote, I didn't want to create a distraction, but by not putting the report out, I ended up creating an even bigger distraction. For that, I sincerely apologize. He also said, quote, it does not meet my standards and it won't meet your standards, but I am doing this because people need to be able to trust the Democratic Party and trust our word.

36:46Well, I agree with him there. The 192 page report is riddled with inaccuracies, at times incoherent, ultimately incomplete. The section headlined conclusion comes with an annotation that says this section was not provided by the author. So still, Joel, you need to know. There's also no mention of Biden's decision to run again, his age, Gaza, inflation. Dan, do you have some thoughts you'd like to share? I feel like I've said plenty on this. You have more to say, I hope this is. So fittingly stupid, like it was like, this is what we suspect all along, which is. Ken Martin hired the wrong person to do the report, the wrong person did a terrible job.

37:35Instead of starting the report over or say that Ken Martin just started lying, couldn't stop lying. And just got himself into this incredible hole. And then let's he doesn't get points for transparency here because that CNN got some parts they were able to get from some sources, parts of the report. And once the CNN had that, then then the DNC made the decision, which was the right decision to release the rest of it. Like it's so. It's it could not have been handled more poorly. Just every part of it. So I'm going to go through a couple of things here. Um, one, this is just a management disaster.

38:17This was supposed to be a huge priority for Ken Martin. He hired someone to work for free who no one in the democratic party would have picked for this role. There was no actual process set up. There was clearly no monitoring of the process or oversight or anyone working on or tracking what was happening because when he got, he was shocked when he got the report. Well, why weren't you getting in? Why weren't there calls every week? Why wasn't someone on your staff in charge of doing this? Why wasn't there a committee of people? I can think of dozens upon dozens of very, very qualified, very, very smart Democrats who would have volunteered to be part of this process, to do it right.

38:51And I know this because there have been a bunch of other autopsies that have come out where they've gotten really, really smart people to do it and completed the work. I, someone that we know reached out to me and said, we wrote a 700 page postmortem on the 2012 campaign, the Obama campaign, and it was done in January. The election was in November. And so like that's just, it's just an absolute management disaster. The second piece is the lying. Like. It's the biggest piece. The lying is so crazy. and I go back to the interview with you, which is, and you talked about this when we did the interview, we talked about it since.

39:31I just want everyone to fully understand. We did not seek out Ken Martin for the purpose of talking to him about the autopsy. We had no interest in talking to Ken Martin about the autopsy. He complained to you about tweets sent by someone who's not you. Nope, yep. Ben Rhodes tweet. Ben Rhodes tweet kicked it off. And then he came up to you at the grinder party. Yep, sure did. and expressed his dismay. You can talk about how he expressed it. And so the response was that he would come on the podcast and discuss it. He sought out the opportunity to do it, to continue to push the lie. Because the argument that they were making, Ken Martin had two points in this about the autopsy.

40:13It's done. It was helpful. It has informed our playbook. He said the word playbook 10 ,000 times in that interview. And we can't release it because it would be a distraction. and divide the party before the election. The last part is, yes, it would be a distraction, but the main reason not to release it is it was embarrassing to Ken Martin or not to come clean with why you weren't releasing this because it would be embarrassing to Ken Martin, not because it would be bad for the party. Yeah. Yeah, and if it was just the autopsy and this was just one incident here, that would be one thing. But the fact that it goes to trust issues and credibility, and as Ken says in his statement, we need to be able to trust the Democratic Party and people need to be able to trust us again.

41:03It is indicative of a larger issue that he has had since taking this role as chairman at the DNC. and look no further than the April fundraising reports that came out the same day today that say, once again, the Democratic National Committee has negative$3 million in the bank when you account for the debts that they owe. And the Republican National Committee has$124 million in the bank. And then when you look at the fundraising of the RNC versus the DNC, The RNC has raised many, many, many, many, many more times the amount of money as the DNC. But when you look at the fundraising between the DCCC and the Republican Congressional Campaign Committee, the two House committees, you know, the Republicans have outraised Democrats by little, but not as much as RNC versus DNC.

42:02Same thing with the Senate committees. So it's not a Democratic Party-wide problem, fundraising problem. It's a DNC problem. And one of the reasons why the DNC is not able to raise money, and Ken Martin has disputed this, but many, many donors have said otherwise, is the autopsy. Because the autopsy has bred just frustration the DNC didn't do it, questions of trust about Ken Martin. What are we giving our money for if we're not getting it? And this is, I mean, bearing the lead here, but this is why I think Ken Martin should step down. I think this is a bridge too far. He cannot repair the trust here.

42:35He's not, everything we've seen here is he's not the right person for the job. I'm sorry that seems like a harsh thing to say, but it is clear. He has an impossible job. We have worked with many, many DNC chairs. Even under the best circumstances, the job sucks ass. It is really, really hard. No one has ever seen a successful DNC chair. People are hammered for it. But the thing is that Ken Martin is now the distraction that he was trying to avoid. And because you're the distraction, then you should go. Like he said, like he says in his post, my job is winning elections. Well, the best thing for the Democrats to win elections is to have a fresh start at the DNC, both now and in 2028, where the trusted issue matters so much more because the DNC is going to run the presidential primary.

43:23They're going to pick they're going to set up the debates. They're going to pick the calendar, which is a huge thing. They're going to make decisions about how delegates are allegated. They're going to deal with states to try to jump the calendar. All of this matters. And when people don't trust the DNC, as happened in 2016, when all of the emails came out as part of the Russian hacks of DNC emails that showed that people at the DNC were favoring Hillary over Bernie, people didn't trust the DNC. They didn't trust the process. They thought it was rigged. And it hurt. It hurt in the general election.

43:53We need people to trust the process. And I say that as a Sixers fan. But we need people to trust the process. Well, and what he has opened up to now is any candidate who runs for president in 2028 who complains about unfairness, the DNC, whether those accusations are fair or not, accurate or not, like no one's going to believe Ken Martin because he has this credibility issue. Right. And same thing with the excuses on the money. Right. He did a whole thing with me in the interview about like, you know, we're actually fine and we're investing in state parties. and you need to spend and all this kind of stuff.

44:29But like, I don't know. Can I believe that now? I don't know. He had this other lie for a long, long time and tried to hide it, tried to cover up this report. So yeah, I guess after it was released today, there was a call for DNC members, a private call just for all the DNC members and talked to some people who were on the call. And he basically just read the statement that he gave CNN essentially. and apologized again. And then also said that Paul Rivera, who he put in charge of this report, is no longer helping out at the DNC because part of the CNN story said that even after he fucked up the autopsy, Paul Rivera was still walking around the DNC, like demoralizing staffers just by his presence because they all knew that he had fucked up so badly.

45:17So he said that Paul Rivera is no longer working. And then no questions on the call. No questions from any of the DNC members after this. I also got something from someone at the DNC saying that a lot of the outlets are mistaken and saying that there's no pathway to removal for Ken that it's actually just a simple majority vote of the DNC so that's interesting and there's at least one congressman representative Mark Veazey said that it's time for Ken Martin to go so I don't know I mean I tend to think do you think his job is safe do you think he'll resign like it seems it seems like a tall order but I don't know I mean, I hope he would be willing to look at the reality of the situation and recognize that because of the mistakes that he made, that the best thing for the party would be to step down.

46:02I don't think he's going to do that. We're in this mess because he was trying to protect himself, not the party. So hard to say. I mean, you know, are we really going to take the – even if it's easy, it's an extraordinary step to remove the DNC chairs. Anyone going to do that five months before the midterms? I'd be surprised. Right. And then you need another candidate. It's a real question before the 2028 calendar is set as to whether we have to do something different here. Also, the other problem is no one seems to want the job. So you need someone else who would want the job. You need someone else who you need the donors to say that if someone else takes the job, then the money will start flowing again and they'll start donating.

46:42Right. Because you don't want the new you want a new chair to still be stuck at the same problem financially. And it does. You know, people have been complaining. this is a distraction distraction like it does at some point eat up a lot of time and energy you know as we're getting close to the midterms but the challenges after the midterms happen if they are as expected and and things go well again you can just you can hear the dnc taking credit for it in advance and they will have nothing to do with the victory again if things don't go well it's still not the dnc's fault they just don't have that much to do with with midterm elections at all but as soon as the midterms are over we're fucking into the presidential primary and people are gonna start putting their campaigns together and you're gonna need the calendars and all the stuff that you were just talking about and so i don't know it's just it's fucking mess fucking mess it's so stupid and we're not digging into the actual autopsy because it's a joke like i was just gonna say like it's not worth talking about anything in it because it's not endorsed by the DNC or anyone else.

47:42It's just like Paul Rivera's ramblings that are the basis of him talking to just some people involved with the 2024 campaign who aren't even most of the senior people on the campaign. Yeah, there's been a lot, I would say to people who are interested in what happened, there's been a lot of actual autopsies from outside groups. Way to Win has one. Catalyst has their report. We talked about Rob Flaherty's bulwark piece the other day. There's one from, I think the Strategic Victory Fund, if I'm saying that correctly, has won. There's actually some pretty good, pretty exhaustive work about what happened in 2024 that people want.

48:15They should go look at. But looking at this version is not worth doing. Because you could look for it. I would say read the executive summary, but that was also not provided. Right, right. All right. Well, you think you'll come back on the pod? Maybe. Maybe. Maybe you guys will meet up again at next year's Grander Party. Fingers crossed. Maybe there'll be alcohol this time. All right. Speaking of Democrats being unhappy with Democrats, the New York Times released new results from their latest poll that we talked about on Tuesday. This installment is focused on Democrats and independents who say they're planning to support Democratic candidates in the fall.

48:52Overall, more than half of these voters disapprove of the Democratic Party. More than half also said the party should move to the center rather than move to the left in order to win the 2028 presidential election. But when asked that question about specific issues, the results were more varied. On economic issues, 36 % said move to the left, pretty competitive with the 42 % who said move to the center. And on health care, 45 percent of Democratic voters want to move to the left compared to just 27 percent who said move to the center and 26 percent who said don't move in either direction. Health care was the issue where the biggest percentage of voters thought the Democratic Party should move to the left.

49:33And then I would say economy was next. And then when you get to issues like crime, I think, was the top issue where the most the highest percentage of Democrats said that the party should move to the right. or at least move to the center, sorry. And then immigration. And actually, you know, we can talk about this too, but trans issues was not as, there weren't as many people, and this would go against sort of the prevailing narrative, but there weren't as many Democrats who wanted the party to move to the center on trans issues as there were on crime and immigration, which is still the top two.

50:08So what did you make of this novel line of questioning in the poll, which they did ask voters, like, how do you personally feel about the direction of the party on these issues? And what direction do you think the party should move in? And then they asked, which direction you think the party should move to win? So they did both. But the move to win, basically asking voters to be pundits, is a new one. Yeah, I generally hate that idea. Like, it's just, I'm much more interested in what voters actually think. Because you would like to believe that that's what informs voting behavior. But I will say that this is a very interesting finding.

50:51One, it just proves that among Democrats, the narrative that Democrats lost because we were too far to the left, too woke, too liberal, has taken hold among Democrats. The plurality of Democrats believe that, at least on a core set of issues. And so it's just, it's like, that's an interesting data point that that has, you know, there was this battle after the election. Did we, were we too moderate or too left? And at least for the people responding to this poll, it was clearly the problem was we were too left, not left enough. And the other reason why I think this is somewhat informative is electability is become the preeminent issue in democratic politics.

51:31You know, it was a huge issue in the Texas Senate primary. It was a huge issue in the main Senate primary before Janet Mills dropped out. It's a giant issue in the Iowa primary that happened a couple of weeks. And it's a big issue in the Michigan Senate primary that is in August. And so it's interesting to know what voters think makes someone electable or in this case may make them think someone is less electable. um you know looking at the numbers it is um you did you dive into the crosstabs if the crosstabs are not that they're not that surprising um i i i figured you did but i did too yeah i was just there i'm ready to nerd out about some crosstabs that people some real nuggets but it's sort of it's what you is the the findings are kind of across the board what would be interesting would be if there was one group who really thought they should move to the left but really just kind of across the board people or not move to the right or whatever it is but that everyone kind of all feels the same way just in varying degrees the call the college split on these issues is notable to me yeah that non-college voters um tend to want the party to move towards the center and college voters want the party to move to the left and then it splits on racial and education lines in a very interesting way, which is non-college black voters and non-college Latino voters, along with non-college white voters, very much want the party to move to the center.

53:01And really the only demographic group that most wants the party to move to the left is white college grads. Also some black and Hispanic college grads, but it's just a larger chunk of the electorate is white college grads. And more with younger people. It all skews younger in all of these. Yeah. And particularly on issues, again, against the prevailing narrative on issues of immigration and crime. Yeah. You see that you see black and Latino non-college Democratic voters say they want the party to move to the center. Oh, yes. Yes. I mean, that is the I guess. I thought we felt like we were past that prevailing narrative or that even that narrative is kind of.

53:41But I guess it depends on where you're getting your news these days. Right. Yeah. Just just wait till we get to the next primary. Yeah. I mean, and it's like obviously electability is going to hang over the 2028 primary in a massive way. And so this this will inform that I think the health care one is very interesting on economic issues. It's only a six point spread, which I think is also notable. And then what I found also interesting is that there is, they asked people, they asked Democrats if they thought the economic system in the country was generally unfair to most Americans. 88 % yes. Only 11 % said fair to most Americans.

54:19And whether the political and economic system needs to be changed. So 63 % said major changes. 20 % said torn down completely. And 15 % said minor changes. And 1 % said no changes. Who that person is, which Democrat thinks that there's no changes I'd be interested in. But I think there is this paradox here, which is you have people saying we think the party should move right on certain issues. But there is an appetite for big, bold ideas on the economy and health care. and like people want real change and so nibbling around the edges is not going to be sufficient both in the democratic primary and the general people want to see that you understand the scale of the problems affecting their lives the ways in which the system is broken and corrupt and you have big ideas so the sort of you know not to pick on kamala harris's economic team but like this is what not to do is we're going to offer tax credits for home for first time home buyers it's a good policy theoretically but it just seems small compared to what people actually want building more houses would be a better policy well that's that would be a better that would be a better policy you you can do both yeah you can do both um but yeah i mean there was a line in here in the in the write-up of the piece of the poll which was uh and when presented with two opposing economic visions, more than two thirds of Democratic supporters, now we're 65, 66 percent, said they favored a candidate who would go after corporate monopolies and price gouging, while just 30 percent preferred a candidate who promised to lower prices by easing housing regulations and expanding energy production.

55:57Now, you know, some of this is in wording, but that doesn't sound very exciting to ease housing regulations and expand energy production. But just to give people a baseline, because I thought this was interesting. So they asked, like where do you how do you think about the party is it too far left is it too far right or is it not too far either way 55 said not too far either way uh 20 said to left 17 said to right so right there you're a candidate trying to win the party's nomination you got like a little more than half of the electorate that you're trying to get who thinks the party is ideologically good where it is right now.

56:36And then you've got almost similar percentages on either side. So that is a tough thing to navigate. I also thought the delta between when they asked people, where would you personally like to see the party move? And to win, where would you like to see the party move? Was actually not that different. So 28 % said they personally like to see the party move to the left. and 25 % said that to win, the party should move to the left. And then 47 % said they personally want it to move to the center and 52 % said to win, they want to move to the center. So you do have a percentage of people who are saying, oh, personally, I want the party to be more left, but to win, it should move to the center.

57:21But the delta wasn't as big as I thought it would be. Well, it's, I mean, for the reasons we've talked about for many years, which is the median Democrat is a is a voter that didn't go to college and is more moderate than most people listen to this podcast. And we are personally, and that that's the party that nominated Joe Biden in 2020. And that that remains that remains true. I think these questions are a little confusing and how they're ordered. Like, but it is just notable that's 50 percent are generally OK with the direction the party is now. How many of those 55 percent can name what the direction of the party actually fucking is right now but well i was gonna i was just gonna say the other thing that stands out in some of the questions that they asked is and we always talk about this but it's a good reminder for everyone is how like those of you listening to this podcast um you are so different than like 70 percent of the rest of the electorate in that you pay closer attention to politics and know more about what's going on in politics day to day than most of the people who will show up and vote in elections.

58:27So they asked about Schumer and Schumer's approval rating in this poll among just Democrats and independents that they're going to vote Democrat is 26 % in favor, 31 % opposed. And you're like, well, that's kind of low. 35 % never heard of Chuck Schumer. Joe Rogan, 11 % approved, 48 % disapproved. The rest never heard of Joe Rogan. Nick Fuentes, what is it? 9 % approve? 11 % disapprove? I didn't even see Fuentes in there. Yeah, Fuentes is in the cross tabs. They asked, I guess, just for fun, maybe Ezra got this question in, have you heard of the abundance movement? 91 % of people that they polled, all of whom, again, all these people said they're going to vote in the midterms, 91 % never heard of the abundance movement.

59:17So it's a good reminder that people who are, even in Democratic, even in midterms, right, which is a more engaged electorate. Even midterm voters are just not paying as much attention to all the shit that we talk about every week. These are registered voters, right? Yeah, but registered voters who said they're going to vote in the midterm. The Israel numbers, crazy. Only 20 % favor more aid to Israel. 74 % do not. 15 % sympathize with Israel over the Palestinians. and 60 % Palestinians over Israelis. The highest group of support for Israel of any demographic is 65 plus, unsurprising there. Even that group, 65 plus, only 27 % so that they have more sympathy for Israel and the Palestinians.

1:00:08That is just a massive shift on that issue. You can thank Joe Biden, Donald Trump, and Bibi Netanyahu for that. Yeah, that is true. And then 49 % favor socialism, 22 % no socialism, and then the rest had no opinion. Every age group of Democrats has a favorable opinion. So they don't support socialism. They have a favorable opinion of it. Thank you. That is important. That may be a distinction without a difference in the ads that will be run, but I think it does matter what people say. But yeah, even voters over 65, if I remember correctly, Democrats over 65, by a more narrow margin, have a favorable view of socialism.

1:00:47Oh, last one I wanted to ask you about. 49 % of voters said it was important to choose leaders with a fresh approach. 48 % want to choose leaders with proven experience. Surreal. And guess what young people wanted? Experience? Yeah. By like a lot more than other age groups. It was a sort of left side. I think that this one is, I think this is a confusing question and I don't think it says exactly what you think it says. I think the backdrop for this is our reality TV show president who has no real experience and is fucking up left and right every single day. And so I think the better of the question that will be more interesting as we think about the 2028 Democratic primaries, do you want someone who is a part of the establishment or against the establishment?

1:01:42Because everyone who's running is going to have some answer on experience. It's just what experience means. Like we saw this in 2008. Like everyone can define experience the way they do, and then you either sell it or you don't. No one wants someone with insufficient experience. That is true. That is true. While we're on this topic, there's a bit of a mess brewing in the Democratic primary in Texas's redrawn 35th district, where Sheriff's Deputy Johnny Garcia is now in a runoff with a sex therapist named Maureen Galindo, who has posted wildly anti-Semitic comments online, including calling Judaism the synagogue of Satan and promising to turn an ICE detention center into, quote, a prison for American Zionists and former ICE officers, adding, quote, it will also be a castration processing center for pedophiles, which will probably be most of the Zionists.

1:02:33Disgusting. A mysterious super PAC called Lead Left, which was formed earlier this month and whose website initially linked to the Republican platform WinRed, has now spent about $600 ,000 to boost Galindo. Demo line super PACs have now just about matched that spending to defeat Galindo. And everyone from James Tallarico to Hakeem Jeffries to AOC has condemned her. um what do you make of this uh it's it's a mess it's an absolute mess i mean good for everyone for speaking up and trying to defeat this person the republicans are pretty devious in what they're doing they're going to do this in multiple places around the country they've already tried to do it in a couple states including pennsylvania i mean we have we have been involved in democratic groups have been involved in primaries before so this is not beyond the balance beyond the bounds of what's acceptable or what's appropriate but add us to the list of people condemning her and hoping she does not win.

1:03:25Yeah. And if you are in that district, if you're a voter in that district, if you know voters in that district, like tell them to go vote for Johnny Garcia. She got more votes in the primary. I know. I know. That's what we're all worried about. This is on Tuesday. So this is the runoff and she got more votes than him the first time around. And so, you know, I think I can't even begin. The most generous explanation is that people who voted for her did not know about all the comments and all the positions, I hope, and that maybe, and that she obviously had a lot of money and spending behind her.

1:04:00So her name ID was better than Johnny Garcia. So he needs better name ID. Maybe this controversy getting kicked up will help sort of focus people and people in that 35th district will, will hear about this and be like, oh, that's crazy. We've got to vote for Johnny Garcia. But anyway, we should, everyone should get the word out because this isn't just someone who's like, crazy lefty. This is like a fucking concentration camps for Zionists. Are you fucking kidding me? Like, it's awful. And Republicans, of course, are so fucking cynical and having a field day with this and being like, oh, Democrats, Democrats are the ones voting for the anti-Semites and the and the people who want to put Jews in camps, not Republicans.

1:04:38And meanwhile, of course, not saying anything about the fact that there's this like mysterious super PAC linked to the Republican group win red that is spending to, uh, on this race, which is just crazy. So Johnny Garcia, go check it out. Um, all right. One last topic today. There are two very notable weddings taking place this Memorial Day weekend. Uh, as we've said, one is our own John Lovett and Ari Schwartz, which we're all very excited to attend. The other is Donald Trump Jr. and Palm beach socialite Bettina Anderson, which Donald Trump senior is maybe skipping. Let's listen to what he said in the Oval.

1:05:16I think your son's buddy this weekend, by the way. He'd like me to go, but it's going to be just a small little private affair and I'm going to try and make it. I'm in the midst. I said, you know, this is not good timing for me. I have a thing called Iran and other things. That's one I can't win on. If I do attend, I get killed. If I don't attend, I get killed. What? You've known him forever. I saw this this morning. It is 4 o 'clock in the afternoon. I am still stunned by this. I mean, we have joked for many, many years about how Donald Trump does not love his children and they act this way because he does not love them and he can barely identify them and really did no parenting.

1:05:56This kind of proves the point. Yeah, just generational trauma, just inaction. We're just watching it unfold right in that clip. it's just also you know what i gotta be honest with you donald trump's famous for um skipping festivities and any kind of leisure activity because he likes to be focused on the nation's business he's well known for that no one would kill him for going to his son's wedding no one like that's one free like he does a lot of dumb shit he's going to usc fighting he's playing golf this would free pass for this one it's in the bahamas i guess where he can't like air force one can go go to the bahamas he can go anywhere yeah and go anywhere they could bring a fucking i bet he's just pisses that at mar-a-lago because he wanted to charge his son that is i i can't even imagine i can't imagine that was the president i hope he doesn't go i fucking hope he doesn't go not like he also wasn't even it would have even been different if he was like oh i'm so like i can't make it you know like he was definitive and he had the excuse but he did the worst of all worlds which is just be like i'm gonna try to make it but i don't know i don't know it's not I'll say it's about me.

1:07:03I told him it's not good timing for me. Yeah. Not good timing for me. It's really, it's your fault I'm not coming to your wedding, son. Good stuff. Anyway, anyway, congrats to John Jr. Congrats to John Jr. And John Lovett. And John Lovett. Yes. Just cut from the same cloth. When we come back, California gubernatorial candidate Matt Mahan.

1:07:32Jon Favreau:pod save america is brought to you by a neutrophil real change comes through the small healthy habits you do every day that quietly add up to big improvements that's the idea behind neutrophil it's built around a simple consistent approach to hair health that works from within and delivers visible results over time not overnight neutrophil is the number one dermatologist recommended hair growth supplement brand and it's the number one hair growth supplement brand personally used by dermatologists neutrophil's hair growth supplements are peer-reviewed nsf certified for sport and clinically tested.

1:08:01Jon Favreau:It's not a one-size-fits-all approach. Nutrafol offers multiple formulas for men and women tailored to different life stages like postpartum or menopause and lifestyle factors such as a plant-based diet so you get personalized support that's right for you. Adding Nutrafol to your daily routine is easy. Order online, no prescription needed, with automated deliveries and free shipping to keep you on track. This whole, their pitch of results over time, not overnight, I think that makes a lot of sense because remember the other options for this sort of thing, or one day you'd just be totally bald and the next day the commercial has a guy like jet skiing with a full head of hair and a sick mullet.

1:08:36There's that, or there's just, you're standing outside at a press conference and it's a little warm and suddenly you got the new hair dripping down your face. His head just melted.

1:08:47Jon Favreau:Good old days. I know. Let your hair become one less thing, taking up space in your head and see thicker, stronger, faster growing hair with less shedding in just three to six months with Nutrafol. For a limited time, Nutrafol is offering our listeners$10 off your first month's subscription and free shipping when you visit Nutrafol.com. Enter the promo code CROOKED. That's Nutrafol.com, spelled N-U-T-R-A-F-O-L.com, promo code CROOKED.

1:09:14Jon Favreau:My guest today is the mayor of San Jose. He's running to be the next governor of the great state of California. Matt Mayhan, great to see you. Thanks for having me. Good to see you. Thank you for coming into the Crooked Media grand offices. What do you think? It's beautiful. I love the art. Yeah, I'm really digging for compliments today. All right, let's cut to the chase. So we've got a motley crowded field of candidates in this race. Election day is fast approaching. People are already voting. I got my ballot at the house. I'm an undecided voter. I want to talk to you about it in a bit. Why are you the best candidate to lead this state?

1:09:46Well, thanks for having me on. I think I'm the best candidate to lead the state because I'm the only Democrat in the race who has a track record of challenging the establishment within my own party to make our government deliver for people. And at a time when we've got an authoritarian president who is trying to take the country in a very dangerous direction, we need Democrats who can govern and make people's lives better. The way we win in the long run is proving that we can implement policies that make people's neighborhoods safer and cleaner, their schools better, make housing more affordable.

1:10:19If we're delivering bad outcomes and people are dissatisfied with our leadership, it becomes very hard to fight for democracy and get people to care about climate change and many of the kind of longer term goals that we have.

1:10:33Jon Favreau:So I agree with a lot of what you're saying, but just, you know, we're in LA, we have this mayoral race happening. That's kind of goofy. I'm sure you've seen, we got Karen Bastian coming to the Democrat, she's got a challenge from the left from Nithya Raman. And then a challenge from the right from like a washed up reality TV participant, I don't even want to call him a star, Spencer Pratt, who lost his home in the Palisades fire and I think has channeled very understandable anger about the response into a surprisingly effective campaign. And he's tapped into this rage at the government, rage at the system, that I think was bubbling below the surface for a lot of people.

1:11:10Jon Favreau:And not just people who are feeling the economic pinch, a lot of rich, powerful people in this city are pro-Pratt now. Yeah. Are you hearing that anger on the campaign trail? And if so, how do Democrats address it and speak to it like when we're in charge of everything here and have been for a while? I am hearing that frustration and in some cases outright anger. And that's exactly what I'm talking about. When I ran for mayor of San Jose, which is the third largest city in the state, I was hearing deep frustration with the most basic things. There's crime in my neighborhood, sprawling tent encampments.

1:11:45Our schools are failing. I can't afford the rent. I mean, the stuff that really keeps people up at night and affects them in their daily lives. And I realized very quickly when I was out knocking on doors and talking to people that we have to own those shortcomings and offer people change that is pragmatic and responsible. I believe we are almost continuously in a change election mode because government today is failing to get the basics right. In San Jose, I focused on things that are very simple but have an outsized impact, speeding up permitting, creating a neighborhood quality of life unit within our police department, building basic dignified interim housing.

1:12:29And when it's available, requiring people come indoors, partnering with our county to get more people into drug treatment. by focusing on very basic issues that people see and feel every single day that you sadly see go viral on Nextdoor and everywhere else. We've increased trust in City Hall by 40 % in my time as mayor. And I think that's the playbook. It'll look different in different cities and different states. But again, I go back to this core premise that we have to be outcome focused. We have to look at the outcomes that matter most to voters. And they're pretty clear. They're telling us it's how it's cost of living, it's quality of schools, it's public safety issues.

1:13:06It's very basic issues. Now it's the cost of gas. And yeah, we could spend all of our time arguing how much of the cost of gas is Trump's war versus - A lot of it. Yeah. The last, what, dollar and a half,$2, something like that is thanks to Donald Trump. But the$1.50 before that is largely our own policy decisions. And we need to be honest about that. I've argued that the gas tax in California has become the most regressive tax. It affects people living in the kinds of communities I grew up in. I grew up in a small farming town on the Central Coast. People who can't afford an EV, Californians who are driving farther because they live in rural communities or out in the suburbs and they're commuting every day.

1:13:46And we should keep it, but we should right-size it. In fact, I would convert it into a flat fee that makes sure EV owners are paying their fair share. That would be fair. You'd provide some relief to people. And you'd show that the Democratic Party is still fighting for working people and trying to make a real impact in their daily lives.

1:14:05Jon Favreau:Let me be annoying and ask a process question. We'll get geek out a little bit. So you got into the race pretty late. It was a crowded field, but now you've been running for a couple of months and there was a poll out earlier this week that had you at 4 % of the vote. How do you turn things around if that poll is accurate between now and election day when it's what, a month out? Less? Less. I mean, look, there's a lot of fluidity in the polls. We also recently had a poll that showed us at 10%. I mean, look, when it's a low turnout race and voters are holding onto their ballots, it means there's a lot of uncertainty and therefore variability in terms of what can happen.

1:14:40I believe people are listening. They're not thrilled with the choices that they perceive to be the front runners today because they have some very legitimate concerns about Tom Steyer and Javier Becerra and certainly Steve Hilton. And I'm offering an alternative that is resonant with those who have heard it. What we see in our data is when people have seen our ads and heard our message, we go above 20 % and we're in the top two. So my focus is on communicating directly with voters through every possible channel, including, thank you very much, this opportunity today. I want to talk to people about what we've done to get housing under construction, to make San Jose the safest big city in the country, to reduce homelessness faster than any other city in the state of California and offer a different view of how we make Sacramento work for them.

1:15:32I mean, we have to own as Democrats the fact in the last six years, we have increased spending in Sacramento by 75%. That's$150 billion per year more than we had six years ago. And none of the outcomes that people care most about have gotten better. That is a systemic breakdown. And that's why I'm trying to offer very concrete solutions. fund Prop 36, expand treatment capacity, do high dosage tutoring when children are falling behind to make sure every child's on grade level for reading by the end of third grade. These are things that work that we have not done largely because of special interest capture in Sacramento.

1:16:12We don't build condos in the state of California anymore because the trial lawyers like the fees they collect from using construction defect laws to sue builders of condos. So the city of Miami builds more condos every year than the entire state of California. Why does that matter? That's the most accessible form of homeownership for young people. And we wonder why people are getting priced out of our state. So I'm running against the special interest capture in Sacramento and the status quo. I've done that as the mayor of a large city and it's worked. We've delivered meaningful outcomes.

1:16:42Jon Favreau:I want to ask you more about homeownership and young people in the state. Just one more sort of process thing, which is like, look, I'm literally an undecided voter in this race in part because as you know we have this stupid fucking jungle primary system here where there's a runoff there's a first round on june 2nd the top two candidates go to the runoff so that leads to strategic voting right there was all this anxiety about democrats splitting the vote two republicans ascending and right then we have a de facto republican governor that probably won't happen now because the chad seems to touch cuckoo um and trump has chosen the british short king is his guy in california what's going on there i guess Fox.

1:17:18Jon Favreau:But then there's people like me who are just like overthinking it, right? Because I have candidates that appeal to my heart. And I worry though that if they can't win, then maybe I'm doing a harm reduction vote because I have candidates that I think are bad and I want to vote for someone to displace them. Why do we have this dumb system? I hate it. Well, I hope I'm speaking to your heart. Well, we'll find out. We got 15 more minutes. Yeah. You can let me know at the end. Look, I don't think people should overthink it. It is almost statistically impossible for two Republicans to get through. There are not that many Republican votes in the state of California.

1:17:56Donald Trump is not on the ballot, which means turnout will be lower than it would otherwise be. Bianco is hanging in there with his third of the Republican party, but not any more than that. And I think it's more likely we'll have two Democrats, then we will have two Republicans by far. It's just not going to happen. So I think people should vote for the Democrat who they believe will do the best job.

1:18:19Jon Favreau:Can we get rid of this process at some point though? The voters can. Let's do it. They can. It's annoying. No one likes this. Who is this for? Well, the theory, I do want to try to articulate it because look, there are trade-offs. Partisan primaries also tend to drive candidates to the extreme. Agreed. And so I don't know that there's a, I've heard another interesting alternative, which is, I know this is going to sound crazy, but I was intrigued when someone pitched me on this the other day, having the top three or four candidates advance and then in the final, the second round do rank choice voting.

1:18:54Jon Favreau:I would do rank choice for sure. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like that solves the problem. If you winnow the field from 62, which is literally what we have on our ballot today, which is insane. Including someone named Barack Obama, I believe. Yeah. Yeah. Good move on his way. Well played, sir. Yeah. If you narrow it to, say, the top four, then you're almost certain to have ideological and partisan variety. And then because it would then, theoretically, if you did rank choice, you would then optimize for whoever's kind of the best overall choice. So I'd be interested in something like that. I worry if you go back to a partisan primary, you get the most extreme Republican, the most extreme Democrat.

1:19:28It's all decided in the primary. And that's, by the way, looking at the other side, that's how you ended up with a Ted Cruz in Texas. He got 5 % of the vote But because it was enough to make him the top candidate in a hyper-partisan Republican primary in a red state, he became the de facto senator for years to come.

1:19:48Jon Favreau:Well, he is a very appealing human being. So I can see that magnetism drew that 5 % in. You have come out against this proposed one-time billionaire's tax, a 5 % wealth tax on billionaires in California. This could be on the ballot this fall. Why? What's your opposition to this plan? Yeah. Yeah. So it's not because I don't think billionaires shouldn't be paying more. I mean, look, I think there are a lot of loopholes in the tax code we should close. I'll give you one example. Today, very wealthy people can borrow against their stock options or other assets that they have not yet paid capital gains on and then use those dollars as a way of funding their lifestyles, their investments, and then never having to pay capital gains.

1:20:37That's a loophole. We should close that. Actually, I'll give you one more. Elon Musk, if he were to die today, would pass his stock onto his heirs, 500 billion or whatever it is, and it would automatically get repriced at market rate, meaning even if they turned around and sold it the next day, would never pay capital gains on it. Fundamentally unfair. So there are a whole bunch of things in the tax code, I would fix. I also think with automation, capital gains will probably need to go up so that we can lower income tax on those who are working for a living. But when it comes to this wealth tax, the concern I have is it's going to punish the middle class in California.

1:21:17We've seen about a trillion dollars of capital flight from the state already. And this is right in line with what we've seen in every other place that's tried a wealth tax. A trillion dollars in wealth asset value, right? Not taxation. Correct. A trillion dollars worth of wealth, of assets that people hold that no longer reside within the state of California because their owner now has a primary residence in another state. Like Reno or something. Yeah. Nevada, Florida, Texas, whatever. And that's what we've seen. So there are 14 European countries that have tried wealth taxes at the national level, not even the provincial or state level.

1:21:57And they have generally rolled them back or had to significantly modify them for a couple of reasons. One, they have seen the overall tax base shrink because they've had capital flight, people with very high net worths moving their assets and their primary residence out of the country or out of the state. The other is to assess people's wealth is not a trivial thing. You actually need to have an army of assessors go out and go through people's belongings and figure out what all these things worth and value them and then tax them. And there's a lot of distortionary effects. I just think it's likely to backfire.

1:22:32It's likely to be very costly. And ultimately, I think it's the middle class that's going to be left holding the bag.

1:22:36Jon Favreau:Because there will just be less revenue, you think? Yeah. And that's not just me. the legislative analyst office, the independent policy shop in Sacramento says that we've probably already taken 10 billion a year off of our future revenues based on the capital that's already left the state. Right. But if we could recoup that with this one-time tax, I mean, there's estimates that it could bring in up to a hundred billion. I mean, it's hard to pencil out the math, right? Because we just don't know how many people will leave. I also feel like there's this concern, we're talking about like 200 people, right?

1:23:04Jon Favreau:Like 200 billionaires in California. If they all left the state, do they all really have that much income that gets taxed? Like Jeff Bezos famously pays himself 80 grand or something and has since 1998, but all of his wealth is in often unrealized gains in Amazon stock, right? Which is not getting taxed no matter what happens. It's like, how do we get at that money? Well, that's why I point to those other two reforms that I think make a lot more sense. One is if he's borrowing against those unrealized gains, there should be a cutoff. at which point it's considered realized and you have to, you can't just endlessly borrow against your unrealized assets.

1:23:43I think that's a way smarter way to do it that's less distortionary. And I would, I mean, really ideally that would be a federal policy. The other is inheritance. The best wealth tax is a one-time inheritance tax when you pass things on. And if you don't want to actually force people to sell assets because it's a family business or a farm, that's fine. But don't rebase the value of it at market rate at the moment the person dies. Leave the original cost basis so that when your heirs sell, they pay capital gains. That seems only fair.

1:24:15Jon Favreau:Yes. And there's so many carve-outs for farms. It's like tens of millions of dollars is already exempted from the wealth tax. It's insane that we're not focusing more on that. So you're the mayor of a city at the heart of the American tech industry. In a past life, if you worked in the tech industry. Americans, I think, increasingly have a negative view of a lot of tech companies, right? I mean, as recently as 2015, Pew found that 71 % of Americans thought technology companies had a positive effect on the country. By 2019, that was down to 50%. Now you're seeing AI explode onto the scene. People are worried about the data centers.

1:24:51Jon Favreau:There's polling that finds an increasing number of Americans are more concerned than excited about AI. You've got people getting booed for mentioning AI at college commencements this past weekend. Yeah. What would you say to voters who are furious at Silicon Valley because certain tech CEOs got fabulously wealthy while they did not? The news media got hollowed out. They feel like harms were done by social media. And now it just feels like the same companies, the same people, they're getting to run it back with AI, which we're all told is this unbelievably powerful step change new thing. And I don't trust those people.

1:25:30Jon Favreau:I don't trust Elon or Mark Zuckerberg or Sam Altman to be in charge of it. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's a very real fear and I understand it. And on some level, I share it. I have little kids. I don't want them on social media or AI. I've argued that, And as governor, I would fight for policies that require parental consent for using social media, ban cell phones in public schools. I've actually got experience with regulating technology because as a mayor, our city is procuring and using technology and constantly thinking about the tradeoffs. New tools can give us new capabilities to improve things.

1:26:12We've sped up our public buses. Right. We've improved language translation in our meetings. We're identifying potholes proactively. We've done a number of things that are making government more responsive and efficient, which is great. That's really cool stuff. On the other hand, people's fears around privacy, manipulation of elections, and just misinformation more broadly, job loss, environmental destruction are all very legitimate. And that's why we created something called the GovAI Coalition. San Jose was the founding member of a platform that helps over 900 public agencies navigate technology adoption.

1:26:48And it's all about the ethical and responsible use of AI. So we use license plate readers, but we don't allow facial recognition. We don't sell data to third parties. We don't even share it with the federal government because we don't trust how they will use it. We delete it every 30 days. On the other hand, it's helped us solve murders and kidnappings and rapes and all kinds of horrible crimes. So striking that balance of how do we harness the value of tools? And I think we want to continue to be a state that is innovative and that is at the cutting edge. But we have to regulate and protect people from these changes.

1:27:25Data centers you mentioned. I believe, and this should be a national standard, but certainly for California, any new data center needs to pay the full cost of the infrastructure they require, the full cost of energy. They should be required to use the cleanest energy. Their investment should help facilitate the clean energy future that we all want. They should have to use recycled water. So I think that we can raise the bar.

1:27:48Jon Favreau:Some people want to pause on building those. Is that too far from now? And that's kind of my point. You have this sort of much more laissez-faire approach on the right that is sort of like, oh, business is good. Capitalism is always good. And let's just have this sort of unbridled capitalism and see what happens. I reject that. David Sachs approach, we're laissez-faire until Silicon Valley Bank is going to collapse, and then we're screaming for corporate welfare. Yeah, exactly. So I reject that mindset and approach. I also think, though, that there is a more extreme version within my party that wants to just hit the brakes.

1:28:24And I just believe we are better served, and I think historically, we have been better served by regulating, managing, shaping technological change, but having the authority to do that than just saying no and having it happen elsewhere. And I think there's a balance to strike there. I put out an AI accountability plan that's all about striking that balance. It's about investing in workforce development, putting strict guardrails on the way that children interact with technology, accountability for data centers and robotics companies. We need to have an AI shared prosperity fund that is paying, that is taking tax revenue from these hyperscalers, these big tech companies, and paying for the upskilling and reskilling we need to make sure that people are prepared for the jobs of the future.

1:29:13And look, if it gets really dire, we haven't seen this yet, but we should have a plan B if job loss increases, we're going to have to talk about things like a UBI. We need to have a whole other set of tools, a totally different safety net if this plays out in a way that some of us fear.

1:29:30Jon Favreau:What's your AI drug of choice? You a Grok guy, Claude, ChatGPT? What are we using? I go between Claude and ChatGPT mostly. Although I end up by default on Gemini a lot just because of the browser. Yeah, but then it's always wrong. You're just getting bullshit from that thing. Yeah, I'm a Claude guy these days. You're a Claude, yeah. I was using ChatGPT and then Sam Allman did something shitty. When he swooped in, he was like, I'll take your Pentagon contract to build the autonomous killer robots. I was like, I'm out. Then you went to Claude. See you, buddy. Yeah, who's just, I don't know, secretly building the autonomous killer robots.

1:30:04Jon Favreau:Who knows? So you raised a bunch of money from folks in the tech world, CEOs at Google, Dropbox, Snapchat, Twitch, I think some prominent venture capitalists. What's your response to people who worry, look, when you take all that money, there are strings, and it can make you beholden to the tech industry? Yeah, I mean, look, it's a very fair question. And my response is, one, I've regulated tech, and as an elected official over the last six years, I have never done one thing to benefit the biggest employers in Silicon Valley over the people of San Jose. And I sure as heck, I'm not going to do that in Sacramento.

1:30:37I'm actually running against special interest capture in Sacramento, and I'm not going to replace one set of interests with another. I have been very willing and have consistently put restrictions on how we use technology, how we interface with tech companies. I think the honest reason that there are tech employees, tech leaders, investors, et cetera, who have contributed to the campaign is I lead the largest city in Silicon Valley, and they've seen that we have led the state in reducing crime, reducing homelessness, building housing, fixing our problems. And I think people are drawn to results and competent leadership.

1:31:18And I'm just better known in the Bay Area, where we have a number of tech companies. But that's why I'm spending so much time traveling around the state, getting to know people in other places and really making the case for good government. But I put out a very clear AI accountability plan that is based on everything I've done in San Jose over the last six years and is where I am on these issues. And I put that out transparently for everyone from voters to my donors to see it. And if donors don't like it, they can find another candidate.

1:31:50Jon Favreau:One donor name that surprised me was a guy named Joe Lonsdale. He's a co-founder of Palantir. Big Republican mega donor. He's like a big Elon stan. Give a million to Elon's like pro-Trump super PAC. Maxed out to you? What's up with that guy? He seems a little crazy. I don't know. You'd have to ask him. I mean, I have probably thousands of donors. He's not like someone you knew back in the day when he was a Palantir or something. No, I know he's from the Bay Area. Yeah, I don't know. Look, he's just an aggressive tweeter. We've crossed paths. That's why. You guys have been tweeting at each other?

1:32:19Jon Favreau:You know, look, we all have our weaknesses, and that's one of mine. It does feel like, though, like there was a time, look, I was in the Obama administration in like the kind of 08 through 2013 phase of like the, there was a lot of excitement around tech. There was a lot of cooperation between the administration and tech industry, probably too much to our, you know, discredit in the Obama world. um now it seems like a lot of the tech industry guys are like gloves are off fuck this we're battling regulation right like indreason horowitz according to new york times has made more than 150 million 115 million dollars worth of disclosed federal contributions to candidates or entities working on the upcoming midterms that's like 50 mil for like a ai pack another 47 million for crypto super PAC, does that worry you?

1:33:13Jon Favreau:Does that disgust you that this one VC firm can dump$100 million to advocate for its book of portfolio companies? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I'm worried about concentrated power in politics in all forms. The biggest donors and tech now is becoming one of the largest industries or donor bases in the country of any industry. You've had oil and gas. In the state of California, it is worth noting, there are other groups as well, from public sector unions to trial lawyers who spend a tremendous amount of money, sometimes for things I agree with that I think are generally good for society, sometimes for narrower interests that are not always good for society.

1:33:55I actually got involved in... The way I ended up in tech was building tools for grassroots organizing, the early petitions like the change.org tools, early fundraisers, GoFundMe, these kinds of early tools to try to basically help people organize at a grassroots level and make the system more accountable to the people than to the donors. I've always been worried about the influence of concentrated money and power in our politics. So it does worry me. I do think, though, that the Democratic Party has to also recognize there's a split within the party right now. And we have also driven away many people who have started companies.

1:34:44And I'm not just talking about in tech. I mean, generally speaking, as I go around the state, just set tech aside. When I go talk to people in agriculture, in Hollywood, in manufacturing, in a wide range of industries, the regulatory burden in California is a real issue. And I think we become very dismissive of it as, oh, deregulation is a Republican thing. That's just because they want more profit. I don't think that's the case. I mean, we broke the housing market by overregulating it in California. that's making building more housing, creating room for new people for future generations, making housing more affordable is actually a very progressive aim.

1:35:22I totally agree.

1:35:23Jon Favreau:But I feel like we're just so far from overregulating like social media companies. I mean, Australia is banning accounts for kids under 16, right? I mean, we're just, we're doing nothing. Right. And that's part of my proposal is actually to require at least parental consent up to 16. So yeah, I think that's fair. But I do think we risk losing natural allies of the party if our answer to every problem is another regulation, another tax. And I think, look, within tech, maybe it's appropriate. The regulatory environment is not very mature at this point, but there are plenty of other industries like housing and agriculture where you could argue we're punishing, we're actually restricting economic opportunity and pushing people out of state.

1:36:09Jon Favreau:You've criticized Governor Gavin Newsom for focusing too much on trolling Donald Trump. I think you said he made a quote, blind leap into meme land. Gavin and Trump have kind of a Ross and Rachel, will they, won't they, frenemies, antagonistic thing going. It's probably unique to them. They're big, larger than life people, but Trump and the conservative media, they love to beat up on California. Fox News all day is some video of something that happened on the street. So I don't think the Trump attacks end when Gavin is gone, how would you manage that relationship differently than him or continuity?

1:36:46I mean, the way I think about it is there's a set of things that are just red lines for me and for the state of California. We're going to fight to protect our vulnerable neighbors. We're going to push back on ICE. We're going to fight to protect constitutional freedoms. We're going to fight for our fair share of federal funding. There are a number of areas where, unfortunately, we are going to have to fight fire with fire, as Governor Newsom has said. And in San Jose, I've led us to sue the Trump administration multiple times. We've used our budget to backfill cuts. We're funding legal services for immigrant neighbors who are at risk of deportation.

1:37:27We've banned ICE's use of masks and their use of public property. So I will use every tool in the toolbox, legal, budgetary, bully pulpit, whatever tools we have to fight back. I do though want to go back to the place I started, which is I also think that we've got to take ownership of our shortcomings and start solving highly visible and visceral problems that affect people every day. I mean, this may sound superficial, but when people drive around Los Angeles and see the state of the freeways and see thousands of people living outside in misery and tents and trash and fires and graffiti, it just undermines our credibility.

1:38:10It undermines trust in government. It makes it that much harder to stand for something different that people can believe in. And I'm not pretending that the Republicans have got it all right. They've got plenty of problems and red states have plenty of problems. We do a better job in many ways at being economically inclusive and certainly more welcoming socially and politically. But I think we've got to also fix our fundamental problems, starting with the high cost of housing. And until we grapple with that, I don't think we're going to be a very effective resistance. Yeah.

1:38:38Jon Favreau:My last question for you is about housing, which is in California, we have something called Prop 13. I'm sure you know about it, but listeners naturally don't. It was passed in the late 70s. Younger Californians mostly hate it because it means that new homebuyers pay much higher property taxes on the identical house to someone who bought it 40 years earlier. You can correct me if I'm getting the details or I'm shorthanding this. It creates this general unfairness and it can lock up housing supply because if you're a senior, you're not going to downsize if that means you're going to pay a much higher property tax, right?

1:39:08Jon Favreau:You want to lock in that privileged tax rate. Over time, Prop 13 is gutted revenue for California's public schools and like smart kind of wonky people I know almost literally will blame it for like all of California's problems, right? There are a number of books to that effect as well. And so sadly, it feels politically impossible to repeal the thing because high propensity to vote seniors like it because it keeps their property taxes low. So what do we do here? How do we bring some fairness to property tax collection and unfreeze the housing market with this anchor around our neck? Yeah. How many hours do you have?

1:39:43Yeah. I mean, look. Wednesday, Thursday? Yeah. I think one is just across the board, our housing issues come down to a lack of supply. So we need to build more housing. And that will slow down the rate at which the value of housing goes up, which will help moderate property tax increases. The reason Prop 13 was passed was property tax increases were happening so fast that people were literally getting pushed out of their homes because they couldn't keep pace with the rising costs. So it doesn't freeze it, but it caps it at a 1.5 % increase per year, which you could argue is too low. Maybe to properly have a more functioning market, it should be higher.

1:40:19That's a debate you could have. I think there are some pragmatic things that could be politically feasible. One is we should enable older residents to take their property tax benefit with them if they downsize so that we can free up that housing stock. So if you're an older couple or you're living alone and you've got four bedrooms in a suburban neighborhood somewhere, if we could incentivize you to capture that benefit and continue to have low property taxes by moving into a condo by the beach, great. We should allow for that flexibility and fluidity in the market. Another thing that could be done is you could say, well, having property taxes go up more than 1.5 % per year could price people out.

1:41:02But what if some of that actually accrued over time and then was assessed at the time that you sold the home. And so that way you're not getting hit each year with a larger and larger property tax bill that you can't afford when you're raising kids or whatever else you're doing. But when you eventually sell the house, presumably the house is appreciated. That's why your property taxes are going up. That thing gets paid back in. But I would also just note, I think Prop 13 reform is about fairness and distortions in the market. I think it's a mistake for Democrats to make it a big revenue generator because the truth is while it did reduce revenues to the state and to school districts, after it passed, we went and found a bunch of other sources of revenue.

1:41:45We created an income tax. We tax capital gains. We tax businesses. We tax everything. So our overall tax burden is the second highest or third high, depending on how you measure it, third highest in the country. I've noticed, yeah. Yeah. So you're experiencing it. We found other ways to tax.

1:42:01Jon Favreau:You're right. We could talk about this forever. But you got a lot of things to do. Where can people find your campaign if they want to get involved, support you, knock doors, donate, whatever? Yeah. Thanks for the opportunity. I appreciate all the great questions. And my website is Mahan, M-A-H-A-N, for california.com. You can find me on social media. If you have any follow-up questions to this interview, shoot me an email. Otherwise, hope to see folks out there. Excellent. Mr. Mayor, thank you so much for coming in. Thanks for having me.

1:42:36That's our show for today. Thanks to Matt Mahan for stopping by. Alex will be back on the feed on Sunday with a conversation with our buddy Norm Eisen about the slush fund and all of Trump's other self-dealing. Check it out. Everyone else, have a good weekend. Bye, everyone. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. Our show is produced by Austin Fisher, Saul Rubin, McKenna Roberts, and Farrah Safari with Reed Gerlin, Elijah Cohn, and Adrian Hill. Our team includes Matt DeGroat, Ben Hefcoat, Jordan Cantor, Charlotte Landis, Kirill Pellaviv, David Tolles, Mia Kelman, Ryan Young, and Naomi Single.

1:43:02Our staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.