319. TRIP US: The Only State Trump Needs to Win

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0:49Hello and welcome to the Restus Politics US. If you're looking for today's episode, we are now on our own separate grown up feed. We'd like to thank Rory and Alistair again for hosting us every Friday for the last few months. To hear today's episode, just search the Restus Politics US wherever you get your podcasts and you'll find us there. Today, we are discussing the fallout of Trump's claims about immigrants eating cats and dogs. Yes, seriously, I did just say that. The lack of trust in elections and we'll be taking a deep dive into the state that will decide the next president. Here's a clip.

1:30If Kamala Harris can't carry Pennsylvania, if you look at that amazing electoral college map of getting to 270 electoral college votes, her only hope of winning the White House is what's known as the Southern strategy. She would have to win either Georgia or North Carolina. And Pennsylvania, there is a New York Times Ciena pole out this week, which pits her, I think, four points ahead. It's the only one that's the best pole she's had in Pennsylvania. It's still within the margin of error. And basically, Pennsylvania is on a knife edge, but it is a completely critical state. It's a state that James Carver, the great strategist who worked in the Clinton administration, famously described as the city of Pittsburgh in the West, one of my favorite cities in the United States, and Philadelphia in the east of the state and Alabama squished in the middle.

2:18And it's kind of ripe. I mean, it's an area that has suburban areas, city areas, and an awful lot of rural areas that tend to be more Trumpy. And I think it's a state that's going to have millions of dollars spent on political ads in it, and that you, Anthony, might be going to visit. Yeah. So I expected I'd been added to the circuit list again, full disclosure. Obviously, I worked with the team on debate prep, and I went down to the spin room, and I've now been asked to go do some of the swing states, and I'll just point out, and I think I may have told this to you. My dad was now unfortunately deceased.

2:57He died last year at the age of 88. Thank God, but he is from the state of Pennsylvania. My dad grew up in the Wuxbury -Scranton area, went to a place called Plains High School. It's a northeastern part of the state, Caddy. It's a poor industrial coal mining part of the state. As my dad pointed out to me, he was raised. It was born and raised about 15 miles from where Joe Biden was born and raised. It's blighted, Caddy. I hate to say this to you. Like, my dad's home on Zillow, where he lived. If you looked it up today, it was maybe 35 ,000 US dollars, which gives you a sense where it's not an expensive place, a very, very poor area.

3:40My dad left that area to come out the long island. I tell you this story because I know the state very, very well. And what Carvel said, we used to say it was a pencil -tucky, pencil -tucky, which was like a hybrid of Kentucky and Pennsylvania. But if you take a look at the map, it's a very interesting map. It's a rectangular state. The left side of the state is really the Midwest, it's closer to Ohio. There are three rivers. You love Pittsburgh, because it's a beautiful city. There are three rivers that connect into Pittsburgh. And of course, Andrew Carnegie made that the home of steel manufacturing because those rivers could get you out to the Mississippi and other places and you were able to move large barges of industrial steel from that area back in the day.

4:22You go to the right side of the state, sort of the east coast. That's that Amtrak corridor. Okay. And so those are lawyers, professionals, people that work in Washington. Philadelphia is sometimes called the sixth borough of New York. It's almost like a suburb of New York. Lots of Philadelphia fiends, excuse me, not pronouncing it right, work in New York. Why am I bringing all this up? It's a very eclectic mix of people. And it's a political puzzle that has to be solved if you want to win the presidency. And Donald Trump solved it with volume in 2016. Joe Biden solved it with being a native in 2020.

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