A Mass Shooting in the Center of a Culture War

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Hello, everyone. Well, them to the next level. I’m JBL here with my best friends, Sarah Longwell and Tim Miller of the Bulwark. Before we get started, go hit the Sub scribe button. Give us the thumbs up if you’re watching on YouTube, if you’re on your podcast player.

Give us five stars and leave a review, do all the things, and then Hit pause. Pause it right now. Go over to the Bulwark dot com and sign up, get the newsletter from me. I write like seven thousand words a week. I’m surely you would like some of them.

Charlie Sykes. Mhmm. Right? It’s a great newsletter every week. That’s totally fow free.

Every week.

We have podcasts by Mona Sharon and we’ve got Will South and we’ve got all the best people with all the best words over at the Bulwark dot com and almost all of it is free for you. Go get it. Alright. That out of the way, we have to start, I guess, by talking about Nashville, another school shooting, another bunch of dead children, I don’t know what

to

say about it really. This is one of those, like, semi regular periods of despair that I get sent into. And I just don’t know what to do or say anymore except for this has seen everybody makes fun of thoughts and prayers. But, like, what else are we gonna do with pray? In this moment.

Right? I mean, there are there are other things you can do starting, like, with how you vote or the kinds of laws that you want to press. But in these moments, like, really what else is there to do? Put pray for these poor families. And guys, thoughts.

Do any of you have something productive to say? Because I don’t.

I do think that there’s other things to do besides thoughts and prayers. Although there is the moment of despair, I was just I was just doing CNN talking about Mike Pence and why he should testify and not run for president. But the package before it, like the whole segment before it was about the shooting and I was listening to this nine year olds, pastor talk about the family and I was, I don’t know, there’s been so many school shootings I I can’t tell whether it’s because I have kids now, but they hit me. They always hit hard. Nothing hits harder than these school shootings.

But I’m not having kids and, like, when you see the pictures of kids, I, like, I can’t tolerate it. Like, I, like, I, like, I, like, body can’t tolerate it physically and I am so sad. So I’m, like, going into my segment, crying and I’m thinking about how, you know, we’re about to talk about politics. Right? I’m there to talk about horse race politics.

And The politics of this does matter. Like, that’s the other thing besides the thoughts and the prayers. It’s like you make changes and Tim talks about this sometimes where he says, you know, this is the one thing I’ve really changed on since Trump, you know, because people are like, well, your democrats are whatever. And I’m always like, I don’t know my positions on a lot of things haven’t changed that much. On guns it has, I think that the way that we approach guns in this country is insane.

I think that the weapons that people can get their hands on are insane. And the thing about this shooting too, when you say you have nothing to say, this this shooting is is actually it’s gonna create a different type of discourse. Right? Because you have a trans what actually, we have we’re not quite sure. We have somebody who has different pronouns on their LinkedIn So there’s this whole discourse now around trans.

There’s gonna be a whole discourse around how the media tree did the shooting, and it’s gonna fit right into the culture wars. People are not gonna talk about solutions, legislative solutions. They’re gonna instead fight about this part of it. And so I actually think this one is gonna stay with us a little longer than some of the other ones because the right is usually very keen to put these things in the rearview as quickly as possible. They come up with a thing to say We need more armed security.

We need guns in schools. It’s a door problem. And then they, like, wanna get out of it. Right? New news cycle.

This time, we don’t really know, but because it sort of fits into the culture where discourse and the way that the right is using transgender right now as, like, very much a a wedge issue, I think it’s gonna go on longer than the normal cycle.

Tim? Yeah, I mean, I my despair in this is is rooted. I mean, the the first order is again, like, the the dead children. But second order is that when I look at our political system, it seems to me, maybe I’m wrong, that if we have like thirty five percent of the country, which is so wedded to their hand penises, as you’ve called them in one of your best pieces for the Bulwark, that they are willing to trade school shootings for, you know, all of their gun stuff, then because of our system, that’s enough to stop us from ever having change. Well,

In some ways, I have a little less despair

than you and and and otherwise, I’m gonna add a a little additional layer of despair. What is the Cognizant for Tennessee Merchant?

Never heard of this guy really. And so, you know, you’d you’d love when you’re somebody’s a backbench congressman you haven’t heard of, and then they just appear on your screen for the first time and like, oh, my

introduction to congressman Burchett is that he just doesn’t wanna even try to do anything about school shootings, like, and not fixable. So,

I mean, we’ve gotten to that point actually where there’s an all this great NRA reporting, you know, about how they handle — It’s Columbine and how they handle Newtown. And, you know, how they were like, well, we we need to have some fig leaves. Right? Like, we need to have something, right, to say. Like, the nihilism is set in to such a degree now that there’s at least some of these guys who just wanted to say, I don’t I don’t even need to do that.

Like, I don’t even need to do the door control thing, like, two step. Right? I That

is the logic of their position. The logic of their position is. Total unfettered access to guns is a paramount right. Yeah. And if one of the unfortunate downstream consequences of that is that a bunch of kids get killed every year in schools I’m sorry, but that’s a price we’re willing to pay.

That

is

their

position. Right? It is. So kudos to Cognition Merchant for actually saying it out loud as ghoulish as it is. But, you know, and we did pass first gun reform bill in thirty years almost last year.

I think that there’s good reason to believe that red flag laws have make a difference. You know, my friends who are in the, you know, gun activism space, who send me all this stuff, you know, pointed to as crazy as Florida is and as much bad stuff that has happened and as many mass issues happen in Florida, you know, where they put in red flag laws in Colorado where they put in red flag laws. It’s not a panacea. It’s not gonna stop mass shootings because of all these other problems that we have, but it is making a difference on the margin. So And I the numbers, I think, are are so overwhelmingly bad for the unfettered access to guns side of things that you know, eventually, you’d think that in time, like, that works against them.

That isn’t much of a solve for the problems of the short term. And frankly, in the short term, it’s getting worse in certain states. We’re passing constitutional carry in some of these red states. But but, you know, the math Bulwark working against some just like the math worked against some unpaid stuff. It’s not working working against some fast enough.

But but, you know, my Instagram is interesting on this front, like, you know, I don’t know everybody in my, you know, college friend groups voting, you know, trajectory, but a lot of them voted for George Bush. I guess, I do know that. Right? And I and you see a lot of like people who don’t comment on politics, like posting fuck this, you know, type memes and and things on on Instagram after these sorts of things. So, you know, I I I do think that there’s movement, but not fast enough.

I don’t Sir, I I want to change the subject of just another element of this.

But before you do, Who’s the guy you interviewed? Where’s it? Chris Murphy?

Chris Murphy. Yeah.

He was on the segment before me. And he was, you know, saying that, like, this has to be an issue that people vote on. Right? It has to be an issue that people make a a central issue that they vote on. And I think if you held an election tomorrow it might be an issue that people vote on.

The problem is is that, and again, going back to, like, I knew I had to be on TV and so I’m listening to them talk and I’m getting wound up and like emotional listening to it. And like that’s a bad feeling. It’s a bad feeling to have. And so I wonder, for the first time, it sort of occurred to me that if you are a campaign, operative. And you are thinking about like, what is going to make people vote for my person?

If unless they have like the tide of rage right in front of them, if you bring it back up when it’s not the tide of rage following the actual shooting, that actually it’s the kind of thing that people are like, why are we? I don’t wanna talk about this. It makes me feel bad inside. It makes me feel sad inside. And so that campaigns are actually loathe.

To put it front and center as an issue because people don’t wanna talk about things that are, like, that sack. Like, is that is am I wrong about that? Like, I was just thinking for the first time about it as an actual campaign issue and why that might not work?

This is one where, again, I’m open to be in wrong about this, but people haven’t tried it. The democrats were in a place for a long time where they’re on the wrong side of a gun issue politically. Right? And so I think that this conventional wisdom set in, the type of people that make ads and the Democratic Party are all like sixty. For the most part.

Right? And so they have this institutional memory of, oh, this is such a loser. We’ve gotta run away from this issue so many of our candidates have gone down because of the NRA in these these states that are red states now. And I just don’t know if that’s true anymore. I mean, certainly, it’s true in certain districts, in certain states, in certain places in the country.

But I I do think that the math on this is changing. And you saw a little bit of it in this past midterm from the Democrats, but I don’t know. I think I’ve mentioned this in this back as far. I think that there are some very popular issues related to guns that you could run very hard hitting evocative ads that might make a difference. I’ve suggested this ad several people that I’ve spoken to in the gun activism space.

But I don’t know I I don’t this is gonna change everybody’s vote. No. But I do think it’d wake people up if they were watching, if we had some kind of ad where, you know, the camera is going through a high school, then you you know, you’ve got the jocks and you’ve got the nerds, you’ve got the goths, it’s like mean girls, you’re in a cafeteria, and then they stand out and everybody’s carrying an AR fifteen. And you’re like, do you want everybody in your kids school to be able to get an AR fifteen? Because Tim Burchin does.

Right.

I don’t know. I think that I think ads like that would make a difference.

Because that’s true. That is the law in some of these states where an eighteen year old, which is a senior in high school, can go online and buy an air fifteen without parental permission, without a like, that’s the law in certain states in this country. So — Yeah. — but I think that could work. I don’t know.

I I don’t the Republicans make that argument, oh, you know, you’re taking advantage of these deaths or these people. Maybe, but it’s like, no, you are. And you’re the reason why this is your laws are the reason why this has happened. Don’t get mad at my ass. Change the laws.

This was we couldn’t make this ad at the laws when this happened.

You’d need an outside group that wasn’t attached to a candidate for that. Yeah. I think any individual candidate wouldn’t wouldn’t be able to stomach. I

think Chris Murphy could pull it off.

Yeah. Maybe maybe he’s

running in Connecticut. I don’t know. But if you were to run for president, we’re in a hypothetical world where, you know, Chris Murphy’s presidential candidate, I don’t know, which is not gonna be our world. But What

about tying it to crime. I mean, one of the things that I think Democrats, I think that they they get really cowed on the crime stuff and for some reason don’t pivot into making it about guns. I

agree with this. Should. Right? This is what Clinton did. Clinton coupled assault weapon ban with tough on crime stuff.

Right? I

just think a general, you know, we need fewer weapons on the streets, fewer weapons in our schools, these are crimes that are killing people and try to own the crime issue in a way that Democrats It’s not even defense. They just, like, hide from this. Yeah.

Ask Brook Jenkins about that. More comps, more guns. Right? Like, that feels like bumper’s securable. Or more gaps.

You’re gone. Excuse

me. Yeah. Can I just rage for a second before you pivot off of this? Because I the truth is I kind of respect that nihilist position that who’s the congressman? You mentioned VirTra?

VirTra. Right. Look. It is a coherent intellectual position to say something like a constitutional right to bear arms is deeply important it is important in America in ways in which it is not important to other countries. It

is

an enmeshed part of our constitutional order and it should be. And there are going to be downstream ill effects of it the way there is for free speech protections. Right? Free speech protections means you’re gonna get Nazis marching in Skokie, Illinois. And it is important to protect this right even though we should just understand that we’re gonna have bad effects like children being murdered in their schools many times a year.

And I’m sorry, it’s regrettable, but it’s important. I disagree with that, but it’s a it’s an ethos. Say what you will about it. What drives me fucking insane is these legislators and people posing for pictures for Christmas with their teens with their ten year olds holding AR fifteen’s and stuff as if it’s all just fun in games.

Yep.

Right? It is one thing to take the the intellectually serious possession of. Right to bare arms is intrinsically important, and there are going to be problems with it. And we’re sorry, but we’ve got to defend it. And another thing to use children is props with guns that they should not be holding.

And those people can just fucking rotten hell as far as I’m concerned. Like that

really I’m

sorry. Is that too hot? That thing really just drives me insane. Is

here something that I’ve been grappling with on the whether it’s too hot side? Because I don’t know. And I this is my not my party this week. It’s not too hot, right, on the merits. Right?

It’s ridiculous. Right? Like that ten year old shouldn’t be holding rifles. Right? I I don’t I don’t understand why that isn’t a universal position.

It’s pretty clear. But we haven’t seen yet, I guess, that there’s some sort of manifesto from this transgender shooter, maybe transgender. We’re we’re still working through the details. But we’ve seen a lot of these manifestos lately from these kids that have been radicalized by eight Chan and the white nationalist stuff. You know, the Buffalo shooter was reading about Christ Church and the Charleston shooter.

I hate that I have to remember every every one of these little Nazi motivations. But the thing that worries me about this that makes me think about are everybody’s responsibility and it sucks that always the responsible among us who don’t want to see the world burn have to, like, think about these things because the other side doesn’t. But Like, it shouldn’t be surprising that we might head towards a place where there are left wing teenagers you know, who decide to try to do mass shootings against MAGA folks. Right? Like, this is just a downside of tribalism altogether.

This is what I tried to write about and I tried that to say this explicitly in the article because I didn’t want to not recognize and not hear and value people’s righteous anger. People do have a right to be angry and and to be enraged and to want people to burn in hell who who like or refused to do anything about this. But at the same time, I do think we all just have to step back and think about, like, the temperature that we are creating online. I don’t wanna live in a world where we have four hundred million guns or three hundred million people or whatever the breakdown is now. I don’t wanna live in that world.

I’d rather live in a world when they’re like, thirty million guns of people who were permitted, who got their gun because they went to a couple classes and whatever were responsible, but that’s not the world wide. Alright. Well, then I take it back. No. No.

I’m not trying to I’m not trying to lecture you. I’m just this is a conversation thing. Right? It’s like if we live in this world, right,

that

where these these guns proliferate everywhere, then if you have easy asynchronous guns and you think that there there’s someone else in your neighborhood that you’re a fucking enemy, then, you know, all it takes is point one percent of those kids to be like, oh, yeah, I’m gonna just take I’m just gonna grab this gun and go shoot up the whatever. And so that’s just something I think that is kind of semi permanent here. And I don’t really know what the answer is to it. I think that’s in some ways even more an ex people than than the the gun problem. But, like,

I don’t

know. That’s just something that I was thinking about yesterday. I don’t know. We don’t know what this don’t want to project anything onto this individual situation, who knows what happened to this person that radicalized them. But I don’t think that we’re very far away from a situation where we have both right wing and left wing teens who have easy access to AR fifteens that that do shit like this.

Alright.

Well, I’ll tell you about don’t Rot and Hell if you are a congressman who is taking pictures of your family with AR fifteens for Christmas. But, like, go sit in a corner go sit in a corner and think about what you’ve done. Is that better? Hey,

Tim. Were you gonna pivot to the transgender conversation?

No. This was the this is kind of where I what I meant. Again, I hate to be like, I’m waiving my finger at you next level listener who’s a responsible person who said something really hot about that evil ghouls like at the New York Post and Don Junior and MTG who, you know, went out there and been like, did the hormones do this? It’s like fuck you. Okay.

Fuck you. I get that. But my point is that, you know, it’s a Christian school. Again, we don’t know what happens situations. I don’t wanna say, but I just like, they are I’m sure wrong and they don’t know the facts and their fuckers for bringing it up.

But one of these days that may and maybe it ends up being this one, we will see like they’re gonna get what they want. Right? Which is, oh, here’s our little antifa mass shooter. Right? And oh, you know, here is their manifesto that we found online and they hate Maga because they spent too much time listening to whatever, you know, liberal TikTok star.

And I just I worry about all that. While at the same time recognizing that at at this point, the like, this notion that Elon Musk and Benny Johnson are out there being, like, maybe we need to investigate the transgender issue. There have been three transgender shooters. Like like, oh, really? Okay.

Great. There have been twenty three thousand SIS HET, you know, mass shooters.

So

so this is the point I I actually wanted to make.

Yeah. And

it’s such an obvious one. But, like, this crowd that has decided that this shooter’s potential transgenderism is the essential factor in this, and even Eric Ericsson has been, see, like, gender dysphoria. You know, this is a mental problem. This should this should count under red flag laws. And ends me really.

Gender Dysportia should count on a red flag once. Great. I

I don’t wanna mischaracterize it since narrative, but I think I’m I’m fair in saying that’s the gist that is not for them. But he’s been actually particularly terrible, like during this one in the way that he’s been talking about things. This is a crowd that if you talked about, let’s say, toxic masculinity or white nationalism or any of these other things that become characteristics, because almost all of the shooters are men. How about just that? Just forget anything else.

They’re men. If you were to say something like Boy, something must be going on with men. A lot of them are turning into mass shooters. Don’t see a lot of women doing this. There would be a not all men dead this is terrible, feminist, Bulwark jobs.

And and I just

I kind of

agree

with this per policy proposal, actually, papillae. If we are we gonna just all men deserve red flagging loss and have to have a higher bar for gun purchasing

than

women because I I you could well, that is a reform. Maybe me and Eric Ericsson can meet in the middle on women can be can have easy

access to have guns. Yeah. No. All

men have an immediate red flag law. On their

on their little driver’s license that they that they need to prove the courts that they’re not. Yeah.

He was basically asking whether gender dysphoria would count as a, like, mental health problem. And we don’t even know. And, like, literally and I don’t know if you’ve watched Did you guys watch the footage? Yes. I did.

I did too. The sirens. Oh my god. I just Okay. But you watched the one that cop’s body cam footage?

Yeah. Did you watch the footage of the shooter?

No.

So there is footage of you see the shooter shoot through the doors. So the doors, this is like the question about the doors. The doors are glass. And so they’re locked, but they are shot through with the gun. Right?

So it it shot through and then you watched the shooter prowl the hallways looking for people to shoot. And, I guess, I don’t quite know how to say this. Like, we literally don’t know any Is this person’s chance, transgender? There is something to me. Like, if somebody showed me that footage and was like, what do you see here?

I would be like, that’s a girl. That’s a girl with an AK forty seven, prowling the hallways of a school. And it’s a girl who looks like a, you know, like with that, like a hat on and stuff. But small. And there’s something about it that is disorienting in a way that, like, I don’t know that made me, like, all this stuff just, like, made me, like, extra sick, I guess.

And it it’s when things you do have this idea in your head. Like, these are these are men and, like, or even like the boys when you see them right and they’re like, all strapped up, but but this person is wearing tactical gear or like the chest armor and stuff. Has a gun and just walking around and, like, the smallness of the person is part of what just caused me. Anyway, now we’re gonna have to have this debate about whether or not the LinkedIn pronouns are the true thing or, like, is this person transgender? Like, whatever.

And that side debate is gonna be really gross. And in a way that it’s not about when it’s just like, oh, we all assume it’s men.

Yeah. I guess it’s gross, but it’s also the door control thing. Right? This you know, remember we did this all. With Duvalde, it’s like, oh, the door was open.

And I kept saying, I got heights with a couple of, like, of the more responsible pro gun people online who I was like, what are you talking about? That the door was unlocked. That was great. But the guy had like three a r’s. You realize that there are windows in schools.

Right? He could’ve just shot through the fucking window and climbed in the window, there’s always gonna be something that’s, you know, I was like, have you ever been to a school? Like, you don’t You don’t think that they’re gonna always be ways in. Right? So that was the one that time.

And now, you know, this time when I have to deal with the hormones. Right? Just my final thing, I was I know Jabil, I’ll just move on. Is the sound from that? You know, there’s there’s so much tragedy to talk about always your folks in these families and these poor old kids and the police and the parent the, like, the other kids in that school, and it is haunting.

You know, these kinds like, you know, and and and they see the picture of the kid going through the bus. I don’t know. I I also, you know, made for another day, just think that the trauma that we’re putting these these kids through —

Yes. — with

the active shooter drills. I’m having to listen. It’s just like, it’s hard to measure the impact on that. And

can I just say just actually so Tim talked about his social media feeds on mine? I had a friend from college who was posting a dad, posting about his kids were in a school two miles away. All those schools were also locked down. Right? And when standing look happened, I also knew people who were in surrounding schools.

They all locked down too. And they’re not drills when they lock down. When somebody’s in that, like, you know, radius of miles, which means these kids are experiencing. Live shooter, not drills, but the sense that it’s happening to them, not even if they’re not in the school. And so it but it’s not just in the school, it prevades.

Right? And those parents, right, the parents are getting text messages. Just imagine as apparently, this is the stuff that I cannot take. You’re a parent and like there’s some shooter somewhere and you don’t even know, but they’re telling you that it’s in the area of your kids school. They’ve locked your kids school down like, the trauma everyone is experiencing from these things.

And it’s like, this is the same crowd that is right now talking about, like, drag shows like, hurting

kids. We gotta get Heather has two mommies out of the school library because your kids can be totally traumatized for life if they know that one of their classmates parents or lesbians or something. But you know what? All the kids in America now have to do active shooter drills once a month basically. This is what my sixth role has to do.

And, you know, he he flippant hates it. Like, you know, it’s terrifying him every single time. But, yeah, that we just gotta live with. I’m so sorry. It’s great.

Fuck her. Alright. Fabulous. Let’s transition to more good stuff. Let’s

talk about this. Our producer did put the tweet in here, and so it just said, Eric Ericsson tweeted, so if we prohibit people with mental health issues from purchasing guns, that would include people suffering from gender dysphoria. Right? Why is close?

We

include all men past puberty, I’d I’d support that bill. That’s a deal. We’re in the meet in the middle, bipartisanship. Hey, it’s JBL. Self care is an everyday practice.

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So I guess we have to talk about other things too. Donald Trump went to Waco, held a big rally,

other uplifting topics, Let’s just

— Yeah. — let’s move to Donald Trump.

Go

to this.

Yeah. The spot of a a groomer. Damon Crush was a groomer. I know that it was just a coincidence that we were doing this on thirty year anniversary of

Just a coincidence, not at all a big wink wink about the deep state and queue. I do find the crash thing interesting because so crash was literally doing q stuff. Right? Yeah. But yet I get the sense that Waco is a touch stone for all the cute people about the power of the deep state.

Right. I mean, deep deep

Right.

That

doesn’t doesn’t land. Right? Actually, the person that was doing the pedophilia, in this case, was not the deep state that went to, you know

Stop the pedophilia.

Yeah. Stop the pedophilia and save the kids. It was Koresh, that was the

pedal. Yeah. Yeah. Just

that one fact, if you haven’t watched, there’s a good there’s a good mini series on this. You can watch, dude. It’s not not quite up to speed on the particulars. Set a bunch of stuff. Gonna be your retribution.

Some

people are very concerned in Republican circles because the things he is saying could hurt Republican chances to win. That’s why they’re concerning. Sarah Longwell you think? Was it everything you

hoped it would be in more? Can I just tell you the thing that I am most struck by? Sure. Because I I actually think Tim could go through all the particulars of the insane things that happen, but I just wanna make one point. Which is I look to see how many people were there.

And I believe the real count was eighteen thousand. Right? Which means that Donald Trump is still getting almost twenty thousand people to fill a stadium. To go and to fill.

Wasn’t filled.

That’s fine. That’s fine. Alright. Here’s my question. Can Ron DeSantis get eighteen thousand people into a stadium?

No.

The stadium in Florida. You think? In the last month before the election.

And

he’s doing this thing right where he flies in. Freight theatrical, he flies in, walks off the steps of the airplane right onto the stage in the podium, with Ted Nugent and other selected insane people. And I saw a couple reports or it’s like that the applause was slightly more tepid or, like, less never be like, there’s still eighteen thousand people coming to see this guy. And I just that’s bigger than any other candidate could get. The current sitting president for sure JOE

BIDEN COULDN’T DO eighteen thousand. Reporter: WHICH

I THINK IS A GOOD REASON TO SAY THAT THE THESE ARE NOT EVERYTHING. RIGHT? BUT THE INTENSITY OF LIKE THIS COMMITTED LEVEL OF SUPPORT IS STILL THERE, ANYWAY.

And

for context, I mean Beyonce, for example, you know, she’s back in the football stadium out here. Okay? So, you know, seventy thousand people, eighty thousand. You know, he’s not a Beyonce level. It’s more of like a, I don’t know, Kenny Logans.

I’m trying to think of what who who’s drawn who’s drawn eighteen thousand. You know? Like, kind of somebody on there. Somebody on the way down, you know, even madonna would do more than eighteen thousand these days. So I worry about over analyzing this as a reaction to myself.

Right? Because in twenty sixteen, I was like, oh, who cares? He’s got a bunch of freaks that show up to these things. And, you know, Mitt Romney had a big crowd at at Red Rock in twenty twelve, and he didn’t win. And, you know, he’s like, I do that thing in my head.

It’s like, this isn’t that big of a deal. It’s just fifteen percent of these the party is freaks, and they all showed up for him. And, you know, then he goes on to win. And I was like, man, maybe art science and crowd size do matter more than I realized. Maybe I should.

I should check my priors on that. So I don’t wanna overreact the other way. I do think that it’s window like Trump and Waco in March of twenty sixteen would have been probably forty thousand, maybe fifty. You know what I I it did look a little smaller in the old days. The notion that, like, that it’s this, you know, star that’s dying out, that’s that’s more intense.

But it’s

twenty twenty three, Tim. That’s what we are so far out.

Seven years in. I know. I know. Trust me. I I wish it was eight people.

You know, I I how could anybody support this? And we’ll get into this with Christie and all these guys. But But it is smaller, so there’s something to that. Right? Like, there’s some shrinkage as Charlie wrote in his newsletter this week.

Is it enough shrinkage to, like, have somebody go beat him? You know, probably not. We’ll see. But it is alarming. And what’s happening at these things?

I mean, you have the January six choir as there. I The January sixth choir is there. Yeah. They have a song. It was number one on iTunes.

Now nobody buys iTunes anymore because people have Spotify or other streaming services? I’d love to see the raw number, but I I you know, I I don’t know how big that raw number is. But still, It’s not nothing. It’s Morgan Wallen and him, you know, up there at the top of the rankings. I don’t

know

who that other person is.

He’s the country singer. I don’t really know him either. He covers a Jason Isbel song that love Jason as well. Also

like Jason as well. It’s the

only reason I know this Morgan long character, but they are singing and owed to the people that tried to overturn the government. Sometimes you just have to say out loud explicitly what this is. Like, did they have a hymn that is honoring the people that attempted a coup to install a game show host as an unelected autocrat in our country. And that’s like, oh, yeah. We’re number one on iTunes.

And and, like, most of the Republican parties either onboard with it are kind of like, I don’t really like it, but why do you don’t want to see how it goes? Like, that’s utter madness. A man I I like to do a time machine game like a magic going back to twenty thirteen and like, here’s a video. Donald Trump is in Waco, Texas on the thirtieth anniversary of the Koresh incident. And he has this huge crowd there and they’re they’re singing a hymn in ode to the people that storm the capital.

Here’s the video of the capital storming. And by the way, you’ll support it. Rob Portman. You still won’t have a lot of support in that person again. Like, you know, whoever.

You’ll support that, Kevin McCarthy. It’s like, Like, everybody would be like, you’re mad, man, like, you’re a liberal extremist. So the whole thing is, like, it’s just utter lunacy. And they have signs Let’s say witch hunt. You lunches?

That’s what the signs are in the back. You know, they they pre make the signs. These aren’t homemade signs. It’s like the Trump campaign hands out to everybody, and it’s not like, inflation bad or, you know, shining city on a hill. It’s witch hunt is what the sign says.

And and, like, that is the animating element of this. Now, Gwen with Paul Trello is the victim of Bullitrade, by the way, does just a quick aside, but

Donald Trello I don’t I don’t wanna reduces to to yard sign counting. But, one of you know, I do keep track of the the houses that I pass in my daily commute with Trump flags. My daily commitment. In my the course of my daily era. In the jurisdiction.

And a a lot of those the original Trump flags from twenty twenty have come down. And in dead, what I see is I may have the wording wrong, but it’s something like Trump twenty twenty four, this time there are no rules. Oh. Or the, like, the gloves are off or is this something like that? But the theme really is retribution and he’s got that right again.

He understands what his people want. He’s right there. I’m not sure about that. Is that true?

I

The retribution part they want. I don’t know. He did fifty minutes of this. Like if just the oh, the witch hunt and the alvin brag and the Department of Justice, is that the deep state? Is that to get me?

And he’s an animal? And and pencil next shift and write, like, fifty minutes. And then he does, like, five minutes on Ron DeSantis crying begging him for his endorsement like a dog. That, like, makes me laugh, but the crowd seemed a little bit mixed on that point. You know?

And then an hour into this thing. It’s like,

you know, he starts talking about the border or whatever. Yeah. I think he’s right though. Because what he does is he positions it smartly. Because it is they’re not doing this to me.

They’re doing this to you. Yeah. If you know what? Alvin Bragg. And that lady prosecuted in Georgia — They’re doing it to you.

— that lady the lady parts, not the part they’re gonna a song.

Well, you know what I’m talking about. Right? And I think that plays. Now, maybe with a smaller section of the maybe it’s only maybe that only plays with fifty two percent of the Republican primary voters instead of, like, maybe

it’s forty two.

Or maybe it’s forty two. Maybe it’s or maybe it’s thirty eight where he was at forty eight in twenty sixteen. Right? I think he wound up with forty eight percent of the Republican primary vote. But I think it plays.

And the people who say, oh, he’s focused on personal grievance and voters won’t respond to that. I think that’s not accurate as an analysis of what’s going on. Maybe a smaller number of voters will respond to it. What

do you think about that, Sarah Longwell a segment of gettable people that he’s losing over this, I think. Do you think that that’s wrong?

So here’s the thing. I can’t remember if I’ve said this to you guys or not. Maybe JBL. I’ve certainly said it to reporters. So there’s all last week, all anybody wanted to know is about Ron DeSantis.

And if I was seeing in the focus groups Rhonda Santos slipping. Now, we were seeing it all over the polling. Right? In the aggregate polling, we’re seeing Rhonda Sanchez have been slipping. I wasn’t really seeing it in the focus group.

Now, the focus groups tend to be a lagging indicator oftentimes because these are just random people we found who are willing to participate in focus groups have voted for Trump twice. And so they tend to like, things get filtered down to them through the news. And so, like, the number of times that a reporter asks me I have somebody call me and be, like, do you ever hear about Vivik Ramaswamy in your focus groups? And I was like, no, never. And then, like, two weeks later, everybody was talking about Vivik Ramaswamy in the focus groups.

And so sometimes, like, the political media’s on to stuff before something happened with CRT in the focus groups. You know, I was like, I I remember with this call, and I was like, no, it’s never come up. And then, like, it was all I heard about for the next, you know, couple of months. And so I have not seen this, like, drop off in Rhonda’s Santos. Support.

I continue to hear from voters, to time Trump voters say, I think Trump has too much baggage. I think we should move on. The only thing that I have seen that would indicate a little bit of a shift is that the language that Trump is using to knock DeSantis is starting to creep in. The idea that he is a regular politician is something I’ve started to hear from people who aren’t sure about Ram status. And people who are like more slightly more plugged in They’ve heard of Ron DeSantis.

They know who he is. A lot of the people who are more interested in Trump, it’s because Trump is still all they know. They don’t listen to tons of media, and they just like they like Trump. And they haven’t learned a lot about Ron DeSantis, and so they’re going to look. Now when they go look about DeSantis, they really get Trump’s version of DeSantis.

Now Trump trashing him. And I think that’s part of what is is happening, but like, The thing that I don’t think anybody knows that is just really unknowable right now is how big is the chunk of people who wanna move on from Trump Ron DeSantis, and it’s sort of does Santos’ quality be damned. Right? They just like they need someone to move on to. They’ve decided to Santos’ as the guy and were there.

There’s a that’s a group. It’s a real it’s a chunk. How big is that chunk? I mean, the polling’s all over the place about that. Then there’s the always trumpers and then there’s still the baby trumpers in the middle.

And I think there’s this open group of people for whom Ron DeSantis had not yet been defined. And this is, I think, one of those things was a little we anticipated it. We’ve been telling people what’s gonna happen. But Trump is defining him for those people, and that’s hurting DeSantis. Just

one thing that’s DeSantis on the polls really quick. That’s interesting. His faves are still really high.

That’s

true. Trump’s faves are lower than DeSantis’ by like six points. Crash hour wrote about this in Axios that that in the early states, Ron DeSantis is sort of stronger, has more strength than these national polls are suggesting. And they had the favorable Ron DeSantis up around like seventy seven, trumps down at sixty nine. Problem is that Ron DeSantis has a lot of room to fall, and Trump’s or post insurrection.

Right? Trump’s on his floor. Trump’s at his floor. Maybe he’s not totally at his floor, but, like, all the bad stuff is baked in. DeSantis has not taken the hits yet, and so his favorables, they’re still really high, but like they got along with they can drop.

I’m

just saying his his ballot has gone down while his favorables have stayed. So that means that’s recoverable. That’s all I’m saying. Right? I’m not saying he’s gonna recover it.

I’m just saying it’s recoverable. It’s not like these people have heard what Trump is bleeding and then, like, okay, I’m done with this guy. He’s Jeff Bush. Right? They’re they’re

not saying that

yet.

Just one really quick thing on the crash hour article that the early state polls I thought that was a classic DeSantis world leak — Yeah. — to somebody that wants it happen. It’s POS that did pull public opinion strategies is like the establishment of Republican polling firms.

Yeah. I mean, like,

if you’re gonna just paint a generic establishment of Republican polling firm, it’d be these guys. So, you know, they hate Trump. And then they’re like, oh, does Sanders and Trump are tied in New Hampshire and head to head? And I was like, oh, okay. That’s interesting.

That’s actually not that good. The multi person ballot with Vivek and Nikki in there. And it’s like Trump’s winning by twelve in New Hampshire. And I was like, well, that’s what he won by last time. Like, I

I just I thought I love Josh’s Josh’s good in the in the

analyst. I just think that some people were over reading how good of a poll that was. Ron DeSantis.

Josh is a good analyst, but, like, he’s also part of the world. Yeah. That wants DeSantis to happen. And so I could drive a truck through a bunch of the loopholes in those numbers. And and even JBL, you were just citing a statistic about the number that Trump got in the Republican primaries.

And I heard Tim push back on this idea that, like, Trump was gonna win the primaries in America, but, like, If you go back and look at his early state numbers, remember he lost Iowa.

Mhmm. He

came in second to Ted Cruz. Iowa

doesn’t count. My cuck to be one Iowa Rick Santorian, one when I I was meaningless. It’s a copious. He’s a bunch of crazy religious people. But

the point is he came in second with I can’t remember what. But the next states that he won the next two states before he really popped in Nevada were in the thirties.

Yep. There are blowouts. There are blowouts. Should do a whole episode of this. He would have beat Marco head to head in South Carolina, and he would have beat John Case ditch head to head like a drum in New Hampshire.

So I think I think that’s fine. I think that’s fine. But I think my point is that that dynamic can persist. And that’s the thing that, like, Trump can win in those early states with basically his floor. That’s true.

Is my point. Yeah. His committed floor. That’s why you need one other candidate who can really consolidate support. The problem for Ron DeSantis is that if he loses, the sheen of inevitability is the consolidatable candidate.

Then things fracture, and you’re really backed into that

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So that’s why the man we all need is let me let me look. Come on. Chris Christie. Christopher, see Christie. So I did a little bit of a rant yesterday.

Let’s hear a newsletter that you guys can

can go read. Let’s do an audio version.

So I I said basically, Chris Christie is the worst never jumper and that, you know, I fully fully understand that if you want to stop the aspiring autocrat, you will wind up having to hold hands with some pretty disgusting people and Chris Christie is one of those and, you know, I don’t wanna be too pure and we welcome converts and all that. That’s a this fucking guy, as Sarah’s interior voice like to say, really is the worst. And up until late last night when he went and reversed course again to Josh crash hour. He refused to even say that he wouldn’t vote for Trump again if Trump was the nominee. Right?

You know, we we got all the way through his big you know, he did his speech up in New Hampshire. He was shucking and jiving through that with whether he would or wouldn’t. And he had appeared to tell Lara Ingram that he would vote for Trump as an nominee, although he didn’t actually quite use those words. And then with all, I guess, he got some donor pushback yesterday because last night, know, again, he could have made this clarification at any point. He he gave an Axios exclusive and told them, yeah.

Yeah. No. I’ve Trump’s the nominee. I just I can’t do it. But he made made short his note, he could not possibly vote for Joseph Robin at Biden because of what an extremist he’s been

Couldn’t vote for either of these guys.

So count Chris Christie is a vote for Edmund Burke. And

Chris Christie is, like, Oh, it is so outrageous that he would have the January sixth choir out there agree. And it’s like how how I mean, how can we have a pro insurrectionist choir event, you could never vote for this guy. Okay, great. You’ll vote for his opponent. No.

I don’t know. He can stand in.

Joe Biden’s kinda old, and

I think he spent too much on COVID.

Right. And you just look at the amount that says that his policies when it comes to infrastructure are out of bounds. Good sir. Which is funny because Trump, one of his retroactive justifications for being with Trump in twenty sixteen, was I just I had to stop Hillary Clinton because she was such a unique threat to America that I you know, I’m sorry. I was I was pushed to the little old man that just owned him.

Yeah.

When Christie was like, how could I have known that Trump would be the kind of president he was?

None of us could possibly have realized. Yeah. And the little guys I didn’t.

Yeah.

I know shit. And everybody laughed at him. It’s like, oh, wait. So you’re coming into this this race. You’re raising data for being in this race you can beat Donald Trump at a debate stage, and you just got beat by a sixty seven year old named Saul at a New Hampshire town hall in a debate.

It sounds like I’m a little concerned. I’m a little concerned. If that’s really your strength. Well,

it also it it calls into mind. This is the other thing. The other thing. Again,

fully

understanding that you can’t the perfect be the enemy, the good, fully understanding that as Churchill said, the only thing worse than bad allies is no allies. I understood. All of that. Christy has demonstrated again and again that his judgment is terrible. But he’s also demonstrated that he doesn’t actually talk straight and do the truth.

This is a guy whose whole stick is like, well, I’ll be the the straight target, and he’s just tying himself into into knots. Which suggests to me that he’s useless as an ally. I’m all

for useful allies. Can I read one quote from my book, the quote from the dispatch? Actually, I quoted an interview that Chris Crafts did with folks over the dispatch. He’s talking about life in the post governorship and like why he felt like he needed to be engaged in the Trump campaign. Here’s a quote.

You know, I was talking to another governor who’s coming off the end of his term. I said to him, look, one of the things you need to know is the music stops. You watch your successor get sworn in. The trooper takes you back to your house. You wake up the next morning and they’re gone.

The cameras are gone. The phone call stop and the music stops. And you gotta figure out that out. What do I substitute in for that? You gotta eat your feelings.

You don’t need to hear any other word that Chris Christie says. You don’t need to see us hear a single word from that fuck. K? He told you exactly why he’s doing everything that he’s doing because the music stopped and he needs he needs to fill this hole in his heart. And if if he if if filling the hole in his heart, singing in the January sixth choir, he would do that.

Right now, he’s decided that he can fill the hole in his heart by being the one guy that can be, I’m a tough guy who can stand up to Trump. I hope he does it. I hope he does it. We’ll see. I don’t buy it.

Sarah, be the better angel here.

I will. I will. Fuck me down. So I I think about what Chris Christie’s gotta be saying to these donors. Right?

People who would SUPPORT THIS CAMPAIGN BECAUSE PAST

THE

DIP.

BECAUSE PEOPLE KNOW. Reporter: ARE

YOU GOING TO Eat THAT?

SPEPS. PEOPLE KNOW that people know. Sorry. Yeah. I just I just

That was good. And he’s been wolfing down the canopies like a wort hog.

Yeah. Oh, did you watch the session? Yeah. That’s so good. So good.

So Chris Christie is going in there and he’s got a pitch and his pitch is this. He has found the donors who really wanna stop Trump. And he’s saying, look, I made a mistake in twenty sixteen when I took out Marco. And I didn’t focus on Trump. But I’m the only one who can go into this race, and I will pound Trump.

And I will be useful in the effort to ensure that Donald Trump is not the nominee in twenty twenty four by being the one person who’s willing to go with him directly. Now, the problem is is that Chris Christie, just like Ron DeSantis, had to learn a little bit of a lesson that when you’re coming to Donald Trump, you’re no longer fighting a one front they’re all used to fighting a one front war against the democrats. Right? Maybe it’s two fronts with the media a little bit. But, like, when you take on Donald Trump, you’re now in a two front war.

At least, like major fronts, which is like, yes, you’re saying I would never vote for Joe Biden. I’m against the democrats. They’re really bad. But this guy this guy is awful. And he, you know, they’re they always further can’t win because it doesn’t, you know, that saves them from saying, like, all the other bad things they wanna say, but the voters won’t tolerate.

And I think that that is useful. I think that Chris could end up being Chris the useful engine in in because I read a lot of Thomas to train to my kids, you know,

being I thought that’s like that. We might need got that. Is that cancellable engine?

Yeah.

He’s a train engine.

He’s a tank engine. It’s a train of stuff. You guys haven’t done that yet because you’re doing Paw Patrol. We

don’t do Tom She

doesn’t

do Thomas. She does Paw Patrol.

No. We don’t do Paw Patrol either. I ban Paw Patrol my house. The one the one show that I ban

Jeez. Anyway, I so could he not be useful in that regard? I think potentially so.

Potentially not also. Potentially not just really quick. Can he be on a stage? Can can we all can imagine him and Trump on a stage? Let’s say even gets to the stage.

And and he’s up there, and it’s a room. And they filled the room with mega people. And Chris Christie is like, Donald, you’re stupid and you didn’t know the policies and not, you know, and you lost, you didn’t even build Fauci bullied you around, and and Trump’s like, you know who bullied you around Fauci? I sent you to White Castle to pick up my hamburgers for me. And, like, You almost died of COVID, you pussy, and then everybody’s like, a drug.

Isn’t that possible Right? Like, we’re all like, oh, we’re starting Chris Christie, you could is gonna is gonna do it to Trump, but he did to Marco. But Trump’s better at this than Marco. I don’t anyway, maybe I hope so. It’d be fine.

I’d be I’d be like, Chris, eight years of failure, and I’m happy you could be our useful engine for this one day. I hope he’s useful. I’m just saying for the donors who are thinking about this, maybe maybe run them through some paces.

Yeah. Here’s the thing. All we do is demand that these candidates, like take the fight directly to Trump. Yeah. And he’s the only one who’s showing even the most moderate willingness to do so.

I’ll be for it. Yeah. If he does it, if he does it, have talked a lot about it. Never actually done it. It’s been eight years.

But if he does it, I’ll be for it.

Mike Pence, doing a pretty good job taking the fight to to Donald Trump, lesser more, Mike Pence, who actually did something to stop the coup, and and Christy, do you notice this thing? Kristy was attacking Pence. He

attacks Pence in this fantasy. He’s our useful engine, and it’s like he’s gonna do the same shit. Trump is gonna make fun of him, and his hits are not gonna land on Trump. Then he’s gonna take out one of the other guys. Can’t

help you. This concerns me. And I, you know, look, nobody wants to hear this. But why not pants? Right?

I don’t think I don’t think Why not? The answer to finish either. But if I was a donor looking to to try to stop Trump, I would be looking at Kemp or Pence, not Chris Christie.

Okay.

I mean, let me just let’s talk about Ben’s thing. First of all

That’s awesome, Sarah.

Because when I was on TV this morning to talk about was my meds. Here’s what I said. I’m gonna say to you now when I said there because this is what I truly believe. Mike Pence wants to be in service to the United States of America. Should not be as a twenty twenty four presidential candidate.

He should stop needing to be subpoenaed, to testify about his conversations around January sixth, he should do it voluntarily, and his service to the country should be in telling the truth and should be making sure that Donald Trump is not the president in twenty twenty four. These psychopaths who say to themselves, well, the way that I’m gonna stop Donald Trump is by not testifying in front of a grand jury. But it’s because the voters will want me instead. I will take them out in a Republican primary. It is the most narcissistic, asinine, delusional thing that I had ever heard.

And, like, Chris Christie is actually I mean, I guess, my Penn City wouldn’t support Trump, but, like, let me just throw another thing, actually. There’s this piece about Yankin right now. And political about, like, maybe Youngkin’s the guy. Maybe he could be the one. Amanda, like, tweeted at me this morning to say, I kinda get, like, pencil light vibes for Youngkin from voters.

Same outfit. Okay. But let me tell you something. There’s a difference. And I actually, I have not JB, I promise.

Remind me to write this piece for you. K? Maybe

we’ll cut the show here, and we’ll just do a we’ll just do a transcript of what you’re about to say and turn it back.

Okay. There is a dividing line that we have not branded and we need to. I’m gonna t m it just like I do, Republican Triangle of Doom no longer with the finger signs, which is We should all talk about twenty fifteen as BT, right, before Trump and in the before times. Right? Twenty fifteen BT anybody who was around then.

Nikki Haley, Mike Pence, Mike Pompeo. This is part of where the scientists is gonna get himself in trouble because, like, The things that it’s not gonna be DeSantis with pictures of him and an underaged girl. It’s gonna be pictures of DeSantis in, like, h w Bush. Oh, right. Okay.

Those are gonna take him out. Right? Yeah. Okay. So if you were a politician in the before times, people see you as before Trump, and they say we’re not going back there.

They can like Nikki Haley Fox. She’s nice enough. Some people can say Mike Pence is a nice man, but they are from the before times. They are from before Trump. They are from twenty fifteen, BT, and they don’t want anybody from that time.

The one thing that people like Yonkin have going for them is because they are from eighty after Trump, the after times. Right? And when you if when you feel kind of age during the sort of Trump cinematic universe, you have a a benefit Now, because one of the things I said to Amanda is, look, the difference between Pence and Yonkin is that everyone knows who Pence sits. They have an opinion on him. No one knows who Yonkin is.

Like, you do a focus group about Kanye, and nobody’s heard of him because he’s the governor from Virginia. We all know who he is. But, like, average voters, this was always one of the things about Ron DeSantis. That was sort of startling is that voters in Ohio and in Texas only who he was, which is unusual for that, hey, you gotta you you can’t buy that kind of name item. It’s one of the reasons that Mike Pence is so dramatically underperforming right now even with he has seven percent.

He’s got a universal name ID, which means like he’s being actively rejected. Youngen has a chance to build a brand in the after times. Unlike Nikki Haley, whose brand got forged in the before times. Does that make sense?

It does. Yeah, I could say that. I could see that. I know So you’re basically, you’re all on board the Young and Drain. You’re ready to take your Vitamin Y, you think he’s he’s the future?

Come on. Say it.

No. No. No. No. No.

Not exactly. I just listen. I I do think that if DeSantis continues to be this candidate who looks sort of unsure and is trying different things. Can’t find the right calibration. People will start looking around.

The media will start looking around like donors will start looking around. Will Fox start looking around?

That’s the important thing. Right? Does Fox start looking around? Maybe. Alright.

Good show. Long show. Everybody. Hit like. Hit subscribe.

Give us the five stars to all those things. Sarah Longwell. Good to see you guys. Catch you next week and on Sunday. Bye.

Bye.