BONUS: Could Trump Still Lose the Nomination? (Live from New Orleans!)

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What's up, New Orleans?

Welcome to Pod Save America.

I'm Jon Favreau.

I'm Tim Miller.

I'm Jon Lovett.

Tommy Vitor.

I'm Dan Pfeiffer.

We have an outstanding show for you tonight.

Your state representative for right here in New Orleans, Mandy Landry is here. Louisiana Public Service Commissioner Devante Lewis is here.
And we're so lucky to be joined by our pal, author, bulwark extraordinaire. Local.
Local. Local, Tim Miller.
Yeah. Good stuff.
All right. Let's get to the news.
Fresh off a very good election day for Democrats this week. Yeah.
Clap for that.

Joe Biden held a rally at a car plant with United Auto Workers after he became the first president to join a picket line for a strike that led to historic wage increases.

I thought Biden had a little extra pep in his step at this rally.

He made a few jokes about his age and then went directly after Donald Trump.

Well, let's take a listen.

I've never been more optimistic about America's future than I am today.

And I know I only look like I'm 30, but I've been around a long time.

That's not too much to ask.

You okay?

I want the press to know that wasn't me. But my predecessor, the distinguished...
six factories closed across the country.

Tens of thousands of auto jobs were lost nationwide.

And on top of that, he was willing to cede the future of electric vehicles to China.

He said if America invested in electric vehicles, it would drive down

wages. It would destroy jobs.
It would spell the end of the American automobile industry.

Well, like almost everything else he said, he's wrong.

Tim, what'd you think? Good way to handle the age thing? Right way to go after Trump?

What do you think?

I thought it was pretty good. I noticed you guys didn't show the dance that he tried to do.
I didn't see the dance. What dance? It was a little stiff.
It was a little stiff on the dance. I don't know about the dance.
What do you think? I was just happy when I saw it that that was a UAW t-shirt because at first I was like, is that like a red Jimmy Carter sweater? Then I realized he was wearing a t-shirt and I was like, this is good. They got him on the primo adrenochrome now.
That's the good stuff. It's working.
Right in the veins. Right in that eye vein.
I thought it was pretty good. Look, I like all of the manufacturing messaging.
Here's the thing. This guy, the college-educated whites, hopefully Donald Trump's going to do the job for him on that demo, right? And so he's got to lean into this.
That speech wasn't for them. Right, he's got to lean into this, right right he's got to lean into this right and he has to he has to try to um minimize the gap with working class voters you know he's struggling with that across races and so he just got he should do this he needs to live in manufacturing plants he's got to do you know that picture of him with uh with ron de santos where like he's hugging the biker and de santos is like in the big boots and he looks sad yeah like that's got to got to be the whole campaign.
Just like hang out with bikers and manufacturing dudes. And that's that's the deal.
Yeah. I mean, I like later he said, you know, when you guys were in the fight, I was here.
Trump went to a non-union shop and attacked you. Like, I think it's in addition to a good economic message.
It's also him getting on the side of people like I'm for you, Donald Trump doesn't give a shit about you, which I think is a good message, good contrast with Donald Trump. Because I think one thing people do believe about Donald Trump is that he only cares about himself.
The thing that I found most interesting about this was when he talked about the plants closing under Trump. There's been this big debate in our party, like, how do we narrow the historic gap on the economy that Biden and Democrats face with Trump? Is it highlighting Biden's accomplishments? Is it highlighting the Trump tax cuts for corporations? Is it talking about Republicans cutting Social Security and Medicare? And there was a sort of a private Democratic poll circulating earlier this summer that showed that the most effective way to do it was to talk about the plant closing under Trump, and especially the ones where Trump said, I'm going to keep them open like the Lordstown plant in Ohio, and then it closed anyway.
And so it is very notable to me that that polling has clearly made it to the White House and that Biden is saying that. Because that does sort of get at what people do have concerns about Trump, that he's kind of full of shit, that he was focused on all the wrong things while he was in there.
And so that's where the plant closing works better, because you're really trying to navigate this sort of, like, pseudo-businessman image he has. And this gets at what people have actual concerns about him about.
Unfortunately for the president, his party's electoral and policy successes haven't prevented a growing list of potential candidates from weighing primary or independent challenges against Biden. Dean Phillips just hired former advisors to Bernie Sanders and Andrew Yang.
And Sarah Palin. And Sarah Palin? Oh, and Steve Schmitt.
Yeah, of course. Don't forget my buddy Steve.
I forgot about that, yeah. The latest New York Times poll has RFK Jr.
polling at 25% in a three-way race against Biden and Trump. Now that Cornel West is running as an independent, Jill Stein just announced that she's going to be running for the Green Party nomination.
Who said her name three times? Shame on you. And Joe Manchin has now decided he won't be running for re-election to the Senate, but intends to travel the country, quote,

to see if there's an interest in creating a movement to mobilize the middle

and bring Americans together.

Tommy, what the hell does that mean?

And will you be joining that movement?

I watched that video.

It was sort of like a folksy centrist mad libs.

It was very, very hard to follow. Here's what I think about Joe Manchin.
He definitely, he drove us all crazy for a year, a year and a half. Forever.
When Joe Biden was trying to... Speak for yourself, Tommy.
He was trying to pass the infrastructure bill. He was trying to pass the Build Back Better bill.
Joe Manchin made it very hard. I think that when you look back on that, his opposition to the child tax credit extension is indefensible and borderline unforgivable.
That policy lifted 3 million kids out of poverty. And Joe Manchin somehow got it in his head that if the child tax credit funding would be used by the parents to buy drugs, which is based on nothing and is, you know, I'll leave it to you to interpret that kind of comment.
But his vote did help deliver the IRA, the biggest investment in clean energy ever. I think if we're being honest in hindsight, some of his concerns about the most expansive versions of build back better and the potential to cause inflation.
You might have had a point.

Ooh, Tommy.

You might have had a point.

I'm going a little bulwark for Tim here.

You're getting Paul Ryan pilled over there.

I like that.

Yeah.

That's right.

But at the end of the day,

West Virginia is what, plus 39 Trump state?

That seat's probably toast.

So we're going to miss him.

Now, I don't know what he's going to do

on his centrist, no no labels rump springer.

I hope he has a good time.

I hope he meets some good people.

My guess is that he ultimately realizes, oh, yeah, I prefer decrying partisanship in green rooms rather than actually party building and running for president in a bunch of states.

Also, it's worth remembering that no label says they want a Republican at the top of the ticket. So he'd have to be the VP.
And also, he's 76 years old, which makes him young for this field. Young as Canada in the field.
Young generally. So I don't know.
I will miss him in the Senate, but not that much. I think only Joe Manchin can come up with a plan to simultaneously cost the Democrats the Senate and the White House.
Yeah, that is true. Does anyone think that Joe Manchin is going to be polling well as a third-party candidate for no labels? Does anyone? We've seen there's the first poll and they're showing them getting what? He was getting he was getting 10 point 10 percent 10 which is enough to destroy the country but probably not enough to make him happy but if i knew how to make joe manchin happy love it we should talk about that you'd be on a houseboat we should we should start with the senate implications for the democrats because i do think that's a big so so this is a stone cold bummer.
We have a 51 seat majority with Joe Manchin. There are seven competitive seats.
We now need to keep all of them. So if Joe Manchin is out, we go from 51 seats to 50 with Kamala Harris breaking a lot of ties.
I was told by the DSA that he'll be replaced by a far left, a real true progressive in West Virginia.

Is that not going to happen?

And no bad ideas in a brainstorm.

I wrote them.

So in order to now for Democrats to keep the Senate majority,

John Tester has to win in Montana.

Sherrod Brown has to hold his seat in Ohio.

Ruben Gallego has to win in Arizona.

And we need to win in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Nevada, and Michigan. Before this, we could have lost one.
Now we need to win them all. If we do lose one and want to retain the Senate, that requires a pickup either by defeating Ted Cruz in Texas or Rick Scott in Florida, both of which are very difficult to do because they're both so charming and charismatic.
The other piece of this that sucks is Joe Manchin was going to be someone Republicans were going to have to fight to beat, and now they don't have to do that anymore. They go from a place where they would have to spend money to a place where they probably don't.
That's money that they can dump on John Tester or Sherrod or in Nevada or elsewhere. So it just made our job of retaining the Senate harder.
That being said, these things are going to move together, and if we were, you know, being in a position to win six and being in a position to win seven look a lot alike. It's just it's harder.
Yeah, I think the way to think about it is if Democrats hold all the Senate seats now that we are defending, if Donald Trump wins, Republicans control the Senate because Because at best now, it's 50-50. And so then if Biden wins re-election, then great, Kamala Harris breaks the ties.
But if Donald Trump wins, Donald Trump wins re-election, the best we can do now is going to be a Donald Trump presidency and a Republican Senate. And Tucker Carlson breaks the ties.
And Tucker Carlson breaks the ties. And that means that Republicans in the Senate will start getting to appoint judges.
That means if there are Supreme Court vacancies, Donald Trump wins. There's a Republican Senate.
Clarence Thomas retires. Alito retires.
Suddenly they get two more Supreme Court justices. So the importance of making sure that Joe Biden and a Democrat win the presidency and making sure that Donald Trump loses is even more important now that Joe Manchin has decided to retire.
I want to make one, yes. One more just note on Joe Manchin.
I think it's worth noting that when Joe Biden put out a statement and his statement was extremely kind to Joe Manchin and that's been his tack whenever Sir Joe Lieberman comes up, that's his tack when Joe Manchin comes up. He talks about how Manchin not only supported IRA, but also a veterans bill, a gun safety bill, a few other things, and voted for Ketanji Brown-Jackson.
And I think one lesson of the last couple of years is that Joe Manchin, booing him is ineffective. He's clearly just extremely ego-motivated, and we've got to

fucking figure out a way to praise this guy

into getting out of this thing.

We've got to hug Joe Manchin.

Joe Manchin loves this fucking country,

and he will do anything to protect

her, and we all know that.

And that's why we know

ultimately, for the sake of the middle,

he will do everything he can to help

Joe Biden, and we all know that, right? Because booing him at his houseboat seems to radicalize him somebody clip that beautiful houseboat beautiful houseboat I think the Wall Street Journal reported this that there's now an effort it's not an effort led by no labels but, but it's a different group. They're leading a

draft Manchin Romney

movement.

I think Manchin will be

president and Romney VP or vice versa?

Romney president.

Tim, are you leading that effort?

Did you want to make that announcement tonight?

I actually, just for the sake of the

content, I have something prepared right now

underneath this Beyonce shirt.

It's Romney Mansion

2024, and I'm going to do it

Thank you. Actually, just for the sake of the content, I have something prepared right now.
Underneath this Beyonce shirt.

Oh, no.

It's Romney Mansion 2024, and I'm going to do it in the hopes that John Lovett gives me a pile driver.

No, no.

I would love to.

I mean, Joe Manchin actually is pretty good.

I mean, he's been a West Virginia senator.

He's been all right.

I know, not a lot of cheers for Joe Manchin being pretty good,

but he has been pretty good. He's going to be better than the alternative.
Cletus Van Ivermectin is going to replace him. Joe Manchin is a pain in the ass that I am sad is leaving the Senate.
He did the gay marriage. That was pretty good.
Without Joe Manchin, we would not have saved the ACA. We would not have had that vote.
We would not have had the Inflation Reduction Act, the largest government investment in climate in history. We wouldn't have had all these judges.
He is a pain in the ass. He has infuriated us.
I get that, but we needed him. Here's the thing.
These rich people that have these fucking delusions that Mitt Romney and Joe Manchin might be there, it's because they look at the race and they're like, people aren't happy. People don't like Trump and Biden.
The thing is, what they don't understand is that this election between Joe Biden, a normal central-left Democrat, mainstream Democrat, and a racist lunatic who is a game show host who wants to end the country, does not call for somebody in the middle ground. If the election was between two far ideologues, if it was like Rashida Tlaib versus Mega Mike Johnson, right?

Then maybe like Romney and Manchin could work

if one of them had a personality transplant.

And then they could like bring together like bulwark Republicans

with Biden Democrats, with like independents who don't want,

who like voted for Trump but don't like Mike Johnson's like

Bible salesman vibe that he gives off. Like could work in that alternate world.
That's not the world we're in. The only people that would go for some normal alternative third party are people that already have a normal candidate, Joe Biden.
It's a big fucking problem if Joe Manchin gets in. Big problem.
Dan, I think polling third party and independent candidates seems relatively useless until we know who's going to be on the ballot in which state. From that perspective, which of these potential candidacies do you think poses the biggest threat to Biden? It is both the no labels candidacy and the Green Party candidacy of most likely Jill Stein.
No labels is already on the ballot in 12 states. Most of those are states that are not consequential to presidential election, but they are on the ballot in Arizona and Nevada.
The Green Party, because Jill Stein, because the 2016 election never stops leaving us, did so well in 2016, they have guaranteed ballot access in a number of states, including the not-so-consequential states of Michigan and Wisconsin. And then they are both on the ballot in Oregon, which is a state which should not be competitive, but has a very weird history with third-party candidates and could possibly become competitive if they're both there.
RFK Jr. and Cornel West are on the ballot as of right now, nowhere.
Getting on the ballot is quite expensive and arduous. It's not sure yet.
It requires, you know, in some states, getting valid signatures from up to 1% to 1.5% of the electorate. And in order to do that, you have to get sometimes like two to three times that number because valid signature means you have to have the correct signature, the correct name, the correct address that matches the voter file.
It's very challenging. You would think that would be impossible for RFK Jr., but within hours of announcing his independent candidacy, his super PAC, which could do ballot access for him, raised $11 million, which is definitely not suspicious at all.
And so we're going to have to keep watching this, but we already know that if there's a Green Party candidate and a no-labels candidate on the ballot, four of the six battleground states... Doesn't RFK kind of

help us, though? Aren't we going for RFK?

We hope.

I think that that is an open... I'd rather not test the proposition.

Yeah, I'd rather not now. And I just want to say to everyone

here, you could have been at a strip club.

But we're going to talk about ballot access.

Rick's... I hear good

things about Rick's. Not my cup of tea,

but just something to think about for after the show.

This is just for anyone. What's going on

We'll be right back. Ricks I hear good things about Ricks Not my cup of tea But just something to think about For after the show This is just for anyone What's going on with Dean Phillips? He's now got former advisors to Sarah Palin, Bernie Sanders And Andrew Yang on his team Does everyone still think this is going nowhere? You either die a Bernie bro Or you live long enough to work for Dean Phillips.
That's the deal, right?

It's this guy, Jeff Weaver, who worked for Bernie.

He was pretty controversial at the time, so I don't know that I'm worried about.

I mean, hiring Andrew Yang's top guy,

Andrew Yang's candidacy was kind of based around universal basic income.

Has Dean Phillips supported that?

I don't know.

Did any of these staffers matter?

Do any of us matter? Let's not get at the premise of the entire podcast. I don't know.
I'm like, Mean Dean didn't do much for me beforehand. It's not a good sign when your top advisor has a higher name ID than you do because of his fucking wheels off YouTube rants that he gives.
I think it's not a

great idea, right? I feel like there's, it's a lot of people who wish the world wasn't as it was for different reasons. I think there are a lot of people that, that when push comes to shove, want Biden, but younger, but that has not been on offer.
And then there are people that want a Democrat. They want center left democratic policies, but from politicians, you haven't been attacked and maligned for years by Republicans.
They want someone who has not been rendered unappealing to a swath of the country, not because of anything they did, but because of a vast apparatus that makes those people seem unappealing. That's the Andrew Yang thing, right? Like, basically, you look at what Andrew Yang wants, he wants a center-left figure, but not somebody that the Joe Rogan types don't like.
Well, why don't the Joe Rogan types like them? It's not because of anything they did. It's because there's a whole machine that exists to destroy them.
And that's not the world we live in. And so basically we're fighting these kind of fantasies and narcissism and like ego trips.
You know, Joe Manchin wants to fight for the middle. He's personally responsible for the most progressive thing Joe Biden never did, as you said.
So it's all just a bunch of people kind of i think like venting anxiety and spleen and and egotism and cashing checks and cashing checks i look at that group of people and i think it only matters if he starts if dean phillips starts adopting policy positions that you can see from that group of people like it's not really a left right thing it's like a top bottom thing and if like Phillips starts being like, okay, all right. I fucking challenge you to walk down Bourbon Street right now and find a single person who knows who the fuck Dean Phillips is.
Oh, that's true. This is all ridiculous.
That's all a preposterous farce. Tim and I are doing a podcast called Top Bottom Thing.
Yeah, there it is. That's what I was thinking.
When Tim said that, I was like, I'm thinking if he went anti-establishment,

anti-war, populist, anti-DC,

but I don't think Dean Phillips has it in him to do that.

Gelato magnate Dean Phillips?

But it's also, it's 2023,

people reinvent themselves all the time,

and if you see Jeff Weaver there and an Andrew Yang person,

you kind of think maybe that's where they're going.

Sure.

That's all I'm thinking. Tim, it's also possible that, just to close this out, a lot of voters just might stay home.
Right. They might not go for third party.
They might not go for third party candidate, independent candidate. They might just say, I'm not voting at all.
Any thoughts on that? I'm concerned about this. So young progress, young progressives don't listen to the bullwarks.
I asked you if I could talk about this here in the hubs that I could reach some of them some because i was i was having trouble sleeping the other night i was on tiktok and i had these like several angry people in their dorm room talking about the moral obligation to vote for cornell west was served to me by the chinese and this this was giving me some concerns and i started like hyperventilating into a paper bag and i was like is this really happening and and so i just do we have a camera i can look into um no hopefully not you're getting pointed out yeah hey hey so i've spent spending the week with steve bannon uh young young progressives who don't think that there's a difference between joe biden and donald trump and here's here was his plan for the next term uh he wants to uh release all of the january 6 prisoners and let every uh maga domestic terrorists know that they will get pardoned no matter what they do. So that's a little concerning.
He wants to deport 10 million people and bring back the kids in cages. He wants to restart putting people back into Guantanamo.
He wants to indict his political opponents. And he wants to do mass firings to the federal government.
So that's not a great policy agenda. No.
You know what? You know what? What's that? The MAGA policy agenda. What's that? It's from the river to the CPAP machine.
Jesus Christ. Oh, my God.
Oh, my God. So it should be something that you should be alarmed about.
Bye, everybody. Young progressive.
I can't even. Welcome to the Bulwark, John Lovett.
So anyway, young TikTokers, if you want to protest Joe Biden, that's fine. If you want to vape, if you want to be pansexual, all that's great.
But please, for the love of God, do not put these fucking lunatics back in there. I'm very concerned about it.
I'm very concerned. It's really like, it's not about sticking it to Joe Biden.
He's not going to care that way. It's about hurting yourself.
It's about hurting the country. Every one of us is going to have to live with the consequences of a second Trump.
There's stated policies like, we're going after trans people. We're going after immigrants, we're going after political opponents.
I think the five of us would count

despite us being cis white guys.

And so we're maybe not at the top of the list.

And then we're going to let the

kind of MAGA domestic terrorists roam free.

That's a concerning kind of combination

for me. That's a concerning combination.
This is not

the most important part, but far be it for me to

give communications advice to the one-time

top message guy in the Republican Party.

But I would offer...

I'm sorry.

Donald Trump only beat us by 46 points.

I just feel like I would have offered

some real context to. I spent the week

with Steve Bannon before telling that story.

Was it Palm Springs

or was it a cruise?

I was in the basement of the Breitbart Embassy

and then we went to Vegas together.

We went to Vegas together.

It was interesting. There's a single

mega Vegas hotel now. We'll talk about it back then.

Thank you. In the basement of the Breitbart embassy and then going to Vegas together.
Going to Vegas together.

It was interesting.

There's a single mega Vegas hotel now.

We'll talk about it back to you. The Trump Hotel?

No, not the Trump Hotel.

Tommy's a big war room listener.

He was live.

You didn't see me?

No, I didn't see you.

Sorry.

We don't want a second Trump turn.

That's the moral of the story.

When we come back, Devante Lewis.

He's awesome.

Joining us now is Louisiana Public Service Commissioner

and a rising star in Louisiana politics, Devante Lewis.

Thank you for being here. Devante Lewis.
Nice to meet you. We've been hanging out for about an hour backstage.
We actually know each other now. We're friends.
We're best friends. So the thing about Devante is he's a young elected official, very impressive person to be doing this job at his age.
But he got into politics like 20 years ago. He was organizing for Barack Obama in high school.
You ran for school board at age 18. What got you at like 17 years old to think like, I got to get involved in politics? What started all this well the craziest thing is my grandfather uh forced me when I was like 15 to watch one hour of the news every day and so one day it was 2004 was Barack's keynote address to the Democratic National Convention in Boston and And something after that, I was like,

oh, I got to get involved. And so after that, I just felt like I needed to do something in my community.
So I got involved, did a lot of stuff. And then running for office, a lot of people thought I would do, but it was something never I wanted to do.
But when I ran for school board at 18, the school board president dared me to do it. He came to my AP government course and we were debating policy.
And then he stopped me and he said, well, Devontae, if you think you can do this job so well, why don't you run for office? So on graduation day, when I walked across the stage, got my high school diploma, I gave him an index card and I said, I'll see you on the trail and that's that's how i ran for office the first time i love that i so i did not know that you so you watched the o4 convention speech and that gave you like the bug that gave me the bug everything was right there we were all just in um in chicago last weekend with sort of an obama campaign reunion and the way that that community is like rippled into politics is very uh inspiring Cool. So you are now a Louisiana Public Service Commissioner.
You're one of five elected officials tasked with overseeing all the utility companies in your state. What does that job entail? And then what kind of added responsibility do you feel serving in this role in a state that has such a terrible record on environmental justice to the point where there is a region called Cancer Alley? Yeah, so the Public Service Commission, we regulate all of the public utilities.
So water, wastewater, electric, gas, sewage, pipeline, waste haulers, common carriers. We also have prison phone call rates moving truck companies tow truck companies and so my district encompasses of course here in new orleans but all through the river parishes in baton root so i have cancer alley um is the district that i represent 971 000 people here in the state of louisiana and when we talk about environmental injustice this is the area that you have to focus on in the country.
Black and brown people are 21 times more likely to be exposed to air pollution in my district. When you think about Shell, Shell is a multinational corporation.
They only have four petrochemical refinery plants in the United States. Three of them are in my district.
Wow. So when you think about environmental injustice, my district is one of the poorest in the nation, has the highest rate of industry users, but also hurricane, natural disaster prone.
And so the message that I said when I was running is that if we invest in climate justice here, not only in my district, we do it in the country because I strongly believe that we can turn America's cancer alley into America's climate answer alley if we do everything right. I like that.
So, I mean, you alluded to this. I mean, New Orleans is on the front lines when it comes to the impact from climate change no one in this room needs to be reminded what a hurricane can do to a city uh your neighbors in texas went through a terrible winter storm and a subsequent power outage that killed hundreds of people uh and tragically ruined ted cruz's vacation Sorry, Ted.
What do you think, I mean, you're an expert in this stuff, what do you think this city and this country needs to do to prepare our utilities, both to transition from where we are now to this green energy future we want to be at, but also to become more resilient in the near term, knowing that weather's getting more extreme, hotter hots, colder colds, et cetera? I mean, I think the first thing we have to do is put people over profits. I mean, let's be very clear.
Intergy has never cared about the people of Louisiana. So, I mean, but that's the important role about commissioners.
I think when we talk about the decarbonization of the United States, oftentimes we have failed to look at utilities as on the front line. We've rewarded utilities by basically making investments that profited their shareholders, their dividend owners, but not actually making our system more resilient, sustainable, reliable, and affordable.
And so I think in this moment, especially here in Louisiana, what we have to do is finally say that climate change, one, is real. So I hope Governor Landry hears that message and knows that, that I'm going to fight him every day to tell him climate change is real.
But it's also actually good for business for business i mean when you think about this the the people that are screaming for renewable energy because they're trying to showcase is actual the industrial users and so like in louisiana i think it's a an unknown fact that 60 of all the energy consumed in the state of louisiana comes from an industry user Not from a commercial user, not from a small business, not from a residential,

but from these big refineries.

And so if we're going to actually talk about the future of Louisiana,

we have to talk about energy policy.

And that's why I ran, and that's what I'm trying to do.

Right on.

Another issue that I know you focus on a lot in your campaign is

Thank you. that's what I'm trying to do.
Another issue that I know you focus on a lot in your campaign is the price of phone calls for folks in jails and prisons. And maybe there's people listening to me right now saying, what are you talking about, Tommy? And why are you asking like the utility commissioner guy about this? But can you explain the problem here and why, how it falls under your purview and what you're doing to kind of address this? Yeah.
So the Louisiana Public Service Commission, we regulate the rates that it costs for an intrastate phone call between, for those who are calling people who are incarcerated. And so when we think about this question, I mean, like Louisiana used to be the incarceration capital of the world.
We are now battling Oklahoma to be second.

I don't know if that's a great task. I mean, I don't know if I want to follow Oklahoma in anything, but I guess if we're going to beat Oklahoma at something, at least we can beat them in prison phone call rates.
But when we think about this, I just want to remind people that the average income of a person incarcerated prior to being incarcerated is around $20,000 a year. So when we talk about our average phone call rate for incarcerated families, the data showcases that a person incarcerated would spend over half of their yearly income just to communicate with their loved ones.
Who's getting paid off that? Oh, these are the sheriffs and these are the telecommunication companies. So it's profitable for them to keep people in jail? The sheriffs get a big kickback.
And so the sheriffs have been the biggest opponents. I tried to just do a study review of our prison phone call rates about four months ago, and the sheriffs called every one of my opponents.
I tried to just do a study review of our prison phone call rates about four months ago, and the sheriffs called every one of my opponents, excuse me, to talk about this issue. And so what we see is that the sheriffs get a kickback from ensuring that people cannot communicate with their loved ones, but then they want to go and talk about recidivism and they want to talk about the rising effects of crime when we know the biggest reduction of crime is simply allowing people to talk.
I think it's a human right to have human interaction. Why are we charging you to talk to your daughter or your son or your mother or your family when we incarcerate you? And so my goal and my quest is to make prison phone calls free, and we're going to keep doing that.
I mean, I imagine when you're talking to folks about this, like anyone who's had a loved one or a friend in prison gets it. But, like, there's, look, fighting for incarcerated people is not great politics, right? As we look around, right, There's a lot of people demagoguing crime and other issues.
I mean, when you talk to folks about this goal and this plan, are they, like, do you think they support what you're doing? I think some do. I mean, what I would like to remind people is that we actually need to put humanity back in the society and actually care about one another.
So you cannot talk to me about the crime in New Orleans if you don't want to talk about the effects of what Louisiana does to incarcerated people or how often we try to incarcerate somebody. And so what I like to do and the way I talk about it is ensuring that we recognize that the same way that you want to call your mother when something happens, someone incarcerated wants to do the exact same thing.
And so why should they not only be incarcerated but also suffer from the lack of seeing if their child got a great grade on their report card or if their mother had an issue or what's going on in their family? And we are literally pushing people into poverty simply to communicate with their loved ones on the outside world so when they are released that they have that connection to their family. I find it baffling that we're fighting this, but oftentimes it's just that the Louisiana sheriffs think they have a lot of power and it's time to break it.
Yeah. Yeah, it seems like keeping people kind of connected and tethered to the outside world is a big part of rehabilitation.
Oh, absolutely. I mean, I think it is extremely important, but the reason why we do it here in Louisiana is because we give our sheriffs a big pay cut for taking state prisoners.
So anytime someone is incarcerated, we do not have enough beds in the state penitentiaries. So what do we do? We send them to local jails.
They make profit off of it. So they want to keep people incarcerated because that's the way they make their money.
Terrible system. Yeah, boo that.
That's for God's sake. All right, happier subject.
So you are the first black LGBTQ person elected to any political office in Louisiana at any level.

What was it like that night, breaking that barrier? What did it feel like? And what do you think it says about the future of Louisiana politics? Well, that night, I don't really remember because there was a lot of tequila. So if anybody was at my victory party, they know exactly what we did.

But for me, it was a moment to showcase that when you center people, right, there's oftentimes in politics, everyone tells you what you should be, how you should run, what you should do. And the way that I ran my campaign was I was going to be Devante 100%.
You're going to like me, you're going to love me, you're going to vote for me, you're not. And what I think this moment showcases is when we actually speak to each other, when we speak to our common values, our common goals, our values, people will put aside their preconceived notions about you if they know you care about them.
And that's what I did.

And I think in this moment, it is showcasing that you do not have to bend to society's pressures. You can be who you want to be, live your life, and showcase that if you care about each other, we can make the world a better place.
And that's what I'm trying to do.

You can run as you is my takeaway there,

which brings me to my next question.

The Democratic Party in Louisiana has had a tough time of late.

Yeah, very tough.

Trump won the state by more than 18 points in 2020.

The recent governor's race didn't go great.

We thought we might be talking about a

runoff tonight when we scheduled this um how do you think democrats get back on their feet in

louisiana well i think democrats get back on their feet if they grow a backbone and stand up for what

they believe in i mean too often times democrats in this state are afraid of republican voters

instead of speaking when we look at the data analysis, right, a Governor Landry-elect won with less votes than Bobby Jindal did in his re-election campaign running against a no-name teacher. So that tells you there is an apathetic view in the state of Louisiana.
And I remind people all the time that the biggest voting bloc in Louisiana is not the Republican voter, it's the non-voter. So if Democrats actually talked about the issues that people cared about, instead of going and trying to be Republican light, we can win.
So I think the message for Democrats is stand up for the poor, stand up for the working poor, stand up for black and brown people, and women, people and our families and our children. And if we speak truth to power, instead of trying to chase power, we can actually get in power.
And so I think that's our message to now is to be true to the values that we hold and fight for the people that we care about instead of trying to find every single way to showcase to the Republicans that we will be a good partner to them. Because let's be very clear, they've made it an assault.
They're coming after black and brown people. They're coming after the city of New Orleans.
They're coming after LGBTQIA plus people. They are coming after what we care about.
And it's a question for the Democratic Party in the state of Louisiana. Will we stand up for the people or will we try to be Jeff Landry's friend? And I'm going to fight for the people of Louisiana.
I feel like I might have been a little more cynical about the Democratic Party's chances of winning in Louisiana before the last election day where we saw, you know, Ohio voted issue one that enshrined abortion rights into the Constitution. You've got Governor Beshear in Kentucky running strong, running on abortion access and winning that race.
Are like, were there takeaways for you guys or lessons learned about what you want to do next? I mean, I think the lessons learned is one, we have to organize and mobilize people all the time, right? I mean, we can't wait till two days before the election to start talking about democratic values, that we have to start that. I think the message that we saw across the country is that when you actually run on the platform that we care about, the people that we care about, we can win.
And so I think we got to get back to organizing and organizing is why people care about an issue, what issues they care about. The people that we care about, we can win.
And so I think we got to get back to

organizing and organizing is why people care about an issue, what issues they care about. And then mobilization is reminding them about the issues that they care about.
And so I think the takeaway for Louisiana is that now that we are pretty much at rock bottom is, I mean, I don't know how lower we can go. I don't know.
I don't know what else the Republicans can take from us

is to finally say like, is, I mean, I don't know how lower we can go. I don't know what else the Republicans can take from us

is to finally say, like, what do we have to lose?

I mean, I don't like quoting 46 minus one,

but I think he's right when he says,

what the hell do we have to lose?

Let's just fight.

I like that.

I like that.

Demonte Lewis, thank you so much for being here.

Clap it up. Thank you.
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So we just had a third Republican primary debate in Miami this week. You almost missed it.
I did, man. I listened to your podcast.
You didn't even know it was happening. Seems like the early consensus among pundits and some polls is that Nikki Haley did well, Ron DeSantis still can't smile, Vivek Ramaswamy still an insufferable asshole.
So annoying. If you didn't catch the debate, don't worry.
Neither did the frontrunner, Donald Trump. He was a few miles away at a rally where he promised to carry out the biggest deportation of immigrants in history on his first day in office.
Then he did an interview with Univision where he defended his child separation policy and again threatened to indict people who've pissed him off. Let's listen.
We have tremendous support from the, I call Hispanic, Latino. You have lots of different terms, but it all means the same thing as far as I'm concerned it's they're just great people incredible people right now you have coming through Mexico the largest group of people call it caravans that was the name that I came up with I never get credit I don't think I get credit for fake news I don't think I get credit for any of these names but I think I came up with most of them it could certainly happen in reverse what they've done is they've released the genie out of the box.
You understand that. If I happen to be president and I see somebody who's doing well and beating me very badly, I say, go down and indict them.
Mostly, that would be, you know, they would be out of business. They'd be out.
They'd be out of the election. Poor guy comes up with the best nicknames.
No one gives him credit.

Genies come out of a fucking lamp.

Yes.

Thank you.

Thank you.

At least a bottle or a bottle.

Pandora comes out of a box.

No, it's her box.

Evil comes out of the box.

Trump's campaign.

He's running again.

There's a buried lead there.

It's like if someone's going to come in and they're going to run against me,

he can't run again.

It's a good point.

I was thinking about that.

Who's running where?

Can he?

Yeah, I was going to come in and they're going to run against me, he can't run again. It's a good point.
I was thinking about that. Who's running where? I also think he lives in a kind of permanent narcissism present.
In his mind when he thinks about a grievance, it's happening again. Someone running against me.
He's always living inside of it. It's a nightmare space.
That's why he was so good on Twitter. It is

interesting. They, of course, asked the campaign

what about the fact that

Donald Trump just said he was going to indict

people who he doesn't like as

president. And they said, oh, he's just

throwing out a hypothetical. That's what the

campaign said. But they didn't rule out that he would

do that. Bad hypothetical.
Despite

Nikki Haley's blockbuster debate

performance, the 538 polling average has Trump ahead by 42 points nationally. 42 points.
And the national polls, they don't matter. 28 points in Iowa.
30 points in New Hampshire. 30 points in South Carolina.
Those are the averages right now. We are just about two months out from Iowa.
Here is the question.

Is the Republican primary already over?

We are going to try something a little different and have our own debate about this question.

We're going to split into two teams,

make our best case,

and hopefully leave the stage without a Nikki Vivek moment.

So, arguing that for all intents and purposes

the Republican primary is over will be me and Tim Arguing that polls don't vote people do Is going to be Dan and Tommy What was that shit? And moderating this debate I'm going to fucking moderate So So now before we begin I want to poll the audience, because we're going to poll again at the end.

Let's understand where we're at as a team, what we're up against here.

If you believe the Republican primary is for all intents and purposes over, please applaud.

If you believe that this is America and anything can happen, applaud.

That's what I'm talking about.

I'd say that was a lot of applause for Trump to start.

All right, so that's where we're at to begin.

To make the case that this primary is not yet over, Tommy, why don't you kick us off? Thanks, John. I'm a data-driven guy.
You know what I mean? People at Crooked Media, they come to me, they're like, Tommy, can I get some facts? So I got some facts. Because facts, they don't care about your feelings, Tim.
And so I want you to think about three numbers. The first is the number 17.
that is the number of points that Dukakis was ahead of George H.W. Bush in the summer of 1988.
You know who won that race? Bush by eight. Fact number two.
Number number two. What's 17 plus eight? 16.
That's how many points John McCain, Tim's old boss, was behind Rudy Giuliani in 2007. He was also losing to Fred fucking Thompson.
You know who was a Democratic nominee? John McCain. My last number for you guys.
That's what I meant. He was the Republican nominee for president.
The last number for you all, the number 303. That is the number of electoral votes that Harry Truman won in 1948 when people like Tim and John were saying Dewey defeats Truman.
They were putting it on the front of newspapers. And so here's what I'm trying to tell you guys.
This race is consolidating before our very eyes. Did you watch the debate the other night? Tim Scott basically quit the campaign on stage.
That is true. I'll give you that.
He gave up to go be with his girlfriend. Oh, my God.
We didn't talk about Tim Scott's girlfriend tonight. Vivek Ramaswamy annoyed the 3% of voters he had left.
Chris Christie is running out of gas. Ron DeSantis is a high-heeled joke.
So, here's what's going to happen. Nikki Haley is going to exceed expectations in Iowa.
Then she's going to go to New Hampshire, get all the never-Trump vote, and get the unaffiliated voters because in New Hampshire it's like a pseudo-open primary and you can get folks from the other side. Then she goes to her home state.
And she's going to seal the deal. And win South Carolina.
Now these guys are snarling at me. Because they.
Very polite so far. You know.
Duke Favreau and Lord Miller over here. They love a coronation.
You know what I mean? When Dan and I were watching Rocky and Miracle,

they were watching The King's Speech.

I'm sorry, but you're going to have to wrap it up.

Downton Abbey.

And so the last time I checked,

we live in the United States of America.

Oh, God.

And anything is possible,

and we can beat Donald Trump.

All right.

Audience, audience, audience, audience.

We'd like to hear from the candidates.

John, you want to go next?

I mean.

Tim's got his mic on like a trigger.

Yeah, no, no.

I'll just respond to my neocon friend, Tommy.

He's a big Nikki Haley fan.

Look.

You're scum.

Wow. Hey, hey,

hey, hey, hey, hey.

Get my name out of your voice.

Tough. Want that one

back. Majority of

Republican primary voters like Donald Trump.

They liked his presidency.

They believe he won the last election.

They don't care about his 91 felony counts They think he can easily beat Joe Biden Why would Republican voters choose someone else at this point? Millions of dollars have already been spent on advertisements Millions of people have watched these boring fuckers Across three debates now Huge organizations have been set up in the early states by these campaigns. The race

has barely moved.

He is 40-something points ahead,

30 points ahead in the early states.

A few Republican candidates have made

the case to voters that Donald Trump

is a threat to democracy. Those

candidates are polling in last place.

Mike Pence has dropped out.

The last candidate with a lead

this big was George

W. Bush in 2000.

How did he do? He went on to win all but

Thank you. Mike Pence has dropped out.
The last candidate with a lead this big was George W. Bush in 2000.

How did he do?

He went on to win all but seven states.

And at the time, George W. Bush hadn't been president already.

Donald Trump has been president already.

He is beloved by the Republican base.

And they think he won the last election.

He's still Ohio. It's over.

It's over.

Wow.

Powerful words.

Dan? I'm going to make three points here. First, I don't really appreciate Jon Favreau's don't wet the bed 2016 type messaging here.
Two, in the world that anything is possible, Donald Trump's a 77-year-old. Hold on, do you have video of John before the 2016 campaign and what he said? Because if so, if you put that up on screen, I'll switch to it.
That would have been good. That has been erased from the internet.
Unfortunately not. Point number two, Donald Trump's a 77-year-old obese man with the diet of a college freshman at 2 a.m.
Anything is possible. Nothing is over with Donald Trump in this race.
Death is a possibility. Point number three.
No, no, no. Shame on.
No. You're applauding possibilities.
We're cheering for actuarial tables. Being accurate.
That's it. Point number three, and I know this one is close to Tim Miller's heart Is that Donald Trump has been running for the Republican primary For a combined between 2016 and 2020 For over two years In that time He has never once Faced a sustained Strategic attack All of the candidates around him have been attacking each other

and hopes to be second.

So it is an untested proposition.

And while I may not share

Tommy's enthusiasm for Nikki Haley,

I do think that there is a world

where there is a world

where Nikki Haley surges,

Ron DeSantis.

What? They're anti-Trump, Dan. No one knows what they're sure.
Hey, you promoted that I was going to be here. There are going to be at least three Neocons out there in the audience.
Originally, the Neocons only had one seat, and they took a second, and then they took a third. so we're Nikki Haley surges

Ron DeSantis surges

which takes some from Trump because most of Trump's second choice voters are Ron DeSantis. Nikki Haley, as Tommy said, beats expectations in Iowa.
Sure did. Wins in New Hampshire, wins in South Carolina, and there we go.
So, Tim, your name was mentioned. Care to respond? I mean, Tommy's first number was 17, and Donald Trump's winning by 42.
So that's the first place I'd start. Devastating.
I have two points. First is the name that Tommy mentioned, which I agree with, which would be the plausible person that could beat him, I guess, in a total fantasy world

where we're all doing mushrooms together,

would be Nikki Haley.

And Tommy Vitor just endorsed her,

officially ending her campaign.

So that's kind of a big problem.

The people in this room like Nikki Haley,

let me tell you, I don't think that's a good sign for her

in the Republican primary.

That was Chris Christie's problem.

Okay.

All right. But I'd like to close with telling you about a town called Lafayette.
Do we have anybody here from Lafayette? What are you, fucking Bill Clinton? What is this? Yeah. I had to visit Lafayette.
Oh my god. I had to visit Lafayette a couple months ago.
Get to the sentence about the fucking politics. Thank you, Tom Friedman.
I was in the Cajun Dome, and there was a GOP meeting there. It was the day after the first debate.
And a lady, kind of with an accent, comes on stage, and she was like, y'all, who do you think won the first debate? And two people in the crowd go, Trump. And then everybody goes, Trump, Trump, Trump.
You guys might not recall that Trump did not attend the first debate. And after this meeting, I went out into the lobby and I started interviewing people.
And I was like, who are you for in the primary? Trump. And I found a young person.
It looked like they went to college in Lafayette. And I was like, who are and he looks around and he goes well we're a trump party i was like yeah he's like so i'm for trump then the girl next to him goes but i like nicky haley and she whispers and i was like but who are you gonna vote for and she goes well trump and so in all of your fantasy plans where nicky haley overperforms and finishes fourth in iowa and then second new hampshire and she wins south South Carolina.
Then she has to come to Louisiana. And the vote will go to Lafayette.
And the last Louisiana poll had Donald Trump 75, Ron DeSantis 8, Nikki Haley 2. Well, that's...
I got a fourth number. It was a powerful...
Oh, zero. The number of times you won Iowa, pal.
It's getting dirty. Okay.
We finished. Moderator, take control.
We finished a gentleman six. I was trying to be one of those moderators that disappears and not make it about myself.
But by the way, not my style. But you can't play that role that well.
Yeah, not my style. Huge mistake.
Back to me. Dan, if Trump is winning by a lot of points, a lot of points, but he always tends to be around 50, sometimes a little bit over, sometimes a little bit under.
What is your argument that if let's say we lived in a world where a bunch of people dropped out because they've been embarrassing themselves? Tim Scott goes off to just young love, pick picnics and walks in the park, merry-go-rounds and so forth. Ron DeSantis goes back into his sort of ooze cave or whatever he does at night.
But anyway, you end up with just Nikki Haley. Do you really believe that if the...
Ron DeSantis is people like Trump. If Ron DeSantis leaves, they're for Trump.
That's what I was going to's what i would like to ask the question to john because i know i because i know how you'll answer but uh but but you really don't you don't believe that there could be a anti-trump majority that could align behind one alternative because there there is all the data suggests there is no anti-trump majority in the republican party there is about 30% of Republican voters on a good day who do not like Donald Trump. We're ready to move on.
Then there's another third who love Donald Trump but are willing to consider other options. And then there is the Trump base, right? It's one of the options that they're willing to consider an Indian woman.
That's right. Who is, who they think is a neocon DC, even though she hasn't served in DC, but like served at the UN, right? Like you can actually see this now.
For Donald Trump. Right.
You can actually see this now with Vivek, right? Who is attacked her at the debate. And then after the debate started doing the whole, like she made a bunch of money on the board at Boeing like they're gonna now do to Haley Vivek Trump the MAGA world what they did to DeSantis establishment shill DC politician rhino all this bullshit Trump is the one true god like they'll just turn it on Nikki and will she could she consolidate the like the bulw, for sure.
But like, that's not enough to win a Republican primary at this point. If only, if only.
Tim, doesn't there, isn't there some weakness in the fact that Donald Trump, despite his popularity among Republicans, never can seem to get that much higher than 50% exactly? That that's sort of where his ceiling, does that tell you anything? No. Why not? I mean, it's still pretty good.
I mean, he's winning by 42. That's kind of a lot.
I don't know. But isn't some share of the people that are in that 50% people that would be open to an alternative? Well, sure.
Yeah, but they like him. So it's not as if in his popularity rating, this is the thing, this is what everybody wishes, right? And I wish it.
I would love for this to be the case. But it's like, if you ask Republican voters, do you have a favorable opinion of Donald Trump? His number is well over 50.
It's like 80 or 85. Yeah, right.
So they like him. So there's a percentage of people that like, I like him.
I like the cut of his jib. You know, I like the whole whale shtick that he does.
But like, maybe I'd consider. But doesn't that tell you that there's the people that like him that aren't for him, the people that love him that would bleed and die for him and have, and then there's a chunk of people that are worried about hostages, as you call them.
But there is a chunk of his support, right? That are people who like him, want to be president, but might have electability concerns, might have chaos concerns. Right.
Is that wrong? Am I wrong about that? I think they had those concerns at one point, but at this point, they're consolidating around him. And you just have to look at the numbers.
Can I have a rebuttal? Yes, sure. OK, first, do you know who's more popular among Republican voters than Donald Trump? No one.
Ron DeSantis. Higher favorability rating in Iowa and New Hampshire.
Point number one.

Why are they choosing him then? Can you please stop interrupting?

Vivek.

It's over there.

Two, no one has made

an argument against Trump.

There has not been negative ads

run against Trump. Not in 2016.

Not in 2020.

They backfire. The negative ads backfire.
These people are in a cult. I'm going to get control.
I will turn off your microphone. Dan is speaking.
This debate should have been moderated by Tucker Carlson, Elon Musk, and Joe Rogan. The last time I checked, we live in America, and you don't cut Dan off.
What are you applauding? Shame on all of you for doing this in New Orleans. Do you even believe this? Eventually, you all are going to vote.
I'm going to say you have two choices. You can vote for Donald Trump or the American ideal possibility.
Donald Trump is spending a lot of his time, not in Iowa, but in a courtroom. Can you make an argument that given that your belief that nothing is over till election day, do you think that there's a possibility that these indictments start to have an impact and start to shift people towards an alternative? Shut up, Tim.
Shut the fuck up. All I see is possibility.
And when you look at, because we live in America, and the Iowa electorate is a very intensely conservative, Christian, evangelical community. The very popular governor of Iowa, Kim Reynolds, just endorsed Ron DeSantis.
So yeah, there's a lot of room to run. I didn't see that news.
Tim is laughing at you like he's salt of the earth. He's not a gay libertarian from Oakland.
But he gets what Iowa's all about. Shut up, Tim.
In the Falls, okay? Let's not forget that in 2016, Ted Cruz beat Donald Trump in Iowa. And if Ted Cruz can beat someone in Iowa, anyone can beat fucking Donald Trump in Iowa.
That's right, Dan. Yeah.
Unfortunately, we're just about out of time. before we go let's see everybody feel good about their arguments? I just want to say that if Donald Trump did die I don't think it would be I'm just saying if that happened I don't think it would be out of the question that the Republican Party would still nominate the corpse of Donald Trump.
From the corpse. And I think the think the voters would go to the hold and they would...
Or Junior.

Or Junior.

Win-win, my friend.

Hold on.

Hold on.

No, no, no.

If Don died, Junior,

Junior would clearly

be the favorite

if he died.

Clearly.

Yeah.

Well, on that note,

where we've landed

at this debate

is Donald Trump

more powerful

than death itself. Surprising to us as our final point, obviously.
But Donald Trump moving sands up through the hourglass. Listen, it's time to vote.
If you now believe the Republican primaries over and Trump will win, please applaud. If you believe that this is America and nothing is over till it's over.
I'm prepared to tell you what happened tonight. This is why Donald Trump won in 2016.
The people cannot be trusted. Because as Tim has clocked, this debate has been won by Dan and Tommy.

Wow.

Wasn't even close.

I'm sorry.

I've hired Sidney Powell.

We are going to challenge this.

Two things that aren't dead,

Donald Trump and persuasion.

We'll be right back.

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Please welcome to the stage, your representative, Mandy Landry.

First, I want to apologize for having you do this interview immediately after whatever that was.

And also, this is what happens when you have a show on a Friday night in New Orleans.

So I want to start, you're obviously very popular in this crowd.

They literally just saw my face all over Uptown for six months. Whatever it was, it worked.
You are a progressive in a very Republican state. What is that like, and what keeps you going, fighting for progressive values in this world? So first of all, I have

a unicorn district. That's what I call it.
They are fully supportive. We have the same views.
And

part of that reason is when I ran in 2019, I said, I'm going to run as myself. These are my views.

If the district doesn't want it, I'm going to go on with my life. And before I did that, I pulled.

I knew they were progressive. 90% pro-choice, 90% gun safety, 90% legalized weed, probably 99 by now.
And the more I do that and talk about that, people come out of the woodwork, especially in the rural areas. A lot of younger LGBT people.
I hear from trans members now because of last year. And I know that there are people out there who look to Devante and me and they said, we need more of you.
Keep talking. You're giving us some hope.
And this last election, they came out in force for me. Half this audience, probably.
Tommy asked Devante about this, but I'm going to ask you as well. 2023 was a great election year for Democrats all across the country.
We reelected the governor of Kentucky. Abortion rights became part of the Constitution in Ohio, expanded the legislatures in Virginia and New Jersey.
Louisiana was a very stark difference, right? With most of the statewide candidates not getting the 30%, as Tommy mentioned, we originally scheduled the show thinking it would be happening during a gubernatorial runoff. Maybe we were naive, but here we are.
And what is your take on what happened in this state that makes it different from what's happening ever? Even in Mississippi, where we didn't win the gubernatorial race, Brandon Pressley, the Democrat, outperformed expectations, came closer than previous Democrats had come. So what's happening here in Louisiana? So I think there are – I think – I was thinking about this since we talked about it.
I think it's a combination of national and local national being from my point of view, being down here, the national democratic party just left red States for dead. Like there's been no investment.
Um, they just kind of left us there. I, I, when I tried both times to get help from national pro-choice organizations, they're like, you're tier four.
I said, well, I'm going to be tier seven if you don't help. So I think there's been no investment in Presley's near win might help us all.
But from a local level, our state party is still run by old school people. It's a clique, patronage system.
You have to kiss the ring. You have to be part of the group.
And they don't want people who come in through the side door like Devante and me. They want to pick the people so they control you.
And if you had told me that existed before I won, I would not have believed you. There's a deep state here for sure.
But they're getting worried. They're really getting worried because they see people like this who are so mad about it, and we're growing.
Abortion was the issue that drove Democratic success in 2022, drove Democratic success in 2023. It's a little more complicated here for the Democratic Party.
I know it's an issue you worked on before you got into politics. You talk a little bit about how maybe the party has mishandled the issue and what can be done here to sort of galvanize what we know to be a pro-choice majority, not just in blue states, but in red states like Louisiana.
Yeah. So what you're describing is the larger argument in the state Democratic Party that for a while now they've said we need to go for the moderate or the conservative whites.
And then some of the rest of us in cities were like, no, your progressives are energized. They want to do stuff.
Those conservative white voters are gone. There are Trump voters.
The few of us or the few who remain are not going anywhere either. and it is difficult here.
I mean, our new Speaker of the House was one of the architects of the abortion situation here. We were ground zero for abortion for 40 years.
They tested everything here. But what we've seen since last year in polling down here is that has started to shift, even in Louisiana.
When it finally happened, people were like, oh, shit. Like, wait a minute.
If my wife is dying, I can't bring her to the hospital. They're going to tell us to wait in the parking lot, which has happened.
People were horrified that there was no rape and incest exception. So we're going to be behind on that, but it is happening everywhere.
And what role did the outgoing Democratic governor's position on abortion have? Do you think that dampened enthusiasm among Democrats? Am I about to get you in trouble with this? He endorsed against me in this election, which pissed off everyone in this room. Okay, we're going to get to that.
It was very frustrating because both times he ran against horrible Republicans. And it was very, very frustrating to go all out.
I mean, I volunteered for him. Everyone in here probably helped him because he was a good person.
He was smart. He was going to do Medicaid expansion, but he loved guns and hated, you know, reproductive rights.
So it was very hard. And we thought maybe he would soften

over the time. He gave the impression that maybe it was going to be about a personal choice.
And

instead, he signed the trigger ban last year. He did not have to sign it.
It still would have

became law. And the letter he put out was full of lies.
And yours truly responded to it publicly.

And he didn't have to do that. He could have been more compassionate about it.
And do you think that dampened enthusiasm among Democratic voters? I think it just made people more deflated, even like, oh, this is happening and he can't even throw us a bone by saying it's too far. And we knew it was happening.
I still refuse to believe it until the day it happened. But it was a part of the last session we had um another member who wanted to charge women who had an abortion with murder and that finally woke up my colleagues and they said oh my god we're going to be so embarrassed if we do this that's what they care about and as you mentioned the democratic government endorsed your opponent you have left the democratic the Democratic Party to become an independent, come back.
What is that? A couple questions on that. One, do you think perhaps it was in an election where most Democrats did not get 30% of the vote? It was a good use of the Democratic governor's time to endorse your opponent.
And what made you leave as an independent, become an independent, and then come back? I mean, those two questions are together, almost the same question. It was him, it was the congressman, it was the former senator, and they had this little girl who was in the clique and wanted to join and all this money, and I was a pain in the butt, and getting popular and saying things publicly.
I think part of the reason he did that is I'm mouthy. I've been responsive to him about abortion.
I've talked back to him publicly about abortion. He cut pandemic unemployment a month early.
A quarter billion dollars he left on the table, and it was a month before Hurricane Ida, and I was part of the lawsuit that sued him. So a lot of things he did not like.
And yeah, they spent their time, all of them. I mean, the congressman was on Claiborne waving signs for the 27-year-old running against me.
Because they didn't care. They already knew Sean was not going to win.
Now I look back on it. Did they know he wasn't even going to make a runoff? They just left that.
He's a good man. And they just left him with no help, nothing.
And talk a little bit about the decision becoming independent and then come back. What brought you back? My friends and House Democratic leadership, they said, we want you to come back.
We're going to help you. And it's going to be extremely hard if you don't come back.
And with House Democratic leadership, it was before session. And they said, you do a lot.
Like, we need you back.

I do a lot of policy. And they wanted me to come back.
But leaving was similar to everything I've talked about. I mean, my party worked against me last year when I ran.
The state Democratic chair did it. She's a whole other story.
Will you tell that story here? I've said it many times publicly. She's incompetent.
everyone in here is very familiar with what's been going on negligent, she early this year decided she might want to run for governor and she did this weird commercial she didn't even say she was a democrat and then she shot a clay pigeon, it was weird she hasn't raised any money she didn't recruit any candidates although apparently she helped recruit the person who ran against me. She helped recruit a candidate who ran against someone else she doesn't like.
It's just provincial patronage politics. But that's kind of what happened last year.
And I was like, well, I should. There was other things, too.
They did stuff to Devante. Gary Chambers got screwed.
Everyone here loves Gary Gary too. There was just a lot that happened.
We love Gary. Is there an effort to try to retake the party apparatus? We've seen this happen in other states around the country where there's been sort of this atrophied establishment, ineffective party apparatus being taken over by the sort of younger activists that happened on Brock.
I was elected a lot of people who worked for Bernie Sanders did it in other states. What's happening here? Yes, it has started and we have a lot of faith in it.
After what happened to Sean and then, you know, a lot of your liberals and progressives around the state were watching my race because there were hardly any races around the state and got mad about it and started saying, what can we do? What can we do? So our Democratic State Central Committee, which is the, I call it the legislature of the state committee, of the state party, those elections are up when our presidential primary is in March, I think. And so we'll be voting on those members.
There's 210, so two for every House district. And then they vote for the chair and the executive board.
So there's been a lot of organizing and talking, and people who've been around for a while say, look, four of you don't run, because if the bad guys run one and we run four, you won't win. And so it's people who are having to learn campaigns in the process, and I think we'll do pretty well, because we came pretty close the last chair election, but we need a lot more people organized and focused on it.
And I think we can do that. But it's going to be this is gonna be a decade of growing.
You know, as Devante said, in his conversation with Tommy, like this is, we've hit rock bottom here, right? Like, that's what this election was. Talk a little bit about the path back, right? You say it's a decade, right? It's are not exactly the same, but we've seen progress in states like Georgia where there was a decade of organizing that brought the Democratic Party back, was able to win statewide elections.
A lot's changed in politics, but it wasn't that long ago that Louisiana had two Democratic senators, Democratic governors a long time. What do you see as the path back as long as it may be? Like, what should the obviously very enthusiastic progressives in this room hold on to for hope as we move forward here? How do we get there? Basically, what Republicans did for decades is go into some of these areas, drop $10,000 on a school board race, $40,000 on parish president in the middle of nowhere.
There's towns, little towns that the mayor is the mayor of 500 people. We saw Republicans build their bench for decades, and then those people became congressmen and governors, and they went to the Senate.
We can do that. Races are outside of, well, outside of mine.
Races in Louisiana, in the rural areas, are totally cheap and affordable, and we can start doing that because there's been none so far. We have a lot of active people who want to do more.
We just don't have any sort of structure on the ground. And that is not expensive, but it takes a while.
And I think there's a lot more enthusiasm now after we saw what happened here. And we were all looking at Mississippi very closely.
And that was amazing what he did.

So you mentioned the National Party has abandoned Louisiana and a lot of red states, right?

And even in Mississippi, Brandon Presley, because of the governor's race, was quasi-competitive, at least for a while, got some assistance from the Democratic Government Association.

If the DNC folks here, the Democratic money folks were here, what would you say to them to get them to invest in Louisiana? Help us start on the ground with some of these small races. We need to start early for recruiting.
We need organizers, young people, retired people, union members. But we need to come up with a plan and we need them to help us come up with a plan.
We don't have that many people here, although we have Linda Woolard in the audience, who has mentored so many of us, but we need 50 Lindas to get on the ground and teach people, and I think they can provide that to us, because once they teach a few of us, we'll have a few more, and we really need to go in the far-flung areas and tell people we're here and just tell them what the elected positions even are in those areas. And it's largely about motivating the people who do not vote, right? Yeah.
And we have, what do we have in the state? 26, 27% who are no party. We still have some Democrats, the legacy ones that basically vote Republican, but that's a lot of it.
Our turnout is always low. We have the off year state elections, which from what I understand are sort of made that way or, um, on purpose, design that way on purpose.
Yeah. I hear it.
It's not an accident. It's here in Mississippi.
That's a choice., yeah. But Virginia, too, which is interesting.
Just final word for the folks here. What would you say to all the people here who are maybe stung by the elections here but want to keep fighting? Well, I have heard from half of you by now.
A lot of you are interested in the DSCC, but there are other groups you can join. There's Vote, there's Step Up, there's Power Coalition, there's a lot of reproductive rights groups.
Lift Louisiana is here. There are groups out there that you, but you have to dig a little.
Like, there's not just going to be a show up and Habitat for Humanity and Build a House Day. You have to research and look around and contact people and to see, like, where you might fit and maybe be willing to go in outside areas.
This happens around the country though. And it's similar here that California and New York and the blue states are like, why do you live down there? And I said, well, why don't you move down here? Like we, we need the help.
And Tim literally did. Yeah.
I mean, he can stay, but that's similar here. And I understand it.
You have someone who doesn't quite fit in in Ruston or Monroe, and they come down to Baton Rouge or New Orleans, and it's hard to tell that person, please stay there and change your neighborhood. But that's important, too.
All right, please give it up for Manny Ledry. Thank you so much for everything you've been doing.
New Orleans, you've given us so much that is good. Jazz, beignets, the idea of getting drunk while also walking around.
Unfortunately, the can't-all-be-bangers in the Bayou State also spat out the house's new speaker and most boring-looking maniac, Mike Johnson. This week, all of us learned against our will that Johnson and his 17-year-old son are each other's so-called accountability partners.
Using an app called Covenant Eyes to monitor each other's porn intake, to review what else we've learned about Louisiana's lousiest, I've assigned each of my co-hosts their own accountability partner in a game we're calling Covenant Eyes Are Watching You. Covenant Eyes They're Watching You.
Perfect. Here's how it works.
John and Dan are one cent of accountability partners.

Tommy and Tim are another.

Each teammate must guess the other's responses to facts about Mike Johnson.

But here's the twist.

No matter what, they must not jack off.

Okay.

Oh, wow.

Dan should have the whiteboard to begin. Okay.
Oh, wow. Dan should have the whiteboard to begin.
Okay. All right.
Here's how this works. It's basically a newlywed game.
Deal with it. John.
Yes. Which of Mike Johnson's claims about himself does Dan consider the least believable? The least believable.
Dan, I'm going to read you two claims. You write the one that you believe less.
Okay? Claim A, that he and his wife have no bank accounts with more than $5,000 in it. What? Even though he makes $223,000 a year and she works.
And lives in Shreveport. Claim B, that he can't even remember his many comments

about how homosexuality

should be criminalized

and that he genuinely loves

all people regardless

of their lifestyle choices.

Which claim do you find

less believable?

Don't make sure John can't see.

Dan is writing it down.

All right, John,

which do you think?

What do you think Dan

finds less plausible?

The things he said about gay people.

That is correct.

Bigoted claims.

Bigoted claims.

One point to John and Dan.

I know my accountability partner.

Love it.

Can we hear this song one more time?

In a game we're calling Covenant Eyes Are Watching You.

Covenant Eyes, they're watching you. Can we explain the origin of that song? Here's what happened.
Last night, I did what I always do when I have an important show the next day and I'm on an airplane. I had an edible and two drinks.
And that's where my best ideas happen. And so I sent a note to this wonderful production team saying,

we should make this game called Covenant Eyes Are Watching You, and people need to sing into their iPhone, Private Eyes Are Watching You by Hall & Oates, but replace the private with Covenant. Then today I received a phone call, and the phone call was, we can't do that because of copyright law.
And I said, fuck that. And then Olivia and Ben

and Ari and Elijah went into a

bathroom. And Phoebe.
And Phoebe was there.

Phoebe was in the mix.

And they formed a chorus

and they got on key and they got

on pitch and they got on beat

and they made this beautiful work.

I would just say, as a legal

strategy, saying that someone warned you about a legal violation

and then announcing to a crowd, fuck that,

it's not a good move.

We'll cut that part.

We'll cut that.

We'll be adding that out of the pod.

No lawyers here, right?

Oh, no, Hall and Oates are sending me

cease and desist letters.

What will I ever do if both Hall and Oates are mad at me?

Will I get the...

Unbelievable. Tim and get...
Unbelievable.

Tim and Tom.

Yeah.

All right, Tommy, I have before me two...

Tim should have the whiteboard to begin, sorry.

Tommy, I have before me two god-awful Mike Johnson quotes from 2004.

Okay.

Which one makes Tim want to make out with his husband right in front of him? All right. Right in front of Mike? Right in front of Mike.
Okay. Which...
Right. Quote A.
Did you write this question after the edible? This was written by a team. Quote A.
Homosexual relationships are inherently unnatural and the studies clearly show are ultimately harmful and costly for everyone. Or quote B.
Experts project that homosexual marriage is the dark harbinger of chaos and sexual anarchy that could doom even the strongest republic. Okay.

Let me know when you're done, Tim.

I'm finished.

I suspect... I suspect Tyler might agree with B,

so I'm going to go with A.

See, this is why

Tyler is actually my accountability partner.

And if Tommy had my phone,

it would shock the conscience.

B, Dark Harbinger.

Dark Harbinger, very sexy.

Wow.

Dan, which of the following real blog posts

on the Covenant Eyes website

would John be most eager to read?

Post A, what does the Bible say about masturbation?

Or post B, when Jesus used technology.

Which is the, what's getting the click?

I mean, to be honest,

offline John would never read a blog post, but.

Yeah, all right.

He's still on his phone at the urinal.

It's not cured quite yet.

Once in a while, if there's a good tweet.

Huh. I would say A, masturbation.

A, masturbation.

That's correct.

That's the one John wants to know more about.

The fun fact.

According to this game.

The technology referenced in the blog post is a towel and a basin full of water,

which seems to go back to post A. Tim, which item on Mike Johnson's dog diaper of a resume does Tommy find most worrying? Which is more worrying? A, the time he played a leading role in efforts to overturn the 2020 election, or B, the time he tried to make Kentucky taxpayers pay for the Ark Encounter creationist theme park, including dinosaurs riding on a life-size Noah Ark.
That's really hard. What does Tommy...
Really hard. ...find more worrying? Okay.
I know about what you find really hard, just for accountability partners. Because they're accountability partners your answer Tim? What's your answer Tim? My answer is A I went with B Listen if you think there's a fucking dinosaur on the ark That's way worse The end of democracy Dinosaurs on the ark The dinosaurs aren't in the Bible.
We talked about that.

Well, you know what that sound means.

It's time for the lightning round.

Oh, boy.

I'm going to ask a question.

The first team to answer correctly wins a point plus a string.

Oh, no, we're not doing that.

That's it.

They win a point.

There is still no masturbating.

Here we go.

Call it out if you know it.

Johnson is the least experienced house speaker in 140 years because he's only served how many terms? Three. Incorrect.
He's now in his fourth term. Shit.
Does Mike Johnson blame abortion or the teaching of evolution for school shootings? Evolution. You're both right.
It's both. Points in both directions.
We're calling that a tie. I have the quotes the quotes here but who cares what is the name of the podcast that mike and kelly johnson co-host where they present thoughtful analysis of hot topics and current events from a christian perspective the next level not enough people clapped for that to my point that you should change the name of that yeah we Yeah, we really do need to change the name.
What the fuck does the next level mean?

It doesn't mean a goddamn thing.

Next level.

I can never.

I listen to it.

I can never remember how to fucking find it on my own goddamn phone.

Change the name.

It was a crooked media podcast.

It was a much better name.

It was a superhero podcast.

It'd be singing Hall and Oates theme.

It'd be much better.

You're right.

JBL canceled.

The correct answer is truth be told.

Bonus point. How many episodes are there? There's like 14.
Zero. They've all been erased.
69. Nice.
Is that right? That's not right. What did John...
It can't be true. Mike Johnson, a man who disclosed no assets on his annual financial disclosure report required to federal lawmakers, he had no bank accounts with more than $1,000 personally, and his wife and his wife have no bank accounts in total of more than $5,000.
How much does he make a year? $22,000. You got it.
Point to Tommy. He has been thinking about running for Congress.
How much am I going to make four minutes ago? You got to listen. You got to listen.
What kind of pay cut do I got to take for the record. He used to, he used to make 174, I believe, but made another 30 doing what? Can we speak? No, no, no.
He got another 30. He was doing, uh, giving people advice, uh, in there.
It was like family advice. Can they? He was teaching online courses for Liberty fucking university.
No, he also, his wife gives people like Christian counseling.

Yes, yes.

And that's another piece of income that they have.

Mike Johnson's wife, Kelly,

compared homosexuality to which two things

on her now-removed website?

Bestiality.

Correct.

One more.

Oh, incest?

No, incest.

It's incest.

Nice, Tim.

Nailed it.

Yeah. Thanks, Tim.
Nailed it. Yeah.
Way to go. Thanks, baby.
A way to go from the crowd. Go Tigers.
Go fucking Tigers. Good pander.
Last question. What did Johnson once suggest was to blame for the fall of Rome? Gay sex.
Gay sex. Yeah, was gay sex some credit to the fall of rome to not only the deprivation of society and the loss of morals but also to the rampant homosexual behavior that was condoned by the society thinks a lot about the roman empire and gay sex and who doesn't i know i do and and i gotta say man you know you you guys, Tommy did great on the debate.
Thanks. As did Dan.
John and Dan won this game. Yeah, we did.
Tim, you're walking home with you. You shot the moon on the games tonight.
And that's Covenant Eyes are watching you. Covenant Eyes, they're watching you.
Wow. That's our show for tonight.
Thank you, Devante Lewis. Thank you, Mandy Landry.
Thanks, Tim Miller. Thanks, New Orleans.
Hot Save America is a Crooked Media production. Our producers are Olivia Martinez and David Toledo.
Our associate producer is Farrah Safari, writing support from Hallie Kiefer. Reed Churlin is our executive producer.
The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan Cantor is our sound engineer, with audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis.
Madeline Herringer is our head of news and programming. Matt DeGroat is our head of production.
Andy Taft is our executive assistant. Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Haley Jones, Mia Kelman, David Tolles, Kirill Pellaviv, and Molly Lobel.
Subscribe to Pod Save America on YouTube to catch full episodes and extra video content. Find us at youtube.com slash at Pod Save America.
Finally, you can join our Friends of the Pod subscription community for ad-free episodes, exclusive content, and a great discussion on Discord.

Plus, it's a great way to get involved with Vote Save America.

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