Is this the most BRUTAL moment of the 2026 election?
00:00 Unlock unlimited free grocery delivery with PC Express Pass. Shop online and get the same low No Frills prices delivered. Get your first year of PC Express Pass for just $2.50 a month. Learn more at no frills.ca. If he was trying to lose this race, I'm not sure what he would do differently. That is just an perfectly executed political ad. Welcome to Political Actress React, where we break down political ads in media, explain what the people behind them are trying to accomplish,
00:29 decide whether or not they did a good job. I'm Dan Pfeiffer, former Communications Director of Barack Obama, co-host of Pots of America. And joining me today is the one and only Tommy Vitor. Tommy Vitor, welcome back to the Polar Act. How are you? I'm good. My wake-up time this morning was 440. I don't know if it was my children or my anxiety about the midterms, probably a combination of both.
00:49 How about you? What was your wake-up? 4-15 or so this morning? It's been... Yeah. We're in an anxious place. Yeah. I sleep with my Apple Watch.
00:59 on to track my sleep. It doesn't give me notifications, but I want to track my sleep and know how much I wake up. And I basically beaten it down where it gave me a good score, even though I only got five hours and 45 minutes of sleep for like the third night in a row. Oh, boy. Yeah, it's not great. Okay.
01:15 But we're going to pass the time here by looking at some pretty fun ads. We're going to start with this ad from Scott Cullum from the Mississippi Senate race. On price of beef continuing to go up. You know, you have so many proteins to choose from. Pick another protein? Shit, I'd rather pick another senator instead. Pick another protein. She'd have lost her damn mind.
01:38 I'd rather pick another senator. Pick another protein. What the... Pick another senator instead. All right. Genuinely funny. Like, genuinely, first of all, pick another protein. That's fun to say.
01:59 It feels like you're singing or you're rapping or something. It's great. I love that ad. It's genuinely funny. Dan, I saw the Mississippi Clarion Ledger had an article about this ad and how it went viral. It said they posted it on Facebook X and Instagram and it racked up more than 2.8 million views in the first 36 hours. The Obama endorsement video got 700,000 views in the same time. So this thing really popped off.
02:23 That's a rough. That's rough for Obama. I mean, 700,000 views, pretty good. Pretty good. But it was just probably like him in a chair. Like, they all looked like the other ones. But it's a great ad. It's funny.
02:32 It's great. Apparently, the column's been touring the state with a pick-your-protein food truck. They're, like, really trying to drive this one home. And, like, this is a long-shot race, although there are Democrats, many of whom you and I are friends with who are, I don't want to say optimistic about this race, but would not be, would not fall out of their chairs of somehow on election night, Scott Column 1. There is, the case here is, this is, Cindy Heidsmith is a terrible candidate. Scott Colum is an excellent candidate.
03:04 In the last time the Senate race went around, it was only about a nine point victory for the Republicans when Mike Svee was running. And then most interestingly, and I think most importantly, is Mississippi has either the or one of the highest percentage of voters who were black voters. And we saw after the Calais decision
03:20 in the Supreme Court where they gutted the Proverture Rights Act and redistricted all these black districts out of existence, that turnout among black voters, least in the primary was through the roof in the South. And so if that, if everything broke the right way, that's the case here. Then you saw sky high turnout among black voters. Then there's a shot here.
03:37 So I think it's really interesting. And I appreciate a candidate who is having fun and in it to win and doing interesting, high variance, risky things. It's because they know that just running the same old Democratic campaign is not going to win you a Senate seat in Mississippi in 2026. Yeah, it's fun. It's funny. It's viral. I didn't realize it. Cindy Hyde Smith's with a Democrat until 2010.
03:59 And then she switched parties. And Dan, do you remember in her 2018 race against SB? No, I'm going to say to tell you that right now. So was that 18? 2018, I think it's SB. There was a video of her at a campaign stop. She was praising the person who had introduced her. And she said, this is a quote,
04:17 if he invited me to a public hanging, I'd be on the front row. Her opponent, that cycle was black. Then there were surface pictures of her, like, at Confederate monuments and stuff. So she's just awful, awful candidate. Like no one, that's a, that's not a turn of phrase people use. Unfortunately, it's such a tough state. Yeah, you and I both have friends in Democratic politics who are really, you know,
04:41 want the Democratic Party to be doing more in Mississippi. And I think that could both mean investing in the column race, but also I think there needs to be like some sort of decade-long or more project to canvas, register, talk to voters. Because I just think there's probably a lot of people there who feel like, completely left behind by the political process generally. And it's not going to be like a turnout operation that does it. It's got to be something deeper than that. I mean, Mississippi is not Georgia. South Carolina is not Georgia.
05:08 They are different demographically, particularly in the metro areas and the voters who, the in migration of college educated liberals from other parts of the south and other parts of the country. But you could learn a lot. And if someone had a lot of money, a place to invest it would be to try to rerun the play that Stacey Abrams and everyone else did in Georgia in all these other states with Mississippi, Alabama with large black populations. Like, that's what you would do.
05:34 And just give you shut stuff. But either way, great fucking ad. Great ad. So much fun. I'm glad we can contribute to the morality of this ad and run out the score on the old boss here when it comes to views. If you like this video and you like Pod Save America, I promise you you'll love Message Box, which is my substack newsletter where I break down what's happening in politics,
05:51 give you real analysis based on years of experience and data about what's happening in the midterms and actually help you understand where you, can have the greatest impact, what campaigns matter, where to give money, how you can volunteer. If you want to sign up, and I hope you do, the link is in the description. If you sign up now, you can get 20% off for a year. Pod Save America Breaking News is brought to you by ZipRecruiter. Let's be honest, ZipRecruiter is everywhere. Why? Because top talent is everywhere too. Just like you, your ideal candidates are tuning into business, sports, and podcasts, just like this one.
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06:50 Again, that ZipRecruiter.com slash crooked. Oh, and if you forget where to go, don't worry, you'll hear another ZipRecruiter ad soon enough. All right, the next ad we're going to watch is from the very interesting Ohio governor's race. You're like a billionaire, aren't it? And I'm like dirty, dirty rich. He's dirty.
07:07 That's Vivek Ramoswamy, the same guy who wants to cut our health care. We're Medicare and Medicaid mistakes. I believe they work with the benefit of registrations, particularly Medicaid. And with millions invested in data centers, he'll raise your energy bills too. We have an AI data center boom in the state of Ohio, which is great. I'm all for it. I'm strongly in favor of it. Higher costs for us, millions for Ramoswami.
07:31 I'm like dirty, dirty rich. If he was trying to lose this race, I'm not sure what he would do differently. I know that Vivek is sort of a, he's on your list of favorite people to beat up on the internet who kind of drives you crazy. How much did you enjoy this spot? That is just a great ad. I mean, what a thing to say about yourself. I'm dirty, rich. You moron, you're trying to run for office.
07:54 You're in politics. What are you thinking? Yeah, I think I mentioned it's, uh, that's, uh, that is just a great ad. on pod before, but I got to interview Vivek Ramoswamy on his campaign bus in Iowa back in the I forgot. You did that. Yeah. Right.
08:04 My takeaway was that he has a repellent personality. I was like could not wait to get off that bus. He's just like a smarmy, arrogant prick. And I think it comes through in all of those clips. I also think like it comes through in the MAGA wing of the Republican Party. Like Steve Bannon doesn't like him. He called him a terrible candidate on his show, I think, in August. Vivek got booed off the stage at this young Americans.
08:28 for Liberty Convention. Now, there is a lot, there is more than a little racism within the Republican Party, especially towards Indian Americans, which is, that is obviously horrible. But like, that doesn't, you know, that's not why I think that ad is so powerful.
08:42 It's because Vivek Ramaswami is a guy who, like, flies his private plane around Ohio to campaign events, and then wants to gut social services for poor people. It's just the worst kind of Republican. I mean, it's, it's worth noting. And it's actually somewhat shocking. Like, you can kind of, understand if you have a sort of a cursory understanding of Ohio politics and national politics,
09:03 why Sherrod Brown might be ahead by a few points against John Houston. Sherrod Brown's won there many times. John Houston is just kind of a generic Republican in a year. You don't want to be a generic Republican, even in Ohio. What is quite shocking is that, and also we know in federal races, voters will, that's where they register their protest against the incumbent party. Right, right. In the polling averages, Amy Acton is up.
09:28 on Vivek. That is quite shocking, given just what it's been a very long time since we've had a Democratic governor of Ohio. So even even a competitive at a governor's race in Ohio, it'd be Ted Strickland way back in the day. And the just Vivek is a sort of perfect candidate to run against. This is an, if we, if Democrats win this race, is another one that goes on Trump's ledger because he is the one who wanted Vivek to do this. It's like sort of his consolation price for getting booted from Doge.
09:57 Yeah. Remember, Vivek was so annoying that Elon Musk fired him from Doge before Doge existed. Like there's a world where people found the, in a pairing with Elon Musk, Vivek was the more annoying person. Yeah, by a lot to the point where he got sent back to Ohio. Dude, my only question in the spirit of the show and kind of, you know, being a political expert. Well, evaluating the ads themselves. It's like part, act one is rich guy.
10:25 Act two is like gutting social services. Act three is data centers. Is there an argument that it's doing too much, or do you think all of that is worth? No, I think those are all of a piece. I think it works quite well. Like we can sit here and nitpick whether there's a way to make the ad more interesting and sort of a less traditional ad. But filthy rich guy who wants to, who does not care whether you get to, you have health care
10:47 or retirement security. And also the thing about data centers is that really books, if we hear this in the focus groups all the time is that they're all these people, these rich people getting richer off of AI. And so it's just like the fact that he's a filthy, rich tech guy who wants data centers is just like fits exactly with how what they see is the problem with data centers. Yeah. Chef's Kiss.
11:07 Also just the fact that there's also Ezra Klein's in the sad. I know. It's like a perfectly manscaped beard. It's very funny. It's very charing. Yeah. Just think of all the, just Vivek's had such just, he's been a great candidate. There was the viral video of him hitting a baseball.
11:23 in the batting cage. That's my favorite. They had to take down. There was the one you guys talked about on YouTube the other day. I think it was where he tried to pick up the child at the event and couldn't do it. Like, don't pick up a 10-year-old. That was such a weird thing to do. I have some sympathy for him.
11:38 Look, I don't know. My kids are still in the sleepy sack phase when they go to bed. And sometimes I will have to physically wrestle them into the sleepy sack. And I know when a kid goes limp, they're impossible to pick up. But that's why you don't pick up a 10-year-old. But him trying to hit the baseball was so funny because there was a guy who was at the batting cage who later made a video out of it. And I think they picked the slowest pitch cage.
12:00 It was like 40 mile an hour cage. I think Vivek took 20 pitches, made contact five times. So they had to recycle his like terrible foul tips multiple times in the video. And it was just so embarrassing that they took it down. Now the version we put up included Elijah, you know, kind of like orgasmically groaning underneath the swings, which, you know. editorial license, but Yeah. Liz Smith was on this show a couple months ago
12:28 and we were talking about candidates as content creators and we were looking at the Abdul Asiad, blues clues video. And Liz was not a fan of it, but she said that when she worked for Pete Buttigieg, she had three rules for any sort of internet
12:43 digital stuff, which was no singing, no dancing, no sports. Which is like know yourself. Know yourself, yeah. And Vivek obviously has known his whole life. he can't hit a baseball? Yes. So why are you doing a baseball video? What are you thinking?
12:56 You like tennis. You play a lot of tennis. You're apparently pretty good at tennis. Someone told them that that was like not man of the people enough. So yeah, he came off looking like a total phony. My, yeah, we do a lot of, as you know, Dan, get asked to do videos and things here for social. My personal rule is like no acting. I'm not an actor.
13:14 I don't know how to act. We shouldn't be delivering lines. Like you're just, we're not good at that. That is mine as well. That, well, there's only, well, maybe, love it can definitely. do it. I think Favro could fake it in a way, but now if John cannot fake it, he just, he can't bring himself. He said he is a,
13:27 I will say he is a historically talented, uh, script reader. Reader or writer? Reader. Both, both. But his, his ability to like read the 17 paragraph, uh, intro to the podcast at times without fumbling is. That's one thing. But like, to deliver a line when you're acting means you have to do it without self-consciousness. And I think that's where all of us are like,
13:53 this feels phony and it's wrong, and this is not what I do. And that's how the vague... He can do it. That's how Vivek should have felt when he was swinging a baseball bat. Yes, exactly. Not good.
14:02 All right. The last ad we're going to look at is a slightly more serious one. It's coming from John Osoth. I ain't a lot. It pisses me off the way I spend my money now. I mean, I ain't gaining nothing. I'm losing.
14:14 This is a life of a trucker right here. All day long, 10 hours shift driving traffic. The fuel tanks right here, this is 150 gallons on this side, and there's 150 gallons on the other side. It's 300 gallon. I'd put comfortably 80 to 100,000 a year in diesel. Oh, it's going to be way more now, definitely since fuel prices shot up. It happens every time there's a war goes on.
14:40 Every time the fuel goes up. The truck ain't shaking, it ain't making. I voted for Trump every election. He sold us. He sold everybody. Nobody wants to listen to the people, people that work every day that makes this country run. Senator John, he's what Georgia needs. He's listening to the truck drivers like myself, you know, just a middle class person. We just want somebody in office that will stand up for us.
15:17 Less viral than the last two spots? So what do you think of this one? That is just an perfectly executed political ad. Like if the Scott column ad is a deep three-pointer designed to like, you know, label Hyde Smith as like a out-of-touch anti-beef weirdo, that is like the Princeton offense backdoor cut, perfect bounce pass layup of a political ad. And John Ossoff should hire that guy for a month and just drive around the state with him because he's like that that's very, very good. Yeah, I wanted to highlight this ad for two reasons. One, you get the first one, which is like a lot of times we will. do the viral ads, the interesting ads, the funny ads. But sometimes it's just like,
15:59 what are the good ads? What are the ones who do the right thing and they execute it? Well, this one's very well executed. It is a classic concept. It's well done. It's obviously our documentary filmmaker King. John Ossoff has, you know, it looks good. The guy is very compelling. But what it gets at strategically to me is like the most important thing down the stretch here, which is, and this is the thing that keeps me up at night is that in almost all of these races, particularly the ones in the red states, the undecided voters are almost 90% Trump voters. And in many cases, three-time Trump voters.
16:33 And so that is the audience we are speaking to at the end. And you want to give people permission, create a permission structure to use a term we use in politics way too much for these people who have never voted for Democrats, who basically thought Democrats might have been the enemy of the people as recently as 2020, or of 2024 who thought Democrats might have stolen the election in 2020 for it to be okay to not just stay home, which gets us one vote, but to vote for Democrat, which the net says two votes. And so I would like to see there's a Abdul L. Sayad version of this ad as well with someone who voted for Mike Rogers 10 times, I believe.
17:11 But we need more ads like this because these are people we have to speak to at the end. This is not, I'm not going to kick off a should we be campaigning with Liz Cheney thing, but your target audience at the end here is people who voted for Trump in these red states. It may be a little different in Michigan, in Maine, in Minnesota and New Hampshire. But in these deeply red states, the last people left, the last people standing are dissatisfied Republicans who are not one of my Democrats. And you've got to give them a path to get there. This ad is a great way of doing that. Yeah, no one wants to feel stupid.
17:45 And no one wants to feel like ashamed of their vote. Or that they're alone. Or that you're alone. Right. But you see this guy who looks maga, sounds maga, everything about him is maga coded. And what he's saying to you is we were lied to. You know, we were deceived. Trump did this to us.
18:02 No one listens to us. And the way you voice your displeasure is by voting for John Ossef. And by the way, he's a good guy. Yeah. And there's just a distinction here between because these things get are so twisted in the internet factional debates about the Democratic Party is this is not tacked to the middle to get these people. It is recognized who your audiences at the end and then give them a path consistent with what you stand for and who you are to get there. And this ad is a good way of doing that.
18:28 Great ad. Well done. Tommy Vitor. Thanks for joining us. Thanks for having me. Always fun. That wraps up another episode of Pocoexerts React. If you want to see more content like this, subscribe to this channel.
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