Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 7/28/26: Trump Admits Weapons Shortage, Americans Cut Back On Groceries, Abdul Vs Haley Debate

Episode Date: July 28, 2026

Krystal and Emily discuss Trump admits munition shortages, Americans cut back on groceries, Abdul vs Haley debate.   Francesca Hong: https://francescahong.com/ Desiree Townsend: https://x.com/Cheering4Change?lang=en    To become a Breaking Points Premium Member and watch/listen to the show AD FREE, uncut and 1 hour early visit: www.breakingpoints.com    Merch Store: https://shop.breakingpoints.com/   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Hey, Portlandia fans. Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen here. The Dream of the 90s is alive in podcast form. We're launching Podlandia, AEO, rewatch, our brand new podcast where we revisit every episode of Portlandia together, breaking down sketches, going deep on our iconic characters,

and pulling back the curtain on how it all got made. And we'll also be joined by the people who helped bring it all to life. Guest stars, collaborators, and friends, including director Jonathan Chrysler, the mayor, himself Kyle McLaughlin, legendary musician Amy Mann, and many more. Kyle is going for it here. You fully improvised, not just words, but a song. Well, I thought you were all going to write a song.

I remember you thinking that. Listen to Podlandia. A.O. Rewatch on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, fam? I'm sports journalist Ari Chambers. Hey, what's up, y'all? It's your girl, Sam J. And we're the host of Everyone Watches Women's Sports, a new podcast from Together and I Heart women's sports. We're breaking down the biggest headlines. Naomi Osaka, showing out. Shout us to you, Naomi. The viral moments. I've been obsessed with Kashan Rock's

boxing journey. She looks good. Her combos are swift. And the stories everyone's talking about across women's sports. Because everyone watches women's sports. Listen to everyone watches women's sports on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. I'm Nick Terturo. You probably know me from NYPD Blue, the longest yard, or Spike Least Black Klansman. And on my new podcast, delivering happiness with Nick I deliver pizza to a new guest. I've shared a slice with everyone from Seth Rollins. What are you doing my belt?

To Bill Burr. I don't think I've ever met somebody so exactly out of their mind as I am. And now we even have more great guests coming up, including the great John Tuturo. It's called Happiness, Delivering Happiness. And many, many more. Open your free High Heart Radio app. Search Delivering Happiness with Nick Tutro. And listen now.

Hey guys, Saga and Crystal here. Independent Media just played a truly massive. massive role in this election, and we are so excited about what that means for the future of this show. This is the only place where you can find honest perspectives from the left and the right that simply does not exist anywhere else. So if that is something that's important to you, please go to breakingpoints.com, become a member today, and you'll get access to our full shows, unedited, ad-free, and all put together for you every morning in your inbox.

We need your help to build the future of independent news media, and we hope to see you at breakingpoints.com. Good morning, everybody. Happy Tuesday. Welcome to Breaking Points. Emily, great to see you. Great to see you. Crystal. Good to be here. Yeah, a lot to get into this morning. We've got Trump saying that he is ready to go back to war with Iran as they say they are not interested in negotiations. Americans buying fewer groceries as Trump claims this is the best year America has ever had. I wonder if people out there are really feeling that sentiment right now. Abdul al-Sayed faced off versus Haley Stevens in a big debate last night. as that race comes to a dramatic conclusion. AI companies are buying and shredding rare books on mass in their latest assault on humanity.

Mitch McConnell, is he dead or alive? The reporter who has been staking out his hospital literally every day is going to join us. I'm really excited to talk to her and learn what she has glean in reading the tea leaves some of the big questions she has about the lack of communication that we are getting from him and his team. And Francesca Hong might be the first socialist governor in America. American history. She is up in the Wisconsin Democratic primary. And Emily, I know you've taken great interest in this one. I mean, this is a, this would be a major, major significant development

if you had a socialist who not only won the Democratic primary, but obviously then would be in contention to become the governor of a swing state. So you can't can no longer say, oh, it's just California or it's just Brooklyn. This is a key part of the argument for socialists that they can really win anywhere. Yeah, and Wisconsin has quite a history with socialism. So not entirely out of the question. We have some poll numbers. We'll break down in that interview as well. That is your right, Crystal, a very big one. Getting back to their roots, the sewer socialists, all of that sort of stuff. So love to see it. I know you do too. M. It's just the best. As a reminder, guys, we have our newsletter. People seem to be loving it. Sign up at breakingpoints.com. You can become a free subscriber and get access to most of that newsletter. If you want the whole thing, though, do become a premium subscriber and get the show uncut early in your inbox, all of that good stuff.

And thank you so much for the feedback. People seem to really be enjoying the product. With that being said, let's go ahead and jump into the show. Trump gave a big speech yesterday. Did a big rally in Michigan that was meant to focus on economic issues. We'll talk more about that in a moment in the economy block. However, he also talked some about Iran and gave people a new rationale or the latest rational. or the latest rationale for why we are in this war to begin with.

Let's take a listen. We have the greatest people. We have the best equipment in the world. I built it during my first term. And I'm using it now. We had no choice. Again, we can't let what was happening in Venezuela go on. And it was very decisive.

But we can't let what was and is going on. They killed 52,000 protesters. Think of it in a four-month period. Fifty-two thousand in Iran. But we've already paid for the Venezuela operation, as I said, and likewise, we're winning big time with the Islamic Republic of Iran, and we're ensuring that they never have a nuclear weapon. When somebody comes up and says, why are we doing this?

Just say because we cannot let them have a nuclear weapon. It's very simple. It's all you have to say. There's nothing else you have to say. If you understood the power of the nuclear weapons, you'd understand exactly what I was saying. Of course, the reality of the situation, Emily, is that they are are more likely to pursue a nuclear weapon now that we have launched this insane war than they were previously when we were negotiating with them on exactly this issue.

Well, and also as we're about to talk about, because Donald Trump is facing this, the weapon stockpile, if you miss out on or if you deplete the tomahawks or that level of the supply, does Trump then feel as though his next option is something that hasn't been depleted? that's more powerful, tactical nukes. I don't know what it is, and I'm not saying it's going to happen, but obviously his options are narrowing right now. What makes you raise that in particular, Emily, because that is something that I've been concerned about as well,

especially when they started talking about Pickax Mountain and, you know, presumably the Israelis started floating this intelligence about, oh, that nuclear program that you've been claiming was obliterated, actually they moved everything into Pickax Mountain. Military experts say that conventional weapons would really do nothing to actually penetrate, you could collapse some tunnels or something of that nature. But as we've seen, the Iranians have proven themselves very adept at being able to dig out these facilities, whether it's the underground missile cities, or presumably nuclear facilities as well.

So when I started hearing that talk, I became very concerned in the same direction. Yeah, no, I think that's exactly right. And it's just been an amplification of that talk from the Israelis and some of the more hawkish people here in the United States combined with the fact that you have depleting supply of the stuff that's been used already. And so when the president feels like he's squeezed, he doesn't want to take an L and he doesn't want to escalate with ground troops. The options start to narrow in a way that's very concerning unless he decides once again to kind of this might be the most likely path, take a deal and try to frame it as a dove, even if it's

really an L. Yeah. To your point about the weapon stockpile, he was asked about this on Air Force One. And to my knowledge, this is the first time that he admitted that there might be a bit of a problem there. Let's take a listen. Are you concerned about the clean and stockpiles if there is a broadening conflict? We have money. We have a lot of ammunition. Different types. You know, Biden gave a lot to Ukraine. And so we're building that up. But we have a lot. We have a lot of the mid-level stuff too. I mean, more than we could ever use no matter what. But we have a lot. I'd like to have more, to be honest, but so much was given to Ukraine by Biden. When I left, the cupboards were full. When I came here with Obama, he didn't buy ammunition. We had very little. And I got it built. Now, as soon as I left, they gave a lot of it to Ukraine. I mean, numbers that nobody's ever seen before. So we're building it very rapidly.

Plants are being built. A lot of equipment is being built. The Patriots in particular are being built. That system is going up. We have a lot. Every one of our contractors is building four to five plants right now. And we're in very good shape. But for some of the more sophisticated stuff, we'd certainly like to have more.

Biden gave a lot of it away. So he says there's some of the more sophisticated stuff. even as he tries to downplay the overall issue. And I've been thinking about this a lot, Emily. Certainly the diminishing weapons stockpiles is something we've talked about a lot here, even predating the Iran war, is a major issue. And there was NBC News reporting that they are, in fact, having to ration interceptors. So they're having to pick and choose, okay, is this a target that's so important we need to protect it or not? That shows you the limits of what we're able to do just because the lack of material. However, I was a bit of the risk.

I was reading policy tense, or I don't know if you follow him either on Twitter or I also am a subscriber to his substack, and he's saying, you know, this is really kind of missing the point because even if the cupboards were full in the parlance there that Trump was using, you still would not, with conventional weaponry and a air campaign, be able to achieve your objectives in Iran. You still would not be able to fully protect your bases in the region and have that basing strategy make sense anymore. Even as a lot of people are saying, okay, well, now we don't have what it takes to defend ourselves and deter China. Well, China's looking at this and going, even if you had full stockpiles at this point, you weren't going to be able to do anything anyway because the very nature of warfare has changed. So while I think this is a really important, significant near-term issue, which is shaping the choice array for Trump in the short term and which his commanders are certainly alerting him to, et cetera, I don't actually think it is the primary issue that has led to this disastrous defeat for the U.S. in Iran, which is more about Iran's strategic positioning,

their intelligent strategy and the way that they've much more effectively adapted to modern warfare than we have. We weren't prepared. Clearly, we're not prepared for the asymmetric warfare. I mean, there's just no question about it. The Center for Strategic and International Studies estimates that we have fired about a thousand Tomahawk missiles from a baseline of about 3,000 that is going to take years to reconstitute the supply to that level. They're estimating as many as 1,400 Patriot defense missiles have been used. So this is a problem that is now going to take years to resolve. That's why Pete Higgseth was talking about, quote, critical shortfalls on Capitol Hill last week as he asked for more money. And there are companies that are trying to bring the Pentagon into the 21st century

and prepare it for more asymmetric warfare. But that's not what we've seen so far in Iran at all. What we've seen is, I would say, if anything, an effort to wage this conventional air war in the hopes that, again, the Netanyahu scenario of the Kurds coming in would take place. That never happens. So Trump is almost just running out the clock until he feels like he can frame something as a big win. Yeah, and we've continued to take losses. Let's put these images of the latest MQ9 Reaper drone that was reportedly shot down over Iraq. You're looking at $30 to $34 million there laying smoldering on the ground.

They've been able to take down a lot of these Reaper drones and then, you know, their drones, which we have actually copied, which is quite unusual for the American military, almost unprecedented, to copy an adversary's drone or weaponry like that. In any case, they're able to spend them out for much less cost and in a very short period of time. They've maintained their industrial base so they can spend these things out, and I'm sure have continued to do. so over the course of the war. At the same time, put A4 up on the screen. This is the big latest Barack Ravid report here. He says Trump told me we're in very deep talks with Iran. There is no indication that that is true. The Iranians are denying that they are talking with the U.S. or that they are interested in talking with the U.S. at this point. Trump goes on to tell Ravid, if they don't work out. We will go back to very strong military action. Asked how long

he's willing to give diplomacy. The president said, not much time either goes fast or not. at all. This seems like another, I think there's a few things going on here. First of all, you know, we had another sort of market manipulation move to calm things before Monday morning markets opened so you could get oil prices down so that the stock market wouldn't completely tank. So they start floating, oh, we're doing these negotiations, we're having these talks. You know, the bombs stopped flying. That certainly is, is in fact reality. The other piece of this, though, is I think that there was a, you know, there was a loss of life. Our service members were killed, and there was a threat from Iran that they were going to continue killing our service

members for every Iranian civilian who was killed, that there would be a one-for-one loss. And I think Trump is well aware that Americans are not prepared to accept really any losses or casualties. You know, in a normal war, Sagar and I played Ben Shapiro yesterday. I'm sure you're familiar with his comments, too, where he was like, yeah, we're willing to accept casualties. Like, first of all, who are you, buddy, to tell us what we're willing to accept? But, you know, in a sense, he's correct that if you had a just war, if this was like World War II and we're up against the Nazis, yes, Americans would have a stomach for some level of sacrifice, but they have never received a straightforward justification for why this is either necessary or intelligent.

You know, we're talking about their pursuit of a nuclear weapon. Well, this has made it more likely that they pursue a nuclear weapon. The war has increasingly become about who has control of the Strait of Hormuz. Well, previously the Strait of Hormuz was open. So not only is the war not achieving any objective, any reasonable objective you may have set, has been rolled back, has been set back significantly by this incredibly stupid and disastrous war. So no, Americans are not willing to accept any casualties, really. We're already up over 600 casualties over the course of this war. And I believe hundreds just in the past couple of weeks. So really significant, you know, injuries and damage to our service members that they'll spend their lives dealing with

and recovering from. And I think Trump is smart enough to know that we really don't have any tolerance for that. And so when he saw this very credible threat from the Iranians, and you couple that with the low stockpile, a very limited ability to deter or thwart those attacks, I think that's part of why he pulled back here as well. Well, and now potentially having problems in the Red Sea, it's a mess. I mean, and that's what everybody predicted, except for one person we're going to hear from in just a moment, Mark Levin, and Benjamin Netanyahu. But that's what everybody predicted basically would happen. I think the low stockpiles probably had a lot to do with this decision.

personally, but, you know, that's what's also really scary right now. He's in this between a rock and a hard place of his own fault. He put himself in that position by choosing who to listen to and what to do in this war. And man, if you are running for Congress as a Republican right now, you're looking at this in terror because all signals point to gas prices probably remaining pretty high. Inflation remaining pretty stubborn over the next couple of months. And more importantly, if you're somebody who's looking to pay your damn bills, you're probably thinking about it exactly in the same way, because this is obviously rippled throughout the economy.

Meanwhile, Crystal, let's listen to what Mark Levin thinks should happen. The reason this president will get on in history for a thousand years, the reason the Prime Minister of Israel will go down in history for a thousand years is because they saw the danger and they stood up to the danger and they're fighting the danger. And Donald Trump will go down in our history is one of the greatest presidents ever, ever, because of what he is doing today, as well as other things that he's done, but certainly because what he's doing today in dealing with this grave threat in Iran. I look forward to Mark Levin's monologue on how we are dealing with the grave threat from

North Korea's nuclear missiles and ICBM capacity doesn't seem to have the same level of concern about that crystal. So we are now getting his monologues to an audience of one, maybe literally an audience of one, about how great Donald Trump is. Oh, there's a few boomers out here who take him seriously to, and they're not all in the White House, just one very important one. More than a few, yeah. You know, he may be right that Trump goes down in history for a thousand years, but not for the reason that they would hope, as the man who destroyed and ended the American Empire. And he may be right about Netanyahu, too, that he goes down for a thousand years in history

as the man who effectively destroyed the state of Israel. So it is possible that they end up as, quote, unquote, great men in history, certainly consequential men. And in a sense, I think Trump cares more about being consequential than whether the consequences of his action are for good or ill. And that's a big part. This type of language is exactly what fueled his ego-driven decision to launch this disastrous war.

You know, Netanyahu, I'm sure, undoubtedly told him this will be your legacy. You'll be able to accomplish something. No other president was able to accomplish, sir. It's all there for you. We can see how we can take out the leadership class. Iran will crumble. Ahmadinejad will rise to power. The Kurds will flood in.

They'll take over these cities. And Trump wanting high on his own supply and wanting to believe the hype and wanting to believe that he could be that consequential man in history decided to pull the trigger. and now is in an absolute disastrous trap for himself, for the country, really for the world. One last piece here. This is Shane Smith from Vice talking about how he, in his recent trip to Tehran, is like, you know, this economic pressure we're supposedly putting on them. They seem to be doing pretty well. And the reason this is consequential is because this is a key part of our war strategy is the economic warfare. You know, the imposition of the blockade, the longstanding sanctions regime.

the idea is that we can make life so miserable for the entire Iranian population that they will buckle and they will come to the table and they will have to make concessions rather than the dynamic right now is that we are the ones who would have to make all of the concessions. We would have to agree to allow Iran to control the Strait of Hormuz. That is clearly where they have drawn their red line and they are not going to go into negotiations until that much has been made clear from the U.S. side. In any case, let's go ahead and take a listen to Shane Smith on the Bullwork podcast, talking about his experience in Tehran. 80% of the people have either relatives in London or in L.A., like in the big Persian communities. Very well informed. Tehran is actually a sort of cosmopolitan city. What did the economic situation look like?

It's nuanced. We've had these crippling sanctions. The first thing you notice is there's traffic jams everywhere, which means everyone has a car, everyone has gas. We're not crippling anything. Store is full. We hear about sanctions. The sanctions have been going on for decades, crippled economy. I come here and it's like all the stores are filled, all the people are shopping. America is bombing Iran and everyone's like, hello, how are you? Nice to see you. You're good? It doesn't seem to be that crippling. The Revolutionary Guards are like the mafia. They're the import-export engines. So they're just getting more powerful. They all have guns. They

have all the guns. If there's regime change, they're either going to jail or getting strung up. So are they going anywhere? No. And they're making oodles of money. By the way, you go around to They're building brand new skyscrapers everywhere. And I'm like, well, who's moving into those? We're not crippling anybody. They trade with China. They trade with Russia. Fine.

They can go on forever if we think that our crippling sanctions are crippling in any way we're wrong. What did you think of that, um? Yeah, I mean, I think that's probably generally accurate. And on top of that, bear in mind, part of the reason Netanyahu was whispering in Trump's year about regime change is that the regime did slaughter thousands. I don't buy the super high estimates that we get from some of the Hawks, but the IRGC slaughtered thousands of people in January, and Netanyahu was saying, now is the time they will revolt,

and that did not happen. So if that doesn't do it, the idea that the economy is going to trigger some mass revolt in Iran is foolish. Yeah. I mean, if you think about the theoretical goals that have been floated at different times, I mean, the most preposterous one was always like, oh, we care about the human rights and the dignity of the protesters. Please. But if your goal is, you know, we're going to weaken the government and foment some sort of regime change, government appears to be stronger than ever.

I believe Shane Smith, I think it makes sense that they are probably making a lot of money because when you increase the black market, yes, those are the sorts of people that are going to ultimately benefit. So you've strengthened the government. If your goal is to deter them from seeking a nuclear weapon, you've made it much more likely. they're going to pursue a nuclear weapon, both by killing, murdering the previous Supreme leader who had issued a fatwa against a nuclear weapon, and also just through the logic of the state looking at an existential threat and saying, okay, well, how can we deter that? Let me look around the world. Looks like people are leaving North Korea alone. Maybe that's the model to go with. So on that front, you've been incredibly counterproductive. If you wanted to weaken their economy,

well, now they've been able to assert control over the Strait of Hormuz, very likely guaranteeing themselves a sort of endless stream of revenue from cargo ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz. So on any of the levels that you could imagine of what the goals theoretically could be, even though we've never really gotten a straight, consistent answer about what those goals are, we've set ourselves back on every single one of those goals. We were in a better place, closer to the achievement of those theoretical goals before we ever launched these attacks. Yeah, I mean, that's a fact pattern at this point, like incontrovertible, unless you buy into like some of the deeper conspiracy theories of the Iran-Hawk world. So,

absolute mess. And we keep seeing why every single day in like Renaissance portrait form, flamboyantly wrong every single day. All right. Let's go ahead and turn now from the impact on Iran to the impact on our own economy. You've heard the chaos. Now you can see it. Do we want to jump right in? Watch all your favorite podcasts from start to finish. right inside the free IHard Radio app. Make some noise. Wooee! Catch every laugh and eye roll

on shows like Bestie Listen, Hey Jonas, and Las Culturistas. Now with full video. I'll just leave that there. It's the same hosts and the same chemistry with all the hilarious moments you've been missing right on your screen. Open the free IHard radio app.

Search video podcasts and tap watch. What's up, fam? I'm sports journalist Ari Chambers. Hey, what's up y'all? It's your girl, Sam J. And we're the host of everyone watches women's sports, new podcast from Together and I Heart Women's Sports. Because let's be real. Women's sports is giving us way too much to talk about these days.

So Kelsey Finler, she became the first female solo rower to go from California to Hawaii. My first thought is like, what's up with the snacks? Like, what are we eating? The highlights, the rivalries, the breakout stars, the moments that take over your entire timeline. And the conversations that start during the game and somehow keep going all week. Every week, we're breaking down the biggest stories across women's sports. Naomi Osaka showing out

She beat Sabalinka Shout out to you Naomi You get the palm Naomi You get the palm for that Because we're not just interested in what happened We're interested in why everyone's talking about it Because everyone watches women's sports

Listen to everyone watches women's sports On the IHeart Radio app Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast Hey Portlandia fans Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen here You know us or rather you know them Tony and Candace Nina and Lance

Spike and yes the chicken We've played a lot of iconic characters over the years, but today we're showing up as ourselves to tell you about Podlandia, AEO rewatch, our brand new podcast. Each week, we'll revisit an episode of Portlandia from the very beginning, breaking down the sketches, exploring the backstories of our most iconic characters, revisiting the Portland locations you know and love, and opening up about our creative process. How did any of this get made? Why do we think that was a good idea? We're ready to talk about it. And we'll also be joined by the people who helped bring it all to life. guest stars, collaborators, and friends, including director Jonathan Chryssel, the mayor himself, Kyle McLaughlin, legendary musician Amy Mann, and many more. Kyle is going for it here. You fully improvised, not just words, but a song, a melody.

I thought he was going to write. I thought you were all going to write a song. I remember you thinking that. Listen to Podlandia. Ayo, rewatch on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. President Trump flew to Michigan yesterday to deliver an economic speech. And the news is good, folks. Don't worry. You're pretty much doing as well as you ever have. Let's take a listen. We're having the single greatest year we've ever had as a country. We're not going to let these people destroy it.

We're delivering the largest prescription drug price cuts in the history of our country by far with differences of 400, 500, 500. and even 600 percent. Nobody can believe it. We will pass the great health care plan. That's what it's called the great health care plan to stop all payments to big insurance companies and give the money directly to you the people so that they can buy their own health care,

which will be much less expensive and be a much better health care. Meanwhile, let's put this Washington Post headline up on the screen. Republicans see, quote, scary lack of enthusiasm among core voters ahead of midterms, a little bit from the piece here, quote, Republican pollsters and political groups are raising the alarm. Their party faces a listless and demotivated base ahead of November's midterm elections. A raft of discouraging data from polling, door-knocking, and focus groups is unsettling Republicans

as their party heads into a midterm election season that would be challenging no matter what, given President Trump's low standing in polls, and the fact that the party control in Washington almost always loses seeds, which, by the way, is something that Trump was saying ahead of the Iran war. He was saying he gave a speech in Iowa. I think it was back in January, Crystal, where he was talking about how, you know, it's not a big deal. He probably won't, Republicans probably won't win the midterms. Now, not only is that historical precedent still salient, but he also has, let's just check the AAA gas price. The national average today is about $4.1.

cent. That is within a hundred days of the midterm election. I think we just passed the 100-day benchmark, what, two days ago? So no wonder, no wonder they're seeing signs or seeing signs quote of listlessness among the base. And I'm curious, Crystal, for your take on his messaging of the economy being, he's doing a little bit of blaming Biden, but then also saying it's great. It's a total mixed message, but he doesn't have much to work with at this point, of course, when he's trying to tell voters everything is just fine, and in fact, it's actually better than ever. Many a president has crashed into the rocks trying to convince voters that the economy is good when the economy is not, in fact, good. I think it's one of the hardest things to bullshit on,

even for the most effective bullshit artist, perhaps of all time in American political history, Donald Trump, because people have their own individual experience with the economy. It's numbers, it's math at the end of the day. Am I able to afford what I used to be able to afford at the grocery store? Am I able to make rent at the end of the month? Am I able to even conceive of the possibility of ever becoming a homeowner? Am I able to afford my health insurance premiums? And so you can't, there's very few people, there may be a few, but there's very few people that you're going to be able to rhetorically persuade that their economic situation is different

than their actual experience of it. So when he says America's having the best year of all time, there are going to be very few people who are going to be persuaded by that. And all of those people were going to be diehard Trump fans. The latest Gallup poll has only 22 percent of Americans who say the economy is either good or excellent. That is absolutely dismal. That piece in the Washington Post is really quite dire because you have them saying, you know, one in five Republican voters. So 20 percent of the Republican base is at risk of either staying home or voting for Democrats. That is an extraordinarily high number. I think, you know, when we're looking at the generic ballot and, okay, theoretically Democrat versus Republican,

et cetera, it's very hard to actually capture but who is going to show up. And midterms are a hundred percent a game of who is actually going to show up. And I think that lack of enthusiasm is the biggest problem for Republicans. It's not necessarily that diehard mega voters are in large numbers going to flip to Democrats, although I think some of them will. It's that many of them will be demobilized and simply stay home. They interviewed some Trump voters in Iowa, which Iowa is the state that, you know, Barack Obama won it, but that feels like a million years ago at this point. It shifted hard to the right. Very rural, you know, this is the type of place that has increasingly moved against Democrats. You got both a governor candidate, Democratic candidate, and a Senate

candidate who have been pretty consistently up in the polls, including in a recent Fox News poll, you know, Democrats winning both of those seats. So they interviewed this guy. three-time Trump voter in western Iowa, which very rural, Lance Salentic, resident of Iowa's rural Harrison County, described the past three presidential elections as, quote, the worst three mistakes I've ever made in my life, saying the president had failed to fulfill his campaign promises, higher gas prices have been costing his family an extra $300 to $500 every month for their motorcycle and four cars. He said, quote, we voted for Trump. He did the opposite of what he said he was going to do. Gas prices were going to be $2. Food was going to be cheaper. Energy prices were

going to be in half. We were going to get two rebate checks to the American people. We weren't going to have any new wars, and we were going to build a wall and deport 30 million illegal aliens. Interesting that he's also disappointed on that front. And he did none of it. So this man, you think he's going to, when Trump is going to come out, oh, but it's the best year of your life, sir. Don't worry. I don't think that's going to be very persuasive for him, Mummlee. No, of course not. And one of the things we should mention about the analysis that you brought up from the Washington Post piece is that it was done by Americans for Prosperity. So that's a Cokeback group that has like basically it's the old Tea Party ground game, but it's still here in 2026. And they were out making this analysis based on door knocking and actually talking to voters. So it's not even just like a cold statistical analysis. It's a lot of it is qualitative, having these conversations. And we should also mention. from the Post piece. The latest Washington Post in Ipsos polling on this shows that, quote, Democrats have a 10 percentage point advantage over Republicans among voters who say they're absolutely

certain to vote in November. Now, that is huge. Ryan and I covered last week the generic congressional ballot differences between now 2006 and 2018. Democrats and Harry Anton, who we're going to hear from in just a moment, has pointed this out. And if you look at real clear for those years, too, it's pretty obvious. Democrats are lagging. Like, they're up in the generic congressional ballot. I think it's five points last time I checked on RCP last week. They should be up higher if they're looking at like a blue tsunami year from the same points in 2006 and 2018.

That doesn't necessarily mean they won't have a blue tsunami or that those numbers won't change and be even more lopsided in their favor by the time Election Day rolls around. But as of right now, there's still work for Democrats. to capitalize on the fact that Republican voters are possibly considering pulling the lever for some Democrats or staying home altogether. So a fascinating dynamic, let's put the CNBC headline up. U.S. grocery slowdown deepens as shoppers buy fewer items, raising pressure on food companies. Shoppers are buying fewer items than a year ago and grocery sales are declining as weakening unit sales are now outweighing rising prices.

CNBC reports, this is according to a new analysis from Bain, using Nielsen IQ grocery data shared exclusively with CNBC grocery units, which refer to individual items or products sold, fell 1.8% in June from a year earlier, a sharp reversal from the point 1% year-over-year growth recorded in June 2025. While prices continue to rise, about 2% to 3% year-over-year, that inflation cushion for the industry is no longer enough to keep overall sales growing. So Trump went from recording a 0.1% growth year over year, his economy went from recording 0.1% growth year over year after Liberation Day, by the way, which is somewhat interesting. Obviously, these adjustments can take a long time to trickle into all parts of the economy, but in the midst of the Iran war to a dip of 1.8% from June to June. So the way that Democrats are going to get Republican voters either to stay home, those one in five by November, to stay home or vote Democrat, I mean, this is such a gift politically. It's a tragedy for the country, but a gift politically, Crystal.

Yeah. And Emily, I know we talked a lot before about how Republicans were pinning a lot of hopes on the big beautiful bill and the tax savings that Americans were going to be, you know, feeling in their bank accounts and the Trump baby accounts and these sorts of things. there was a recent poll and I have the numbers in front of me that, you know, unsurprisingly, American voters are very like, meh on the tax savings because they're immediate. They don't know what it is. Right. Number one, they don't know what it is. Number two, whatever savings they may have achieved is being instantly eaten up the very next time and they go to fill up their gas tank. So, you know, you talked about we're 100 days, you know, away from the midterms, more or less. We're six months into the Iran war. There's no end in sight. And those economic indicators are just going to continue to decline. You know,

we're going to have even higher grocery price. If you look at a chart at the cost of groceries over, let's say, the past six years, the way it's skyrocketed, it is truly jaw-dropping. How much more people are having to spend for the same items? I'm sure you've seen these viral TikToks where people will, like, pull out their receipts, their like target receipts or their Walmart receipts from 2019 and just be in shock. And how much more they're paying for the exact same items. So, yeah, you're not going to be able to talk that away.

That is one area where people really have a very fine-tuned sense of what is actually happening. Much more so, I think, then, is even captured in the top-line numbers, which, you know, unemployment's low. It's not like things if you just look at these certain macroeconomic indicators look that disastrous. But the, you know, your average American is really feeling a lot of pain and a lot of despair about the direction that the country is going in and what the prospects are for them and their children. And that is the reason why if we put before up on the screen, Trump is seeing. his lowest approval rating, or I'm sorry, this is actually a SOT, a Harry Enton Sot, talking about some of these poll numbers of how Americans feel about the economy and how just dismaling their rating Trump's performance here.

Promises made promises broken in the minds of the American public. 44%. 38% said they make them worse off back in October of 2020. Look at these numbers now. Oh, my goodness. John's shaking his head off on the side. Now, 58%, nearly three and five voters say that Trump is making them financially worse off. That's up like a rocket, the better off down to the floor.

Back when Trump was reelected, November of 2024, look at that. 42% of Americans, less than 50, said that, in fact, the economy was getting worse. Look at that now. 59%, 59% say the U.S. economy is getting worse. I don't know how this works for Republicans come to midterm elections when, the economy is the number one issue with inflation and three and five say it's getting worse off and just about one in five saying that it's getting better, that's an equation that does not work out. And Emily, I saw Trump going back to the well and that Michigan speech was supposed to be all

about the economy, about like transports and utilizing kids and these sorts of culture war issues that, you know, he believes will help to rub up the base. And, you know, for some, sure. But I think when you're dealing with this pessimistic of an outlook on the economy and pessimistic view of Trump's own handling of the economy, because let's be clear, these are all complete own goals, you know, manufactured crises of his own making. I don't think the culture war red meat is going to be enough to rescue him. Well, he was talking also about prescription drug prices. And the fact of the matter is healthcare premiums, early data for the year shows that they're likely to be increasing again this year. So he can talk about prescription drug prices that he's been able to, via executive order and deals with some of these individual companies, muscle down. And in some cases, I think that's good. But the overall picture is not a rosy one.

And so calling attention to this kind of hodgepodge quilt of executive order accomplishments only go so far when the big picture for people is not, but it doesn't reflect the opposite. optimism that he's trying to project. And that brings his full circle to the point you made initially. That's it's a classic pitfall for precedence. He's not on the ballot, which is another problem. From the Washington Post article, it raised one of the experts saying, we have a high propensity voter problem. That is from, again, one of the right-leaning experts who say,

listen, Trump's not on the ballot. So not only do we not have the voters who turn out for Trump, that Trump coalition, that does have more Hispanics, more men, in particular, you don't have that coalition. And a lot of polling suggests it's already, you know, fractured anyway because of the war and prices and the like. But on top of that, your high propensity voters that used to make up the Republican Party base are less energized and interested now, too.

So they're in an absolute mess right now. Yeah. And even on that prescription drug price thing, he just announced, they just announced that they're slapping tariffs on generic drug imports, which is going to increase. logically increase the cost of those generic drugs, which are the less expensive alternatives to brand names here in the U.S. So, you know, even on this one area that he's trying to claim some progress, at the same time, he is undercutting his own progress on that same issue. And then I don't even know what he's talking about with this health care plan because we've

never heard anything else about it. At least I haven't. Maybe you have, I guess this is this is the next phase of the concept of a health care plan that we were promised in the presidential election, but I don't think anyone's holding their breath for that one. No, I don't think so either. I mean, maybe they're trying to squeeze something into reconciliation. I have no idea. It seems unlikely to happen. But good luck to Donald Trump trying to convince people that it's all not just fine, but better than ever.

That's right. You've heard the chaos. Now you can see it. Hello. My gosh. Watch all your favorite podcasts from start to finish right inside the free IHare radio app. Get the blood going up. Catch every laugh and eye roll on shows like the time.

I'm Green Farmcast and park the bus. Now with full video. We're building a ramp for Tony Hawk. It's the same hosts and the same chemistry with all the hilarious moments you've been missing. Right on your screen. Cheers. Open the free IHard Radio app.

Search video podcasts and tap watch. What's up, fam? I'm sports journalist Ari Chambers. Hey, what's up, y'all? It's your girl, Sam J. And we're the host of everyone watches women's sports, a new podcast from Together and IHart Women's Sports. Because let's be real.

Women's sports is giving us way too much to talk about these days. So Kelsey Finler, she became the first female solo rower to go from California to Hawaii. My first thought is like, what's up with the snacks? Like, what are we eating? The highlights, the rivalries, the breakout stars, the moments that take over your entire timeline. And the conversations that start during the game and somehow keep going all week. Every week, we're breaking down the biggest stories across women's sports. Naomi Osaka showing out, she beat.

Sabalinka. Shout out to you, Naomi. You get the palm, Naomi. You get the palm for that. Because we're not just interested in what happened. We're interested in why everyone's talking about it. Because everyone watches women's sports. Listen to everyone watches women's sports.

On the Iheart radio app. Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Hey, Portlandia fans. Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen here. You know us or rather you know them. Tony and Candice, Nina and Lance, Spike and yes, the chicken. We've played a lot of iconic characters over the years, but today we're showing up as ourselves to tell you about Podlandia AEO rewatch, our brand new podcast.

Each week, we'll revisit an episode of Portlandia from the very beginning, breaking down the sketches, exploring the backstories of our most iconic characters, revisiting the Portland locations you know and love, and opening up about our creative process. How did any of this get made? Why do we think that was a good idea? We're ready to talk about it. And we'll also be joined by the people who helped bring it all to life,

guest stars, collaborators, and friends, including director Jonathan Chryssel, the mayor himself, Kyle McLaughlin, legendary musician Amy Mann, and many more. Kyle is going for it here. You fully improvised, not just words, but a song, a melody. I thought he was going to write. I thought you're all going to write a song for you. I remember you thinking that. Listen to Podlandia.

Ayo rewatch on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Well, a marquee race in Michigan, that being the Senate Democratic primary, is coming down to the wire. Election Day is next week on Tuesday. Abdul al-Sahed and Haley Stevens faced off last night in a very interesting debate. Let's start with a little bit of Abdul criticizing Haley Stevens for the money that she's been taking. This was a primary line of attack against her throughout this entire debate night. He tied a lot of his answers back to her APAC funding and other corporate funding coming into her campaign. Let's go ahead and listen to that.

What are you doing? That's something that perhaps we haven't heard before in Washington that's different to keep the cost of living down. So let's tell you, for me, it's I don't take money from the corporations who are jacking up your prices in the first place. When you're bought off by DTE and Blue Cross and Big Pharma and Big Tech and APEC, don't be surprised that there's a pro quo that comes with that quid. That money doesn't just fall off trees, $60 million from outside organizations in this race.

They just come from nowhere. it's because those exact same organizations expect something on their other side, and that's that they get to expect to own your next U.S. senator. So it starts with being able to say, I'm the only candidate in this race who doesn't take any money from corporations, never have, never will. So I just want to say the difference between us is $46 million of APAC spending. They've set a record in this race to help elect my opponent

because they know that she'll be a reliable vote, just like she took last week to send your tax dollars to a foreign government that is aiding, arming, and abetting the very people who want to foreclose on the possibility of Palestinian self-determination. Look, at the end of the day, my job is to take care of you here. I want to be your U.S. Senator. I want your tax dollars spent in Michigan to provide schools in Michigan, to build health care in Michigan, to build roads in Michigan. And I think that money sent over there to kill kids and women is the worst use of our tax dollars.

And yet, that's exactly what 46 million. million dollars in spending will buy you. And Emily, he really hit this theme again and again. You know, it's it's really interesting and a little bit risky because I'm not sure I've ever seen campaign finance be this prominently featured in any election. You know, a lot of times, both sides are taking a lot of money and it kind of gets lost in the sauce of who's taken what from whom. But it's a sign of the times because APEC has become so incredibly toxic and such an important litmus test in terms of the credibility of Democratic candidates in these primaries. I think it probably packs a punch. He also did a thing I thought was very clever where he'd say,

hey, they're going to go to commercial break. You're probably going to see two, three ads funded by APEC for my opponent. And let me tell you what the problem is with that and what they're saying, et cetera. So I thought it was a very interesting strategy from him. Yeah, it is interesting. And also, I think for the kind of normal Michigan voter, what makes it less of a risk, strategy when you think about it in the context of 2026 is that people are people's frustrations with money and politics are boiling over because of obviously the war because of the Gaza war yes but it's I think also just a proxy crystal for people's frustration with money and politics in general and with the system so if people on the right or in the center are saying he keeps

bringing up A-PAC because of Israel, I think actually it's more than that. I mean, just as we followed this issue really closely, you see people around the country reacting to APEC, not even necessarily always with a foreign policy aversion to it, but just saying what happened to Thomas Massey, for example, was gross. It was just an example of everything they don't like and don't trust about the American political system. It's a catch-all for a lot of different themes. I mean, between APAC, data centers, which we'll talk about later in today's episode, and

flock cameras, like, these are big, what's the best way to put it? They're sort of touchstones. They're things that represent what people hate about politics right now, and they're unifying in a weird way. Yeah, no, I think that's absolutely right. Haley Stevens, for her part, her attacks on Abdul were, number one, she's been trying to make big deal about how he hadn't released his financial disclosure. That didn't land as hard because he did really.

his financial disclosure yesterday and there wasn't anything that was particularly scandalous there, but she was trying to still launch that attack, I think is a way to kind of muddy the waters, where he's saying her, like she's basically corrupt. And she's saying, well, he's corrupt because he's not disclosing everything about his finances. That was one of her attacks. Another one was to try to frame him. This is a way to kind of jihitsu the fact that he's much more camera ready, much more charismatic and intelligent in front of a camera than she is.

How dare you? How dare you? Sorry. First of all. for all the Stephen stands out there. I know deeply sexist commentary on my part. In any case, she tried to flip that around and say, well, we don't need, yeah, he can go on all these podcasts. We don't need a celebrity senator.

I'm the one who's in the trenches, getting the work done, et cetera. In any case, let's take a listen to the way that she attempted to attack Abdul over his lack of financial transparency. Not released your full tax returns. $300,000 in other income while you sat in the podcast chair and you hawked, junk health care cures that RFK Jr. would thumbs up. You talk about getting money out of politics and putting money in people's pockets, but still no one knows who's putting the money in your pocket. You know, I have been transparent, and I am offering, you know, real plans to address the cost of living crisis, to tackle Donald Trump's abuse of power. And what you're talking about what you did,

but you also made some accusations here. Dr. Al-Sayad, that is a question that some people may have that Congresswoman is talking about. Talk about. the money and the financial disclosures. You were going to release something. We released all of our financial disclosures. Again, this is a distraction from the issues in your life. I'd love to talk about transparency. I really would.

Because I want you to ask yourself, there is this group called the Center for Democratic Priorities. They didn't exist until they popped up and started running ads from my opponent. And then there's this other group called Center Forward that paid for a flight for the congresswoman and her mother to go to Portugal. And they just released their donors.

And then it's a whole bunch of shell, 501C4 organizations. They're the folks who are literally putting money in our pockets right now to try and miss and disinform us about this race. No concern about the $46 million plus dollars spent on the behalf of APEC that should worry people about perhaps you doing their bidding should you win the seat. Well, I don't think there's much difference between Super PACs going in for Abdul or Super PACs going in for me.

We have a problem with campaign finance reform. He didn't call me an ogre. No. Again, for the record, it was Mr. Federman that was apparently called an ogre in the call, not you. That last part, oh my God, to even get started with us. But yeah, put C4 up on the screen. So Politico had this whole piece about how there was leaked audio of Abdul talking about John Federman, not Haley Stevens, saying, I have no problem primering people like John Fetterman.

I have no problem to do that. Ideally, you put one ogre on a pike, and then everyone else gets the message in all of a sudden starts to sound a lot different. Haley Stevens and Niro Tand and tried to turn this around like he was talking about Haley Stevens being the ogre on a pike, which is what she said there. She gets fact checked in real time by the moderator. I think probably highlighting the fact that Abdul Al-Sayyad, like the entire rest of the Democratic base absolutely despises John Fetterman and thinks that he's an ogre who should be taken out. It's probably not the win, the propaganda win that they were hoping for. Well, she couldn't even land the plane on the financial disclosures.

I mean, just sometimes it's frustrating. Chris, I don't know if you ever experienced this as somebody who covers these races to watch the candidates. Even when they're so bad, like Haley Stevens flustered. Because look right into the camera and say, this is your working class champion. His wife has a $100,000 rental property in Dubai. Like she couldn't even land an effective punch on that. Do I think it's a huge issue for Michigan voters? No, but it gave her something to work with.

Yeah, at least to, like, kind of muddy the water. Right. Yeah. She couldn't even do it. She couldn't even do it. You could hear her trying to, like, interrupt and then deciding that she probably shouldn't interrupt. Like, she just lacks a, I mean, it's not just Riz, but like, she kind of lacks, like, a convincing self-confidence in that setting, at least.

Well, this is the hard thing about standing for nothing. It makes it much harder to have a convincing self to put forward. I mean, genuinely, I think about Kamala Harris suffering for them. this. You know, we talk about Kamala Harris as untalented. It's not really true. It's very hard to not really know where you stand and have to answer all these questions about where you stand. That's really difficult. It's much easier if you have an ideology and you can just take the question in and respond with what you actually think based on a well-thought-out ideology in some sort of principle. And so I think there's no surprise that you have this big gap in the

capability and the charisma of the lefty candidates versus the centrist because the lefties, whether you like them or you, you know, don't agree with their worldview, they have a worldview. And they're not afraid of putting it out there and they're not running away from it. And they, you know, so it gives them a real leg up when you're in a situation like this and you're just having to respond to, okay, well, what is the question? What I actually think about this rather than what do my briefing book say? What's the clever retort that my campaign team came up with when we were workshopping this in practice? So I think that's part of what's going on here as well. Canadian women are looking for more.

More out of themselves, their businesses, their elected leaders, and the world around them. And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest Talk podcast. I'm Jennifer Stewart. And I'm Catherine Clark. And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most inspiring women. Entrepreneurs, artists, athletes, politicians, and newsmakers, all at different stages of their journey. So if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us. Listen to the Honest Talk podcast on IHeart Radio or wherever you listen to your podcast.

What's up, fam? I'm sports journalist Ari Chambers. Hey, what's up, y'all? It's your girl, Sam J. And we're the host of everyone watches women's sports, a new podcast from Together and I Heart Women's Sports. Because let's be real. Women's sports is giving us way too much to talk about these days.

So Kelsey Finler, she became the first female solo roer to go from California to Hawaii. My first thought is, like, what's up with the snacks? Like, what are we eating? The highlights, the rivalries, the breakout stars, the moments that take over your your entire timeline. In the conversations that start during the game and somehow keep going all week. Every week, we're breaking down the biggest stories across women's sports. Naomi Osaka showing out, she beat.

Sabalinka. Shout out to you, Naomi. You get the palm, Naomi. You get the palm for that. Because we're not just interested in what happened. We're interested in why everyone's talking about it. Because everyone watches women's sports. Listen to everyone watches women's sports on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.

Hey, Portlandia fans. Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen here. You know us, or rather you know them. Tony and Candice, Nina and Lance, Spike, and yes, The Chicken. We've played a lot of iconic characters over the years, but today we're showing up as ourselves to tell you about Podlandia, AEO, rewatch, our brand new podcast. Each week we'll revisit an episode of Portlandia from the very beginning,

breaking down the sketches, exploring the backstories of our most iconic characters, revisiting the Portland locations you know and love, and opening up about our creative process. How did any of this get made? Why do we think that was a good idea? We're ready to talk about it. And we'll also be joined by the people who helped bring it all to life. Guest stars, collaborators, and friends,

including director Jonathan Chryssel, the mayor himself, Kyle McLaughlin, legendary musician Amy Mann, and many more. Kyle is going for it here. You fully improvised, not just words, but a song, a melody. Well, I thought you were all going to write a song. I remember you thinking that. Listen to Podlandia.

Ayo rewatch on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. We have another Haley Stevens moment that we wanted to highlight here. And shout out to Sam Robinson, who is a journalist in Michigan. He's actually going to join us on Friday to give us a breakdown of the race. He's just been following the candidates around and talking to them, talking to the voters, who are interacting with both Abdul and Haley, getting their sense of things. And he captured a pretty extraordinary moment here where Haley Stevens was meeting with a constituent who was a community leader. He expressed his concern over her support for the slaughter in Gaza and in a very, you know, compelling and personal way.

And, you know, she really was sort of uncomfortable in the exchange. And it was a, it was a very telling moment, I think, in terms of how voters are processing their choices here. Let's go ahead and take a look at that. That's what you've already voted. I did already vote, early voted. Somebody is going to win. I do not want Mike Rogers to win. And whoever it is, like I said, it's not an issue,

it's not a candidate issue, it's a community rights issue. Yeah, what's your full name? J-A-I. Sable Terry. I know it's not like a broken record. Those six-year-olds that I coach here, they're just as precious as the six-year-olds in Palestine. And it just absolutely breaks my heart when I see

limbs missing children, children, they're having to play soccer on crutches with no legs, having to live lives. And I feel like my country is directly responsible for those actions. When you hear... What do you make of this interaction that you just had? What do I make of it? I mean, again, I... She's not a devil to me, you know?

She's somebody that could potentially win the seat. And I wanted an opportunity to speak with somebody about an issue. And I have no Palestinian. blood in me. It's just I have to believe what I see. I have to believe what I see. So about the interaction, it was fine. It was cordial. We got to talk about both. I tried my best to talk about both sides of what I care about and my professional work, but also a person. So you see there, he says, you know, it's not a candidate issue. It's a human rights issue. And she says, yeah, okay, and she walks out. And then reporters are left there to ask him more about, okay, well, who are you voting for?

Who did you vote for? And tell us a little bit more. Put a little more. Put a little more behind why you hold these views. I think his views are entirely common within the Democratic base. And the question is not whether his view or Haley Stevens view is more popular. There's undoubtedly the case that the Democratic base is more aligned with Abdul al-Assad and with this gentleman who was speaking here. It's a question of whether that $50 million that has come into this race is going to be enough to confuse people about Haley-Stevens about Abdul-Az-Aid. And you would, you know, you have to take that seriously. You really do. I've seen pictures of the people's doors just stuffed full of mailers, you know, many of them from APAC, backed by this, this flood of

money that has come into this race. And that's what they're hoping. They're hoping to make an example of Abdul and show that if you're on the wrong side from their perspective of Israel, Palestine, that they will come in, they will spend whatever it takes, and they will make you pay. Because right now, I'm only the political incentives are shifting very rapidly in the other direction, where Democrats for the first time are having to worry that if they are too pro-Israel, they are going to be primary and they're going to suffer electoral consequences. A-PAC is trying to even the score so that they have to consider, okay, but then am I going to draw the IRA of A-PAC and have $50 million spent against me in my primary?

My Bluetooth speaker just went off as you were being very eloquent, Crystal. But yeah, it's like the turnout problem for Republicans is also a big problem for Haley Stevens because the voter that we just heard from in Michigan represents the type of person that you can pretty much be sure is going to turn out on primary day. That is somebody who is highly motivated by something they see as a fundamental human rights question, a fundamental American values question, and they see somebody who they think is just flagrantly on the wrong side of it. And so that is the person who's going to turn out.

So it's a real problem for Haley Stevens that this is the issue that has motivated Democratic voters in a way that, let's juxtapose it with the Massey primary, Republican voters are not right now having this reckoning at large, right? Younger Republican voters absolutely are, but younger Republican voters are not the majority of voters in a primary, and they're not even the majority of like the grassroots on the right. And that's one of the big differences, I think, between the left and the right is you have more young people involved in the grassroots level on the left. And so if you juxtapose Massey and Kentucky for with this Michigan primary, it's not the

same dynamic at all because Democratic voters right now see this as a litmus test for everything else, for authenticity, for corruption, and of course for foreign policy and humanity and decency. as well. So this is the type of person that's highly motivated to come out on primary election day. And I don't know that Haley Stevens has a comparable kind of cohort on her side. I saw someone talking, I wish I could remember who right now, but I saw someone speaking in terms of what we did in Gaza with our taxpayer dollars is a moral injury to the American people. And so separate and apart from the horror that most Americans feel at the genocide being committed in Gaza with our, our funding and our support. It also, I think, is experienced deeply personally. I mean,

this is, it's shameful. It's horrifying that to have any sense that we were involved with this, that our money that we sent into our federal government went to these horrific crimes. And so I think that's an important lens for understanding the depth of feeling around this, too. You know, that man said, look, I'm not Palestinian. I don't have any Palestinian. I don't know anybody there. But when I look at these kids that I coach, I see them as exactly the same. as these kids who are having their limbs blown off, and that's unacceptable to me. So, you know, I see a lot of, like, why do people care so much about this? And I think it's very easy to understand the depth of feeling around that, the level of shame

that comes from having been complicit. And as you're pointing out, Emily, the way that that maps onto a whole host of political issues and how politicians are going to conduct themselves in office. On the other side of the ledger, Haley Stevens, has gotten some really, I think, important endorsements, Gretchen Whitmer, who is the governor of the state. state endorsed her. You know, we'll see that may be really impactful for some of the people who were undecided, who aren't following terribly closely, who, you know, I think she's generally well-liked within the Democratic base. So she's got that going for her. Gary Peters, the current

senator also came out. Both of these people, by the way, had said they weren't going to get involved in the race. But then when I was like, oh, Abdul's going to win, they're like, I guess we have to decide, you know, they were like, oh, we're not going to insert ourselves. We're going to let the people decide, but then when it started going a direction they didn't like, they changed their mind about just letting the people decide, I guess. Zooming out from the Michigan race, we were talking earlier about the broader Democratic landscape and how, you know, a lot of things are going poorly for Republicans, but it's not all rosy on the Democratic side.

You can put this tear sheet up on the screen. Ken Martin, who's the head of the DNC, apparently things are not going well there. They're broke. They said to spend a lot of money helping Kamala Harris pay off her debts. fundraising is not going all that great. There's a lot of drama and infighting. There was some phone throwing incident that occurred where Ken Martin threw his phone either at the desk or, you know, I guess it's in dispute how close it came to an aid.

It led to an HR complaint. There was a lot of talk about this. Anyways, just a sign that things are not going particularly well there for the DNC. And, you know, you've got all this, you got plenty of money washing into these primaries. But people are so disbared and disgusted with the overall party apparatus. It's not exactly an exciting thing for anyone, whether a larger or smaller donor, to want to pony up money to this dysfunctional institution. Yeah, and this is definitely why. It's a double problem for Haley Stevens, by the way, but other candidates like her, this is definitely why we were talking about Dems lagging in the generic congressional ballot based on their own performance at this exact same part of the cycle, this point in the cycle, 2006 and 2018.

both big blue wave years, I think because there is such disillusionment among people, particularly, you see how motivating this is in primary elections. The question of APAC, the question of Israel, it is a central motivator. It is what is fueling the Democratic Party's grassroots right now. So if you're a Democratic voter that doesn't have one of these upstart anti-establishment candidates in your area, would you vote? Right? You actually might not at all.

Even if you're a generally motivated Democratic Party voter, you usually show up in primaries. You can understand why there would be a lag in the generic ballot because there's such disillusionment with the way the national party is being run, which Ken Martin, by the way, was elected specifically to fix. And there was a lot of dubiousness about whether he'd be able to do it at the time. But that was what he was supposed to do. It seems like it's only getting worse. Yeah, and lastly, in this, the DNC came together and set some of the primary calendar for 28 with the mind to trying to thwart the rapidly rising leftist part of the party. They've been very successful at doing that in the past, but they are losing their grip,

simply because the left has won the argument with the base of the Democratic Party. And so even if you may be able to, and I think this is very much in doubt, rescue, let's say a Haley-Stevens, the winds are shifting and the credibility that the Democratic elite previously had with the base is completely shot. Their electability arguments are completely shot after handing the White House back to Donald Trump. Their media landscape is profoundly different from how it was even in 2020 when they were able to thwart the rise of Bernie Sanders, both with, you know, media sort of marching in lockstep for Joe Biden and also some behind the scenes maneuvering from Barack Obama and an endorsement, by the way, from Jim Clyburn, that was very consequential for Joe Biden in South Carolina. So now the move is, okay, we're not going to wait for South Carolina to go because this is the most establishment-friendly

and conservative primary electorate almost in the country for Democrats. So they've decided to move South Carolina up to be first in the nation with their primary. And, you know, I understand what they're trying to do. I'm not sure, Emily, that it honestly serves their purposes that well. because the previous position of South Carolina was you'd already had a few states that went. You had Iowa, New Hampshire, and then Nevada that had gone before South Carolina in the past. And then you come to South Carolina, it's this sort of like marquee consequential moment. And they were able to use that as like, okay, now black voters have had their say, everybody else has to get on the race.

That worked. If you have South Carolina fill in the space that Iowa previously did, like Iowa's role is not, I'm going to crown the victor. Iowa's role is, okay, the people who just aren't going to be. able to compete at all, it's going to winnow the field somewhat. So it served a different role. So I think maybe this doesn't work out for them the way that they're thinking it ultimately will to put South Carolina first. And rather than having it serve as the kingmaker that it has in the past, having it serve as like the initial culling the way that Iowa used to. Right. And their argument is

purely on the grounds that South Carolina is more representative. But they are doing it now for a reason, representative of the broader population, that argument has basically always existed, but they're doing it right now because they're actually scared that they've lost control right now, which might have something to do with refusing basically to allow Joe Biden to run in a serious contested primary election and then foisting Kamala Harris on everyone. So no surprise that they feel like their control is slipping. But yeah, that's a really interesting perspective on whether it even backfires on them because they don't necessarily, I mean, they don't have control over the grasslands in general right now. It doesn't matter whether it's in Iowa or South Carolina. By the way, latest poll has

AOC doing very well with black voters. So, you know, I don't know that this is going to be the stumbling block they think. Put this quote up on the screen to your point about why South Carolina, because you have the party chairwoman of South Carolina weighing in with this quite telling quote, if Nevada gets elevated over South Carolina would be because of their Latino vote. So you'd then be telling black voters, you matter less than brown voters. And I refuse to believe our party wants to send

any type of message like that. So are, because South Carolina's first, are we now saying that black voters matter more than brown voters? Is that the message that's being sent here? Or the white voters in Iowa? I mean, like, it's just such an inky way to divide people. Completely.

This disgusting racial resentment politics is so, and it is always weaponized. to try to thwart the left. They're doing the same thing to Abdul in Michigan, by the way, who by the way is the person of color who was running in this race versus this white woman and they're still trying to play this like, oh, his base is not the way, you know,

it doesn't have enough of this, doesn't have enough of that, et cetera, Jim Clyburn coming in to make these allegations, et cetera. So in any case, they made it pretty plain what was going on here and it has all to do. They don't care about black voters in particular. They just think that those would be the voters in South Carolina. not just black voters, it's older black voters who are more conservative, more likely to back the establishment candidates. That has been the track record. And so that is the reason why they're

elevating South Carolina. I think anyone who is looking at this with any sort of rational view can see what's going on. Hey, Portlandia fans. Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen here. The Dream of the 90s is alive in podcast form. We're launching Podlandia, A.O. Rewatch, our brand new podcast where we revisit every episode of Portland, together, breaking down sketches, going deep on our iconic characters, and pulling back the curtain on how it all got made. And we'll also be joined by the people who helped bring it all to life. Guest stars, collaborators, and friends, including director Jonathan Chrysall, the mayor himself, Kyle McLaughlin,

legendary musician Amy Man, and many more. Kyle is going for it here. You fully improvised, not just words, but a song about it. Well, I thought you were all going to write a song. I remember you thinking that. Listen to Podlandia. AEO rewatch on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, fam? I'm sports journalist Ari Chambers.

Hey, what's up, y'all? It's your girl, Sam J. And we're the host of everyone watches women's sports, a new podcast from Together and IHart Women's Sports. We're breaking down the biggest headlines. Naomi Osaka, showing out. Shoutouts to you, Naomi. The viral moments. I've been obsessed with Kashan Rock's boxing journey. She looks good. Her combos are swift.

And the stories everyone's talking about across women's sports. Because everyone watches women's sports. Listen to everyone watches women's sports on the IHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. This is Chelsea Hamler from Dear Chelsea. Every week, the news gets worse. The world gets crazier. And Yamanika is here to tell whoever's responsible, you're the problem.

Do you know I just found out who Sidney Sweeney was? If he got a bunch of women, then I should have a bunch of men. Do better or do less, so I don't have to do so much. I'm Yamanika, and I'm out. Listen to You're the Problem with Yamanika on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.