No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen - Republicans get bad news ahead of Trump-themed midterm convention

Episode Date: September 6, 2026

Republicans get some rough news about this week’s midterm convention. Brian interviews Maryland Governor Wes Moore, the Bulwark’s Sarah Longwell, and the Democrat running to unseat embattled Republican congressman Max Miller, Brian Poindexter.Support Wes Moore: https://wesmoore.com/Buy HOW TO EAT AN ELEPHANT: https://static.macmillan.com/static/smp/how-to-eat-an-elephant-9781250464170/Support Brian Poindexter: https://poindexterforcongress.com/Written by Brian Tyler CohenProduced by Sam GraberRecorded in Los Angeles, CASee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Republicans get some rough news about this week's upcoming midterm convention. And I've got three interviews, Maryland Governor Westmore, the bulwark, Sarah Longwell, and the Democrat running to unseat and battled Republican Congressman Max Miller, Brian Pointexter. I'm Brian Tyler Cohen, and you're listening to No Lie. If you've got your big first-ever midterm convention this week, as Republicans do, this is probably not the news that you want shared when it comes to ticket sales. The NRCC did confirm to Fox more than 2,000 tickets.

have been distributed ahead of the convention. So tell us more about the convention and also about this cash advantage for you and the R&C. The big question here, where are you going to deploy the money? Well, listen, I think that people are giving us money because they believe in the agenda

that we're selling to the American people. And I think they believe in the president. They believe in what Speaker Johnson doing and Leader Thune is doing. And we're ready to go. 2,000 tickets. This thing is days away and Republicans have barely broken triple digits.

when it comes to ticket sales, which actually makes sense for three reasons. First, let's start with a price tag. House Republicans are being asked to pony up a minimum $25,000 suggested donation to attend. And this isn't to speak or to headline. This is just for the distinct privilege of being able to walk in the door. And for an idea as to how that's landing, out of 70 Republican candidates and sitting members who were asked whether they were going, 45 of them said no or that they were still, quote, considering. That's nearly two-thirds of the people that were actually asked, hedging or

outright declining for their party's marquee midterm event. Tim Burchett said, quote, I just got a bill. I'm not sure. He called the $25,000, ask, quote, pretty steep. Former New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu said that Trump is supposed to be raising money for the candidates, not the other way around. Jake Elsie said, quote, not everybody's a fundraising juggernaut, and some of these folks feel it's better spent on themselves. And he's right that everybody is not a fundraising juggernaut. And one would think that the leader of a major political party would recognize that too and would consider not charging $25,000 to your own members during their re-election campaigns, while he himself has $450 million, but Trump isn't most leaders. And these Republicans have to

remember that at the end of the day, it is not about them, it's about Trump. When you swear allegiance to the world's biggest narcissist, that means you got to pay the narcissism tax too. Reason number two, This thing pulls Republicans who are in genuinely tough races off the campaign trail at the exact moment they can least afford it. Like, we are fewer than 60 days out from the midterms. And thanks to Trump, Republicans are running in the least favorable environment in decades. Maybe leaving their states and districts to go rub elbows with big donors is not the best use of their time. Perhaps talking to the people whose votes that are actually trying to win might be a little bit more productive.

Then again, this isn't exactly a Republican Party known for their allegiance to regular people. which leads to reason number three, which really is the whole ballgame. This convention is basically shaping up to be one big Trump celebration. It's literally being billed as Trumpapalooza. And it's all happening as Trump's rock bottom approval rating drags the rest of his party down. So if you are a vulnerable House Republican trying to convince swing voters back home that you're your own person, you're independent-minded, you're focused on their kitchen table issues, maybe the last thing you want is a viral photo of yourself on the convention floor in Dallas.

with your cowboy hat included, courtesy of the $20,000 honorary delegate package, cheering for a president whose numbers are cratering and who the voters are showing up to vote against, you would be voluntarily nationalizing your own race around the most unpopular figure in it. And let's be honest, this is going to be a Trump worship fest. Trump's RNC is not going to put on an event where it is anything other than that. So anybody who goes is basically telling their voters, this is where my allegiance lies. I am in Dallas, genuflecting at the altar of Trump instead of talking to you. Like, the reality is you don't show up at Trumpapalooza and then get to go to your own district

and distance yourself from that very guy. You can't have it both ways. And that tension explains basically everything else weird about how this event's been organized. Like, for example, how Republicans haven't disclosed basic attendance projections or state-by-state participation numbers for what is supposed to be the largest Republican gathering since 2016. Like, when you're proud of your turnout, you want people to know what that turnout actually looks like. When you're worried about the turnout, that's when you go quiet and vague. It's also telling that Texas Republicans had to slash their premium ticket prices mid-sale.

They cut their top tier from 20,000 down to 10,000. The next tier got cut from 15 to 7,500. Not something you do when fundraising is going well. You cut prices when the demand isn't matching the hype. So here's where that leaves us. Republicans built an event explicitly designed. designed to be a show of strength heading into a brutal midterm environment, and instead, it is exposing exactly the vulnerability that they were hoping to paper over. The price tag is

scaring off rank and file members. The politics of appearing on a Trump-branded stage is scaring off anybody in a competitive district. And the people who most need to be home doing the actual work of winning their races are choosing to do that instead of going to Dallas. So you can slap, you know, convention on a two-day Trump rally, you can print up cowboy hats, you can book the American Airlines Arena, but you can't fundraise your way out of the basic problem that the man you're building the whole event around is dragging down everybody standing with him. Next up are my interviews with Wes Moore, Sarah Longwell, and Brian Pointexter. No Lie is brought to you by Factor. It is genuinely tough to stick to any semblance of a diet

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We have some major news at the Maryland Supreme Court. I'm joined by the governor of Maryland, Westmore. Governor Moore, can you explain what just happened at the state Supreme Court? This is something that you and I have been speaking about for years at this point. So can you tell us what the big news is? and have been fighting for for years. And yesterday's decision was just massive, where the Maryland Supreme Court, and again, by an overwhelming 5-2 decision, really gave a victory to the people of our state.

And what they did was they said that we can have on the ballot and we now, we will have on the ballot where people have a chance to defend their own democracy and decide whether or not we can redistrict our congressional. congressional lines. You know, the thing that we have continually said is that I believe in national redistricting reform. But what I also know is this, I'm not blind. And what is happening right now, in absence of national redistricting reform, you're having the president of the United States who's deciding to go through his own process. And where Donald Trump is then saying he wants to do things like nationalized elections, and he wants to do things like put federal

agents around voting booths, and he wants to do things like eliminate mail and balloting. And he wants to do things like eliminate mail and balloting. And he wants to tell Republican states that they should do mid-decade redistricting. And so what has now happened in the state of Maryland? We've been pushing for over a year now that Maryland cannot sit on our hands while getting punched in the face and while watching all this happening all across the country. And now we're just very, very grateful that after a lot of work, the Maryland Supreme Court has ruled with us. And this will now be on the ballot in November. Okay, so talk us through the procedural aspects of this. What's the timeline here?

You just mentioned that this question is going to be on the ballot in November. So walk us through between now and the general election in 2028. Yeah, so what is going to happen now is come November 3rd, there will be a question on the ballot about for Marylanders to be able to decide whether or not we can have this freedom and flexibility to be able to make these adjustments on our congressional lines. I will be going around prior to November 3rd. And as I've said, I'm also on the ballot for re-election come November 3rd. And we're going to urging our people to vote yes and vote West come November 3rd.

If we are successful come November 3rd, what then will happen is we will have the ability to go back in front of our General Assembly and say that now we have this authority that's been given to us by the people of Maryland. We now must act. And so we will be able to turn around quickly. and we've already been having conversations with members of the General Assembly, already been having conversations with our legislature. So we know that if the people of the state give us the authority to be able to do this, we will be able to make these adjustments. And I do want to highlight why this is important to.

Because for anyone who thinks that this debate is over, they are deeply mistaken. Because let's be clear, next year, we know that Mississippi, we know the potential of Georgia, we know that Indiana, we know that other states are now going to go through and they're going to follow through on Donald Trump's will, which is go and rig a system, weaken voting rights, and make this pain permanent through this aggressive mid-decade redistricting. So the state of Maryland, if the voters give us

the opportunity come November 3rd, the state of Maryland will have an opportunity to respond. Can you talk about the difference from where we are right now versus just a few months ago? I mean, you and I had spoken at length about the prospect of Bill Ferguson, the state Senate a president blocking this effort. And so how did we get from that point where there was kind of a refusal to acknowledge the broader political environment to right now where, you know, now we are in a place where Maryland Democrats are willing to see the broader environment and fight fire with fire. Well, I think, unfortunately, what would happen was people saw that what we had been predicting for the past, you know, over a year was happening. Right. Wasn't just alarmism.

It was not alarmism, that we were watching an election being stolen in front of our faces, that when we're talking about things like the, you know, him trying to eliminate mail-in-balloting, which, by the way, we sued him over and beat him in court. When he was talking about things like telling us to turn over our voter rolls, which he knows is unconstitutional, and there's no reason for us to do that because it's a violation of the 10th Amendment. And then when he's turning around and then you saw the fall of the Voting Rights Act, which was the crown jewel of the civil rights movement. Yeah. And so we've been talking about this for a year and a half that this was not just some, you know, this was not just some, some overreaction.

We were literally watching an election being, the attempt of an election being stolen from us in broad daylight. And so we're thankful now that we have, you know, have a party that is ready to move, that is ready to respond, that we were able to work very hard to go get both the House and the Senate on board. And then post-November 3rd, if the people of Maryland vote to be able to make. make these adjustments, we will continue to working with both the House and the Senate to ensure then we can present maps. Well, I think, you know, before we move on, I think you and the other Maryland Democrats deserve a lot of credit for moving this issue forward because, you know, as we've seen, it's easy to say the right things. It's a little bit more difficult to expend some political capital and do the right thing, and that's exactly what's happening right now in Maryland.

So, again, a lot of credit to the work that you and the rest of the team have done in your state. To that end, you did just mention what Donald Trump is trying to do, which necessitated this kind of response. Right now, he is engaged in this effort to appeal his illegal executive order, basically ending mail-in ballots except for a narrow set of circumstances in all of the states ahead of midterms. Even though he's had been blocked by temporary restraining orders in lower courts, he's now seeking to appeal this up to the U.S. Supreme Court, what is your job right now? What are you looking to do to protect mail-in voting in your state as he pulls out every stop he can to try and block basically an enterprise that is disproportionately used by Democratic voters. I mean, let's just

call it what it is. He's doing this because he knows he cannot win on the issues. He's doing this because he knows he cannot win when you're watching inflation at three-year highs. He's doing this because he knows that you cannot win when you're starting, you know, starting trade wars with Canada and putting illegal tariffs on other countries. He's doing it because he knows we're in the middle of a war that none of us asked for, that none of us understand, another forever war that he wants to get out of as fast as possible, but he's realizing that one side can start a war, but one side cannot finish it. Other people will have an opinion as to when a war ends. And so what does he do, he then tries to rig the system and he tries to cheat. What we're doing here in the state

of Maryland and what I've also been doing is, you know, I, the other governors selected me as to be the chair of the National Governors Association. So we're working with governors across the country, both Democrat and Republicans, to basically say, remember your rights and remember your powers. Because the truth is, is that this is a by, if he, by doing this, this is actually taking away from state rights. Elections were given to the states, not to the federal government. And that was done by the Constitution. And so what we're urging all of our governors to do, all of our attorneys general, all of our secretaries of state to do is do not give up your power because the only way that Donald Trump can do this is if we forfeit it. And so we're hopeful that as other courts have,

as other courts have shown that regardless of what judge or what jurors that he puts this in front of, they will go back to their legal training and the legal foundation, which knows that him trying to do this is a direct violation of the 10th Amendment and is a direct violation of state rights. I'm joined now by the Bull Works, Sarah Longwell, also the author of the new book, How to Eat an Elephant, one voter at a time. Sarah, thanks for joining me. Hey, man, thanks for having me. So I want to get into the book in a moment, but first, I have to ask 30,000 foot view, as we are now two months out from midterms, what is your outlook on midterms, the Senate-specific? as we've seen Republicans continue to scramble a little bit more. There is obviously money problems with people like Ken Paxton.

Mike Johnson just adjourned the House as he tries to scramble and figure out how to contend with the prospect of a new Epstein discharge petition. So a little bit Republicans in disarray moment right now. As we look at midterms, what is your top line here? Yeah, they're not showing a lot of confidence, are they? Look, this is all about the enthusiasm gap right now. And if you had told me, if I had told you 18 months ago, a year ago, hey, BTC, guess what? Iowa was in play.

Texas is in play. We would have been like beside ourselves with joy and optimism. We wouldn't have believed it. And here we are. And look, am I going to put, am I going to bet the farm on Texas? Never, ever. But if everything that has to go right for to win a federal election in Texas is going right at the moment for Democrats. They got a good candidate on on the damn side. They got a terrible candidate

on the on the Republican side. And they got an environment in which enthusiasm among Republicans. And look, I do the focus groups all the time. And I can tell you the main thing I'm hearing is the depressed enthusiasm from Republicans who are mad about a war, mad about high costs, feeling betrayed. They never got their Epstein files. They think Trump spent all his time on the ballroom in the arch or whatever. And he's not paying attention to their affordability. their material economic concerns. And so we got big races in places we haven't had Democrats with the potential to win and so long. So look, I'm bullish, but always with the cautiousness that comes with saying, could a Democrat really win Iowa? Could a Democrat really win Texas?

Like, it's got to be a big blue wave for that to happen. But all the markers are there. Right. I feel like at the end of the day, all you really need as that caveat is it's still Texas. It's still Iowa. And so you can't, you know, you can't just assume that anything is in the bag. You had mentioned enthusiasm. And I want you to drill on that one point here. To what extent does enthusiasm correlate to people coming out to vote? Well, look, right now in midterm elections, Democrats, because they've sort of traded voters

with Republicans and they now have a lot of these college-educated suburban voters, they structurally do better in off-year elections than Republicans do. because Republicans now really need Trump to kind of juice those low information voters, and Trump brings them out in the general election. But in midterms, Dems still have a structural advantage. Their people want to crawl across broken glass to get out there to vote. You tell them ICE is going to be at the polls. They say, well, we'll see ICE there, right?

While as Republicans, when I listed Republicans focus groups, man, I just did one in Florida a couple weeks ago. And this was really stunning to me because sometimes I screen for Trump disapprovers. So we're already asking them, hey, how do you rate Trump? You know, for people who say somewhat bad or very bad, you know, we bring them into a group to hear, are they persuadable? Are they staying home? What are they doing? This was just a straight up group of Trump, Florida voters. And we asked him to give him a letter grade.

He couldn't get above a C from anybody. Like, and it was mostly D's and a couple people were like, I can give them an F, right? And it's the war. It's the war. When the Iran war has multiple implications for voters. but obviously high gas prices is one of them. That has a negative personal consequence for people. But also it's like another lie that Trump told them.

One that was very, we weren't supposed to be doing this. This was literally you said you weren't going to be doing this. This is how you were supposed to be different. And so it's a betrayal. And so that said when people are like, what agenda am I protecting? What am I turning out to defend? And that diminishes the enthusiasm. What about something like Tarrant County, Texas?

The third biggest county in Texas where the commissioners in Tarrant County, three to two, along party lines, voted to close down 92 polling places in that county. To what extent does these, like you had mentioned before, there are voters who are going to come out and say that they're going to crawl through glass. This is kind of the equivalent to that. When you shut down a third of all polling places in the entire county, you kind of do need to, in a way, crawl through glass to actually be able to cast a ballot. And so to what extent do you think that something like that is going to be effective versus

is that's going to be, you know, something that that almost backfires in the sense that now you have these voters who are going to see that their votes are being suppressed and they're going to be kind of even more inspired. They're going to redouble their efforts to make sure that they can get their ballot cast even in the face of such blatant voter suppression. Yeah, I mean, look, I don't know, if you listen to black voters right now, black voters are very aware that their voting rights have been under threat by this administration. Like, there is more, and like the black community has done a lot. People who are, you know, leaders in that community have done a lot to make sure their voters understand that these guys are coming for their

voting rights in ways and stripping people of their rights. And so I do think it backfires in that it creates more enthusiasm. I think the problem becomes just like a real logistical problem is like, do they have to wait eight hours to vote? And anytime you do that, you know, are putting a friction and a real barrier between people and their ability to vote. And so it's hard to game out exactly how that works. Something I can say, and you know this, right? We both have lots of friends who are in the voting rights community who are out there doing this work. And they are prepared.

Like, there is money. There's lots of scenario planning. Like, they are trying to make sure that they can figure out how to make it possible for everybody to vote. Like, there's people on this. So the book is called How to Eat an Elephant, one voter at a time. in writing this book, which you basically lay out a playbook for building a coalition big enough to permanently defeat this kind of magistyle authoritarian, fake populism, whatever it may be. What was the most surprising thing that you came across while you were writing this book?

Well, this is, you know, eight years of focus group data. And I started the focus groups when we were trying to primary Trump in the early days. And I was trying to figure out if that was something we could do. answer was no, by the way. And it's, in the early days, I really realized how deep Trump's relationship was with voters, how much they had watched The Apprentice, how much that had contributed to the carefully curated, the carefully curated image of this businessman. You know, he was firing Gilbert Godfried on a soundstage and American voters said,

that guy's a good businessman. Yeah. And that good businessman thing, and it also like Oprah, he spent a million years with Larry King, he spent a million years with like, you know, Howard Stern, like, he was so much a part of the firmament that the thing that I would say is at the center of this book as a thesis is that Donald Trump really is a unique individual with a unique communications talent and a unique parissocial relationship with voters. He broke a bunch of things that are now permanent parts of the communications infrastructure, number one being, I'm going to talk directly to the voters. I'm not going to be

mediated through the media or through anything else. Like my tweets, my bleats over on truth social. Like, I'm going to talk directly to people. And so at that core, though, is I as a former Republican have watched as Trump has basically not just taken over the Republican Party, but like it's a cult of personality and there's nothing after him. And so the point is, is that if you look two years, everybody's so like, will he leave? What will he do?

What happens when Donald Trump is gone? But like actuarially and constitutionally, this guy is gone from the presidency. And then the Republican Party has to decide, is it for something? What does it stand for? Does do these voters still turn out without Trump in the ballot? He brought an entirely new group of people into the voting population and drove a whole bunch of different people away. So my point is, what if the Republican Party is nothing without Trump, a hollow shell? that the Democrats, if they could just get it together in a few places, recalibrate in a few areas,

that they could be on offense for the next decade and dominate it because Trump will have left the party in shambles. And so it's a playbook for how to build that sort of, hey, guys, let's get our shit together and all go hard and push right now. It's a generational opportunity. Which kind of underscores how clownish the JD VIII. Vances and Marco Rubio's of the world are when they do this like this poor imitation of Donald Trump because they don't have the same charisma. And I say that as somebody obviously who doesn't like him, but still acknowledges the charisma that he has for his audience and how effective he is at communicating with his

audience. But when you've got J.D. Vance and Marco Rubio doing their like, their like, T.M.U. version of Donald Trump kind of like underscores how, how lame all of that is because they don't have what he has to their audience. But I was going to ask, you know, you had mentioned what Democrats need to do to pull it together. What does that look like? If Democrats are going to, basically, in your version of events, run things for a decade in the aftermath of Trump, after he's hollowed out that party and kind of exposed the truth that this GOP doesn't stand for anything. I mean, they claim to stand for family values lined up behind a guy who is a serial,

sexual predator, claimed to stand for fiscal responsibility. The debt is now past $40 trillion. I mean, the list goes on and on. What do the Democrats need to do to get their shit together? Yeah, look, the book's 330 pages, although it's a fast read. So I'm not going to be able to do all of it now, but let me try this as like the centerpiece. Donald Trump promised people economic populism, right? He came in as a, he doesn't even remotely look like the Republican Party that I knew 15 years ago. And he pitched a kind of populism that he never delivered.

delivered on, not even remotely, right? He talked like an economic populist, but he just gave tax cuts to the rich and did all these corrupt deals with like the tech oligarchs and everybody else. So Democrats now, they lost their working class coalition. They lost their multiracial working class coalition. And how do they rebuild it? Voters are very clear on this. Please talk almost exclusively about my material well-being. Now, people will say kitchen table. issues, they'll say affordability, they become buzzwords. I need Democrats to say, okay, 70% of the time in every speech I give and I'm going to give more of them, I've got to communicate about this all day long. I need to lower the cost of people's health care. And the fact is, you know what voters are

ready for? And I think that Democrats need to get their first on. And it might feel weird to hear a former Republican say this. Universal health care of some kind is like, it's like it's like it is where people are. It's what they want. For all the good that the ACA tried to do, ultimately it made a lot of people's health care costs too expensive. It, you know, tethers them to a job. Like universal health care would reset both our economy. It would mean that people could have health care without, you know, having to stay at a job for healthy. Like it would do so many things. Voters want that. But it's also about education, upward mobility. It's about jobs. Are we hiring more nurses? Are we hiring more home health care aids? And I think for a Democrat, they need to kind of get their

heads on straight and say, I'm going to talk about the issues that are close to people's sense of how they live their lives. And I'm going to, because this is the other thing voters say. They're like, it's not that I don't, I'm not mad about trans people. This is like, especially Democrats and swing voters. They're like, I want trans people, but I don't want to talk about it so much. Like, why is this what we're focused on? And so Democrats should, and I don't think it has to be like Mom Dani, for example.

So I don't think that Mom Dany's ideas on policy, his prescriptions, whether it was the grocery stores or the free transportation. I don't actually think that those are particularly good economic policies. However, the particulars of the policies matter a little bit less, especially to voters, then making it clear you care about the thing that they care about, which is making their lives more affordable and making New York City a place that they can live in. And actually, as Moldani is actually governing, he's just doing like good government things. He's doing like licensing reform. And so me, the former libertarian Republican is going, okay, Moundani, are we doing licensing reform?

I love this. And so I think that there's a world where Democrats could really say we're going to focus on people and what they need, the top level thing and not all these niche concerns and we're going to build a bigger coalition that way. I think what you said about universal health care, I completely agree. And I think Trump has been instructive here because he's shown that our institutions and the way that things used to be is not sacrosanct. Like he's come in and barreled through everything. He's broken everything. All of these things that we were told can never change. He's just change them. And so if he can do that but for self-enrichment, then we could do it to make sure that everybody, at a bare minimum, in the wealthiest country in the entire world, has health care.

Last question here on this, you know, in large part, the reason that Republicans were able to be so successful is because they've had a right-wing media infrastructure at their disposal for, you know, since the mid-90s, really at this point. I mean, Fox came about, I think, in 1996. And since then, you know, Fox's, and I've told this before, but like, Fox's motto was fair and balanced, not because Fox itself was fair and balanced, but because Fox viewed itself. Roger Ailes viewed Fox as a balance to what was otherwise a liberal media ecosystem. And so they've always been overtly right-wing. And of course, now with independent media, you know, you've got Tucker Carlson, Alex Jones, Megan Kelly, Daily Wire, Candice Owens,

you name it. There are so many avowed right-wing propaganda outlets. And so given the fact that they have had, you know, a 40-year head start on building up their right-wing infrastructure. And I think you're the perfect person to talk to about this because of the excellent work that you and your team have done at the Bowork. You're the publisher and CEO of the Bowork. How do we contend in upcoming elections, 2026 and 28, on the media space with a right-wing machine that's just been humming along for my entire life? Yeah. So here's the great news about this. I do have a chapter called Build Baby Build and it's really about

this building a new media ecosystem. The thing is, yes, they had a 40 year head start, but also it was much harder for them to build that back then. The cost of entry or the barrier to entry now is so much lower. And so part of what I

am asking people across the political spectrum to do is like, get out there and go on offense and you cannot rely on the mainstream media anymore. The mainstream media is bound by rules that cannot work in an authoritarian age, right? That they're trying to, I'm not even judging them exactly because like they're trying to be these neutral arbiters. They think that's what's required.

And it defaults then to the benefit of the authoritarian's. And so I need Democrats to basically, and this is my my one real sort of kick in the pants is like I come from the Republican side. I'm in a unique space where I've seen the operative side on both the right and the left. And on the right, they are straight up mercenaries. They are fighting every day for dollars, attention, eyeballs. And I need Democrats to do a little more, a little less nonprofit C3. Hey, we're going to unionize our C3 and we need Fridays off and no one's going into the office. And a little more like, hey, if democracy is really at stake, put on pants, go into the office,

grab a microphone, like get on offense. Like do some narrative dominance. And, you know, I bring the affect of a softball coach here. I'm just like a lesbian Republican who's like. Like, come on, guys, we can do this. Stop saying America's lost. If you say Americans are too stupid and America's too corrupt and whatever that we're lost, then we surely will be because you've already given up.

Don't give up. This book is a optimistic pitch for what we could do if we pull ourselves together and say, let's all go on offense. Let's talk about Epstein. Let's talk about corruption. Let's demand wartime generals from our leaders and stop having these peacetime diplomats who think that we're still, they're dealing with John McCain. They're not.

These are not, that's not who these people are. And so it's sort of a desperate plea as well as, look, here's a bunch of concrete steps. And here's a posture. I need you guys. What if your life depended on it? What would you do? How would you do things differently? Because you say democracy depends on it.

How about we act like it? Perfect place to leave off. Again, the book is How to Eat an Elephant, one voter at a time. I'm going to put that link right here on the screen and also in the post. description. Look, there is nobody in this ecosystem right or left who has spoken to more actual voters than Sarah Longwell. So I would highly recommend taking this advice, highly recommend grabbing this book. Again, I'm going to put it right here on the screen, also in the post description. If you're listening on the podcast, I'm going to throw it in the show notes.

Take the time right now, click that link, support the invaluable work that Sarah does. Sarah, as always, thanks so much for taking the time. I appreciate it. My man. Thanks. One Republican congressman who is embroiled in a scandal, a domestic abuse scandal with his ex-wife, just had a disaster encounter with TMZ. Here's that clip. I just want to know about your opponent, Brian Poindexter. You put out an ad called Daughters with his three daughters taking center stage,

saying that he's for everyone's daughters. That's why he wants to be in D.C. What do you make of that campaign? Yeah, so once again, absolutely. Did you know that we returned over, I think, $50 million? to our district, back to our community. So once again, did you know these campaign? What do you think of his campaign?

Did you know that throughout our time here, in just the last, this term of Congress, 18.8 million we brought back to the district. That's amazing, critical infrastructure in police and finance. Thank you very much. Well, why is that, you're only going to answer it? It's not a gotcha question.

Is he finding an effective campaign or not? I'm not worried about my opponent. I'm worried about the work that we're doing for our district. These are all trapped questions. If you want to know, if you want to know, you're not trapped. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You guys don't want to have a serious conversation.

You said you supported the first one, right? You guys don't have a serious conversation. But once again, real things that matter to our district are incredible. Thank you, for your time. Thank you for your time. So I'm joined now by Brian Point Dexter, who is running against Max Miller in Ohio's 7th Congressional District. Brian, I got to ask first and foremost,

do you think that was an effective strategy, by Max Miller to diffuse some of the bad press, bad attention away from him as he remains embroiled in this domestic abuse scandal. Well, I don't know what he was thinking there. I know he doesn't want to talk about the ad because it's a really good ad. You know, really highlights the fact that, you know, I am a good dad. I am just somebody coming out of the workforce to fight for people in this district. And, you know, the ad really shows who I am, which, you know, by default,

shows who Max Miller is too. And the fact he doesn't want to talk about it, you know, I can see why he doesn't want to. To that end, I'm going to play that ad right here. Mark. Our dad, Brian Poindexter, has been working since he was 15. Every night after school. He never stopped, factories and kitchens. 20 years as a union hour worker building our community.

And he always shows up. For family dinner, for our games, to help with homework, even when he's not helpful. He shows up for everyone. Co-workers, neighbors, and our whole community. For anyone who's getting hurt, or needs a hand. And he keeps his phone clip to his hip. It's like it's 2003.

The second he starts ringing, he, like, grabs it so fast, and he answers it, he's like, Prime Point Xx shirt. He'll never ask him to floss. Oh, no. Like a Fortnite dance. I bet he will do it right here.

What a dork. I still don't know how he did it at all. He'd say that's just what you do for your family. Our dad is running for Congress because he knows every family here deserves that. It's not a campaign thing. That's just dad. I'm not going to D.C. for me.

I'm going for my daughters and yours. I'm Brian Poindexer, and I approve this ad. All right, so that was an ad that you put together with your daughters. I understand, and I think it's pretty obvious to everybody watching, the contrast that that sets between not just your families, but you and Max Miller himself. And I think that, you know, we are in a moment where character, does and should matter, even if the broader environment sometimes makes it feel like that isn't

a condition or a qualification at all anymore. What did your daughters have to say about putting this ad together? You know, they were good sports. They, you know, we have a really good relationship with my daughters and I and we roast each other all the time. You know, it's part of how we show our love for each other. You know, they called me a dork, you know. So they definitely had fun with it, but, you know, when you get down to the meat and potatoes or what the ad was expressing is that, you know, they love their dad and their dad loves them. And that's why I got in this race, because, you know, I want to fight for a future where they can, you know, buy a house, where they can, you know, live comfortably and where they can have more opportunities than we had. And, you know,

we used to do that in this country, pay it forward to the next generation. And I think we need to get back to that. Yeah. To that end, I mean, look, my generation and your daughter's generation is the first that's going to be less prosperous, less wealthy, less healthy, have lower rates of homeownership and poorer health care and food security. I mean, the list goes on and on than previous generations. You know, that was in large part, I think, part of the pitch that Republicans had for voters. I mean, this was this was a populist pitch that they made in 2024 where they promised they were going to focus on the little guy, the forgotten American. And yet, of course, right on Q,

we have an administration and a broader political party that is so in bed with millionaires and billionaires. Their only legislative accomplishment passing a tax cut that disproportionately benefited those people. You've got Trump out here advocating for data centers because those are part of the interest of the billionaire class. And so what are you hearing from voters out there who believed Trump and Republicans cast votes for Trump and Republicans, including Max Miller, on the back of this promise? Yeah, the folks I'm talking to in the district, they're tired of the lip service of Washington. You know, they see it all the time. You know, the legislation with a catchy name that doesn't do what it's intended to do, you know, like right to work.

We know that right to work laws make it harder on working families to save America Act, which we know is going to make it harder on Americans to vote. You know, and, you know, they were promised all these things, you know, the one big beautiful bill was supposed to be prosperous for Americans. And really what it is is just highlighting the fact that we have a group of politicians who just want to extract as much value out of our communities and out of our country to enrich themselves. And they're already rich. Like they're trying to get richer and richer and richer and we're paying for it. You know, we see the Dow going up every single day. You know, but at the same time, food lines are getting longer and longer every day. There's no clearer indication of what's happening in real time than to see that dynamic play.

out. And yet we have a gold coin now with Trump's face on it. And yet, despite all of these, you know, vanity projects or ways to, as you said, extract money from working class Americans at the hands of this president, nobody in his party lifts a finger. I mean, you have Max Miller, who hasn't said a single word against Donald Trump as he continues to push forward this war that's sending gas prices higher, that's sending inflation higher, that's sending fertilizer costs higher. that continues to suppress the Epstein Files, even though it's been nine months since the Epstein Files Transparency Act

was actually signed. We have the trade war that continues to rage that's sending the cost of everyday goods, consumer goods, even higher. Is Max Miller doing his job as a member of a co-equal branch of government? No, and Max Miller isn't doing his job, and there's a lot of politicians

who aren't doing their jobs. I think, you know, some members of Congress think that they are the offensive line and the president is the quarterback. back and they're there to protect him no matter what. And that's not the case. You know, Congress should be standing up for the rights of Congress. It is a co-equal branch of government. And, you know, me as I've had to do it on a city council where I've had to stand up to the mayor, even though, like, I'll agree with the mayor on some things. But my job is to stand up for

the people, stand up for, you know, the residents of Brook Park. And I want to get into Congress to stand up for the American people who are being hurt by. these policies. We shouldn't, you know, I don't care if it's a Democrat president. You know, if they're doing something wrong that's going to harm the working families of Ohio 7, I'm going to stand up to him. And that's the job of the congressman. And Max Miller has absolutely shirked his duties at every opportunity. And, you know, probably because he, he benefits from those things. You know, he's wealthy and well connected. And the wealthy and well connected in this country are doing just fine. It's everybody else who's paying the tab.

and, you know, we need to make real change in Washington. Number one priority that you'd like to see if and when you win your race for Congress. Number one priority is to bring relief to working families. You know, I'll sign on to the Pro Act right away, you know, and work to get in that past. You know, but my main goal is to try to be a voice for working families. And I will do that. I'll work with anybody who wants to help me in that cause, you know, So I don't care if the Republican, Democrat, or independent.

I am going there to fight for working families. And that's my mission. As you've been on the campaign trial, has there been any conversation or moment with any Republican or independent voter that's stuck out to you? Well, yeah. I mean, it happens almost daily. But, you know, one of the best moments I, you know, I was out canvassing in Parma, Ohio. And, you know, this was early on in the cycle and I was, I was knocking on Democrats' doors. And, you know, there was people out there moving some furniture into their house.

And they weren't on my list, but I was in their neighborhoods. So I wanted to introduce myself. And I said, hey, I'm Brian Point Exeter running for Congress. And clearly the dude was Republican because he, you know, he crossed his arms. He had the 1776 shirt on and the blacked out flag. I'm like, hey, man, you know, I just wanted to introduce myself. I'm running for Congress. I'm in your neighborhood.

He's like, he asked me point blank, are you Democrat or Republican? I said, I'm a Democrat. And he scoffs. And I was like, look, I'm the old school Democrat who's a union iron worker, who's going to fight for working families, and I'm not going to get into all the bipartisan BS,

or nonpartisan BS. And he's like, oh, my buddy who's helping me move is a union electrician. And I was like, so he knows what I'm talking about. He knows what I'm fighting for. And he gave me that opportunity to talk to him. And after about five-minute conversation, he's like, you know what? I'm going to vote for you. And that told me then and there that we're on the right track.

We're bringing people together. And, you know, people are tired of the partisan divide. And if I can help bridge that gap, you know, I'm going to do it. And as an iron worker, I build bridges. So I think I have an opportunity to do that. To that end, what does the latest polling in your district look like? You know, I'm not really focusing too much on polling. We are, you know, we are slightly up in the polls, but polls don't vote.

And I'm going to keep on doing everything that I can to engage with as many people in our district as we can before November 3rd. And, you know, I hope they see that I am somebody different, somebody who is going to go to Washington and fight for them. Well, on that point, how can folks who are watching and listening right now help your campaign? Well, easy. Just go to pointexter for Congress.com. You can, you know, read about my boss. You can watch our new ads. And, you know, you can sign up to help.

And obviously, you can donate to help us get that ad up on air. And I would highly recommend for everybody who's watching and listening right now. This is an opportunity to get somebody who actually represents the working class into the U.S. Congress. And, by the way, get somebody who is not just dangerous for Congress, but just unto himself, dangerous as a person out of the halls of Congress, out of power right now. So I'm going to put a link to Brian's website right here on. the screen and also in the post description. If you're listening on the podcast, I'm going to put it in the show notes. Brian, as always, thanks for taking the time today. Best luck in the campaign trail. Thanks, Brian, and I appreciate all the work that you do. I've been a fan of yours for a long time,

and I want to say thank you again. Thanks again to Westmore, Sarah Longwell and Brian Pointexter. That's it for this episode. Talk to you on Wednesday. You've been listening to No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen. Produced by Sam Graber, music by Wellesie, and interviews edited for YouTube by Nicholas Nicotera. If you want to support the show, please subscribe on your podcast. preferred podcast app and leave a five-star rating in a review. And as always, you can find me at Brian Tyler Cohen on all of my other channels, or you can go to briantellercoen.com to learn more.