Raging Moderates with Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov - The Rise of Conspiracy Politics in Trump’s America (ft. Astead Herndon)

Episode Date: April 29, 2026

After Trump imposed sweeping tariffs, tried to prevent the release of the Epstein files, and led the U.S. into another potential “forever” war, are the bonds that keep the MAGA coalition together starting to fall apart?  Jessica Tarlov sits down with Vox’s Astead Herndon — political journalist and host of the new podcast “America, Actually” — to discuss these and other big-picture trends on both sides of the aisle. They also break down Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s testimony on Capitol Hill, as the 60-day clock on the Iran conflict winds down. Facing tough questions on strategy, civilian casualties, and rapidly depleting weapons stockpiles, one key question looms: is there any real clarity on how this ends? They also talk about the major ruling delivered by the Supreme Court on Louisiana’s congressional map, which many say further narrows the Voting Rights Act, intensifying the fight over redistricting. With Florida Republicans pushing an aggressive new map, which party is really winning the map wars? Plus: conspiracy theories explode online in the aftermath of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. But it’s not just Republicans who are holding conspiratorial beliefs. Jessica and Astead dig into the state of the electorate ahead of the midterms: which voters are being misunderstood, what storylines are overhyped, and what a post-Trump political landscape might actually look like. Follow Jessica Tarlov, @JessicaTarlov  Follow Prof G, @profgalloway  Follow Raging Moderates, @RagingModeratesPod  Subscribe to our YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@RagingModerates Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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You can visit Grow Therapy.com slash Vox today. to get started. That's growtherapy.com slash box. Growtherapy.com slash box. Availability and coverage vary by state and insurance plan. People have always projected the version of Trump that they wanted to see. And so much of his appeal was rich guy for little guy. And like, you know, outsider of the club, he was pushing back against an elite class more than he was a member of it.

And I think there are ways that he was outside of the establishment, particularly in Republican politics. But he's now the Republican. establishment. And I think that the behavior of this administration has driven that home. That group of people who really saw Donald Trump as a means of busting up the cabal, like, has lost faith in him. Welcome to Raging Moderates. I'm Jessica Tarlov. And today I'm very lucky to be joined by a Stad Herndon, who hosts America, actually, at Vox. He's also the editorial director.

He's also a political analyst at CNN. And you may recognize him. least this is where I became familiar with the stead when he was a national political reporter at the New York Times. It's so cool to have you here. Thanks for coming on. Thank you for having me. I'm pumped. Yeah, I'm pumped too. If you aren't already, please make sure to subscribe to our YouTube page to stay up to date on all of the politics. There's a lot to get to. We have some very heated testimony taking place on Capitol Hill already. Defense Secretary Pete Heggseth is there. He would like to be talking about the budget. Everybody else is talking about the war in Iran. And he's also talking about Joe Bucethexeth.

Biden a lot, which is one of my pet peeves. The guy is gone and you won, so just enjoy it. But the 60-day deadline to draw down the conflict in Iran is fast approaching. Lots of reporting surrounding how, especially on the Senate side for the Republicans, that they're getting a little twitchy about it. But let's take a look at Hegssath answering a question. So they haven't broken yet. Okay, we haven't gotten there yet for all of the... Well, their nuclear facilities have been obliterated. Underground, they're buried and We're watching them 24-7. So we know where any nuclear material might be, we're watching.

We're watching my time. Just a quick second here. We had to start this war, you just said, 60 days ago, because the nuclear weapon was an imminent threat. Now you're saying that it was completely obliterated. They had not given up their nuclear ambitions. And they had a conventional shield of thousands of- So Operation Midnight Hammer accomplished nothing of substance. It left us at exactly the same place we were before. So much so that we had to start a war.

Their facilities were bombed and obliterated. Their ambitions continued. Timelines are pesky things in all of this. What do you make of Hexeth on the Hill and kind of where we are with the war? Yeah, I mean, I think that has Hexeth is scrambling to backfill an administration that is recognizing a quagmire they're in over there. That's one of their own making and one that was completely predictable. I mean, we talked to John Bolton for today, Explained Saturday. who, you know, has been advocating for something just like this for a long time.

And he was saying, not like this, though, that he thought, he's like, oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like, I didn't want it like this because of just how they've walked into this, not preparing allies, not recognizing a kind of clear points of retaliation from the regime, things like closing the Strait of our moves, which were brought up to Donald Trump. And the reason he didn't do this in the first term. And I think, like, we're seeing an administration that was a trigger happy, frankly, I think, after Venezuela and just wanted to press on. I mean, from my work through the run-up into now,

it's been so consistent even how much the MAGA coalition would tell themselves that Donald Trump would not do exactly what he's done. So I think for a lot of people, you know, Trump hypocrisy is just a thing that's built into the cost, and I completely understand that it's a man who like flip-flops every second and, you know, doesn't believe many words he's saying at the time. But this was the specific issue. that a lot of people, from the Steve Bannons to the Tucker Carlson's to the kind of broader

group of Republicans who had changed the party, had told themselves that this is what made Donald Trump different. He would not do the Forever Wars. He would not kind of walk us into a foreign conflict without an exit strategy. And that's exactly what he's done. And so I think heck said what is trying to do on the Hill is, you know, what the administration's been trying to do over the last several weeks, which is backfill an explanation that most Americans aren't buying. And I think that's why the, those, you know, the timelines flail, the kind of answers don't make sense. And I think for most, for most, like, individual voters and I think for an electorate that we're tracking for the future, people get that.

I don't want to say this is such an important day because tomorrow it'll tick higher. But today, gas is 423 a gallon. And that's pretty high for the average American, you know, diesel up over six in a lot of cases. We have a huge fertilizer problem. And Donald Trump is making this argument now that he, wants to basically just play an economic pressure game and he'll just keep the blockade going. So he's not interested in resuming even the air attacks. He certainly doesn't want to put puts in the ground because there's no appetite for that. But it does feel like they're making an

argument that there aren't economic consequences for us. This is about squeezing Europe and China and Russia. And from your reporting, what are you, I guess, hearing about that and the kind of cognitive dissonance between what they're saying and people who support him are feeling. Because this split, and you already mentioned some of the key figures in it, like a Steve Bannon or a Tucker Carlson, is really hyped, certainly on my side of the aisle, right? Like, I love to see infighting. But I never know how real it actually is. I think it's fair to be skeptical of it. And this is what I tell people.

I'm like, baseline Republicans are largely with Donald Trump, but we've seen some of that change over the last seven to eight months. I think it started before the Iran War. this is principally about tariffs, in my opinion. Like, this is principally about a decision that this administration made that spiked inflation, that was the exact opposite thing of the egg prices reason. A lot of people put him into office in the first place. And so we started seeing that drop off really last summer from even some people, particularly the independent swing voter who voted for him.

And that's why I say make a distinction between MAGA coalition and Republican. Because Donald Trump's success, as an electoral candidate, is that he pulls together a type of person who will vote. for him, you know, outside of the Republican Party. Now, that's where I think the Tucker's and others matter is because they're more representative of that group than the traditional Republican base. And so I think that like tariffs were the initial driver. And even when we see some of the backlash from Iran, when we talk to folks, that's

mostly driven by gas prices, as you mentioned, by, you know, I think an underestimation of the diversity of goods that would have been affected by the Strait of Harmuz. and fertilizer and others. And so I just think that the economic concerns are the tangible ones. But there is always, I think there is a sense of loss of credibility and dysfunction that's really plagued this White House since his return. And I think that is not just, you know, tariffs and Iran. That's also Epstein, which I think was a backtrack that really split some of that base.

And I would say Minnesota and ICE, I think that was widely, you know, even if he correctly named a problem that some people felt about border security or something. There's been a mass rejection of his big deportation push. And so I think across the board, you've seen a White House that has lost its own ability to narrative set. And they don't really have another play, my opinion. Like, they're busy, they've been busy and they've gotten used to being able to tell their voters what to believe, to kind of play assignment editor to media. And I think, kind of dictate, you know, block out the sun, I think on a lot of issues. And I frankly don't think he has that power anymore.

I would also add in he's just kind of diminished. Like, you know, this happened in Biden era too. But I think this is not, you know, I think the sleeping. He's tired. Yeah, the sleeping. The hell, he does the sound the same. He doesn't look the same. And I don't think that stuff is meaningless.

I think that also has like, I think, caused a group of people to really see this as like a more expected, I think, you know, traditional Republican administration rather than what they were trying to do, at least on the campaign trail. He hasn't followed through on the premise he set out. Yeah, I think that that's really important, especially because the MAGA coalition now has so many casual Republicans, seemingly the Latinos and young voters in particular, who seem to be shifting back to the Democratic side because they were just visiting, right? They were like, we'll try this out. And if it's shitty, you know, we'll move on. So I do think the aging part of this matters a lot. And especially in the context, I think a lot about all those autopsies, not the one Ken Martin won't give us. But the ones that we actually saw about how folks felt about the parties and it was weak versus strong.

And part of being strong is being awake. And Donald Trump is struggling with that. It was easier to pitch himself as chain change it when he was running against a Democratic Party pitching himself as status quo. His, I think, the solutions he was pitching on the campaign trail were never universally agreed. I think he did a better job at Democrats at diagnosing problems people felt. And so that's what I think is the tension we're seeing. now is the gap between the solutions he was always pitching and the fact that I remember on the trail when you would ask people about tariffs or you would ask people about the kind of project

2025 of it all, they wouldn't necessarily love that. They just thought what was happening right now wasn't good. Now we're seeing them seeing his proposed solutions. And I think there's a backlash against that. Yeah, I 100% think that's right. Obviously, it's reflected in all the polling. But I want to ask you about this lack of power to agenda set because someone, as someone who works in conservative media, I've been frustrated for several years by the fact that, A, Donald Trump seemed to have his finger more on the pulse of the average American than a lot of people in Democratic leadership, but also that he could essentially order everybody, no matter your politics, to talk about what he wanted to talk about. And I don't see that anymore. I think

Epstein is a key plank in that where people are just like, yeah, he's just trying to hide the Epstein list or whatever. But, you know, what do you think about that diminishing power? I think you're right to really point that back to Epstein and some of the other issues we talked about. I tell folks like, you know, particularly I think if you don't follow conservative news or talk to Republicans or whatever, I think that a lot of like more, you know, news watchers can be like, how did you ever think that Donald Trump was, you know, someone who wasn't part of the Epstein class, right? We knew they had a long relationship. We knew all of those things coming in to 2024 and that. But, you know, people have always projected the version of Trump that they wanted to see. And so much of his appeal was rich guy for little guy.

And like, you know, outsider of the club who people felt was more of, you know, like, you know, like he wasn't, he was pushing back against an elite class more than he was a member of it. And I think Epstein really showed how much that's not true. Or they were pushing back against him. Yeah. Because he always wanted in. Yeah. And they were like, actually. That's a better way to push.

it because he has been desperate to be in that kind of club. And I think we kind of saw that rejection. And so he was able to pitch that electorally as a reason he would be fighter for you. And I think there are ways that he was outside of the establishment, particularly in Republican politics. But he's now the Republican establishment. And I think that the behavior of this administration has driven that home. And so I think Epstein's a key link there because it, you know, I was, I remember I was so, you know, that kind of, um, Kewanani. conspiratorial wing of the right isn't small, you know, like, and I remember, you know, that kind of Ron Paul wing, that, you know, like that group of people who really saw Donald Trump as a means

of busting up the cabal, like, has lost faith in him. And so I don't think that means that, you know, Republicans ain't going to win an election again. But I do think that means that, you know, that kind of approval rating collapse or the midterms are something that, as we could closer to referendums on Trump, that's better and better for Democrats. I want to talk Supreme Court with you, but you already brought up the conspiracy theories, which I also wanted to talk about you. So let's stay in the land of red-pilled and blue-pilled because it's a great time to be a nut case. Right.

And I'm sure you saw the Manhattan Institute survey that had 46% of Democrats think that Butler was staged to benefit Trump. I actually messaged at the Manhattan Institute to ask if they had data. on the right for that question, which they didn't ask them about, which frustrated me. And I voiced that concern. But they also had asked the right about a bunch of other conspiracy theories. And it's mostly these new entrants into the coalition, who think the crazy stuff. Everything from, you know, 9-11 was an inside job, moon landing, faked, et cetera.

What do you make of the state of the American consciousness? Yeah. It's wild. I mean, like, I think that we're in a breakdown of shared reality. And I keep telling people, like, I think that's been building for a long time, like, whether that has been, you know, all the way dating back to, like, the collapse of shared media or monoculture, whether it's our kind of self-selecting social media ecosystem or kind of deference to the algorithm, whether, you know, whatever kind of version you want to do, I don't think we all,

you know, we don't agree on the version of events that are in front of our face. And I think that's been building, we know that from the Republican side. Like, I tell people, like, you know, I follow a lot of conservative news. I talk to Republicans all the time. I do a lot of traveling to make sure we hear those voices. And one of the things I always remember was, like, the fever pitch after 2020 before January 6th. And the kind of like fervor and anger that was taking over people that, like, we're going beyond the kind of conspiratorial folks who expect.

I always tell the story about, like, being at, I was covering the, um, the special elections in Georgia for the Senate after Biden had won. And I remember being at like an Ivanka Trump event in suburban Georgia with all of these kind of well-to-do Georgia ladies. And everyone was talking about like machine fraud and like the kind of conspiratorial like Biden stole the election. And it really was this moment for me like, this is not as fringe as you kind of thought. Like this is becoming more mainstream.

Obviously, that culminates in January 6th. Now, I don't want to say it's one-to-one with Democrats, but it's been building. Like, I totally think it was undercover how many people think that the 2024 election was fake. I mean, I talk to some Democrats who still tell you they're not sure that Donald Trump really won every swing state. And so you started seeing some of that then. You stole of it in Charlie Kirk and I think in Butler. And I think it's really exploded, you know, even this weekend with the shooting at the White House Correspondence dinner. And so, like, I think that it's somewhat a function of our institutional trust loss, like, right?

Like, people have stopped believing in kind of institutional media. And I think, like, and I think some of that has led to conspiracy rising. Like, if you believe the creators more, like, if you rather advice come from your, like, kind of individual friend rather than like trusted doctor. I even say this back to COVID. I think this was a big part of that institutional breakdown too. I think it leads to some of those conspiracies bubbling up. I would also say in their defense, I do think something like Epstein shows how institutional

media can be missing, like doesn't want to touch things that are somewhat in their sphere. And so in there, that like independent media, that kind of like TikTok-driven journalism hasn't been able to seize on our willing blind spots, too. So I think some of it is self-inflicted on like our part. But I think it's a much bigger breakdown of shared reality. And I think it's going to make stuff like politics harder because I don't think we're all working from the same premise. And those silos that folks are living in have only grown to be more and more further apart. Yeah.

And you also have, in this links back to what you're just talking about with Trump, that you have politicians. that are scared of telling their constituents the truth. For sure. About, you know, anything from, I mean, it's still over 50% of Republicans who think 2020 was fraudulent. Yeah, I mean, like, if we start to, like Donald Trump's origin story,

I always say this, like, birtherism was a popular opinion among the Republican electorate. Like, when we think about his rise, we should not think about birtherism as a problem for him in that early 2016 primary. It helped him. It was an asset.

That was an asset because it was wide. I remember this is a long time ago, so I don't have the poll on hand. But I remember doing a story at that time about how the majority of Republican voters in Iowa in 2016 thought Obama was born in Kenya. So, like, I'm like, he wasn't off the pause. He was on the boss. He was driving the pause. And so I'm like, sometimes I think our unwillingness to deal with the scope of people who believe in those conspiracies, allow them to fester. And I think also allow us to miss political movements.

that are happening. And so because we have decided that's fringe, that doesn't necessarily mean it's French. And so I think something like that Manhattan Institute poll, something like I think the flood of, I think some reactions we're seeing about Butler, about things, things, I think are forcing a conversation that isn't just simply left-wing violence or left-wing conspiracies or right-wing conspiracies, I think it is a breakdown of institutional trust overall that's led kind of baseline voter to be just wildly out of the, um, I keep using share reality. But wildly out of the share reality that I think you're more elite or news watchers or news followers are existing in.

Yeah. I would add Maha. Yep. Another great one. Especially like I have a four and a two-year-old and, you know, a mostly liberal set of friends. And they weren't, they didn't, you know, switch to Trump for RFK Jr. But they were like, why aren't you guys talking about? For sure.

Right. Like, why aren't you talking about that my kid doesn't. need the COVID vaccine, right? That this might be safe and affected for adult. You're totally right to call it back to COVID because that is really where we started to go. He really seized on that institutional distrust. I remember being in Michigan during when he was still running as an independent.

And I'm like, you know, saying that both parties don't have your interest in mind is a 70% plus opinion from voters, right? Like saying that corporations have captured pharma and food and all this is a majority. opinion among voters. And so I do think that sometimes there are issues that are on the ground that like the kind of establishment or kind of corporate-led versions of both parties aren't really talking about. Or can't touch. Or can't touch, really. And I think that's allowed this kind of lane to fester in a bigger way. But, you know, I certainly interviewed RFK. It's so wrapped up in conspiracy. It's so wrapped up in falsehood that I don't want to act like it's legitimate from a

truthful, like, factual basis, but it's definitely emotionally true for a lot of people. And I remember, like, the, you know, at RFK events, the majority of those people were ex-democrats, you know? And I think that was an underrated piece of the Trump to coalition. Yeah. Another day that I'll cry about that again, but I totally saw that too. Okay, let's take a quick break. Stay with us.

I'm Maria Sharpova, and I'm host. a new podcast called Pretty Tough. Every week, I'm sitting down with trailblazing women at the top of their game to discuss ambition, work ethic, and the ups and downs that come on the path to achieving greatness. We'll dive into their stories and get valuable insights from top executives, actors, entrepreneurs, and other individuals who have inspired me so much in my own journey. Follow Pretty Tough wherever you get your podcasts. I want to tell you about a new podcast from Vox called America Actually. It's hosted by political journalist Estad Herndon, who I love. The show asks the question, what will America look like after Donald Trump?

Better happen. Trump's been running a one-man show for over a decade, but we're heading towards the first open presidential election since 2016, and it'll play out in a country that'll feel very different. America actually digs deep into the questions that you and your friends are asking about politics, culture, and the economy. It'll map out the people and ideas that will shape the future beyond Trump. You can watch America actually on the Vox YouTube channel and listen wherever you get your podcasts. Is the U.S.-China rivalry ultimately a race to build the future? The United States and China are the two countries that are really inventing the future. The future is being financed by Wall Street, invented in Silicon Valley as well as Chen.

I'm Jake Sullivan. And I'm John Feiner. And we're the hosts of The Long Game, a weekly national security podcast. This week, author Dan Wong joins us to discuss America's Lawyerly Society, China's Engineering State, and why derangement might be a prerequisite for superpower status. The episode's out now. Search for and follow the long game wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back.

I want to make sure that we talk about the Supreme Court because this is a massive ruling that Louisiana's congressional map was unconstitutional, upholding a lower court ruling that mapmakers relied too heavily on race when they redrew the state's voting boundaries. The ruling delivers a significant victory for Republicans and narrows the landmark voting rights act. It doesn't do away with Section 2, but it's on its way to gutting it. The news comes as Florida's legislature debates, a new congressional map proposed by Governor

Ron DeSantis, so I guess he is going to aff around and find out. Leader Jeffries, please pay attention. The new map could potentially add four more GOP leaning seats to the state. Democrats say it'll be a dummy mander. but we'll see what happens. It'll definitely go to court because their Constitution, I think, bans it. How significant is today's Supreme Court ruling? Huge.

So, I mean, I think that, like, we're at the first steps of this, right? Like, we are going to see, I think we're going to see a couple things. We're going to see Republicans who are already planning for some of these rulings, particularly to Santas and Florida, test the limits of how far they can go on these gerrymanders. I think we're going to see questions of Donald Trump's power. remember in places like Indiana, he tried to really force those state lawmakers to do a more dramatic gerrymandered. They did not want to do it. That intensity is going to grow, I think, in some of those states. We'll see how kind of far some could go. But I just think in general,

like, you know, this is an arms race that has been building for a while. And, you know, it's so disconnected from the majority of the electorate who don't find these, who understand Congress's brokenness, right? Like, who don't, who understand that Congress has gotten A more partisan has gotten, has refuses to pass, like bigger legislation because they're mostly worried about primary challenges. And they don't necessarily, you know, I don't think, sometimes I think insiders can overrate how much information you need to really get, like, the power structures going on. I'm like, they don't need to know about Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. They know Congress is broken. Like, that's obvious that everybody involved. And so I think

the big impact, of course, is going to be about like some of these black districts in the South, whether these conservative groups are going to try to write them out fully, and whether Democrats can marshal a response. But I would just say, like, there's the short-term question of the midterms, right? Like, Donald Trump's goal has been to win these midterms before they start. Like, his goal has been to functionally usurp the kind of democratic process that would make this a referendum on him and ensure that the Republicans can maintain their majority through gerrymandering.

I think that's the short-term question. I think as we build to 2028, there is going to be increasing pressure, particularly on Democrats, but I don't, you know, I think it might be all around about what is the version of democracy we want. I think there is some level of political creativity that's been missing from Democrats about like a long-term plan to make democracy more responsive. And so when you saw 2024, you know, the pitch from Harris and Biden, I think, was a lot about protecting a democracy that sounded like a status quo argument. my opinion. And for the majority of voters, and killing some Democrats, they don't, they didn't think that what we were doing right now was working.

But I think it's a better message. And I think what Democrats are getting closer to is improving democracy. And so I think you're going to get proposals on the kind of structural government rethink from all of these candidates getting ready to run in 2028. The question will be like, has Donald Trump blown everything up before they're able to do that stuff? Because as we remember, Democrats tried to, tried, to reinvigorate the Voting Act in the early days of the Biden administration and they ran into some blockades,

filibuster, cinema, mansion, and others. But the necessity of it is very clear because I do think we are, I don't think like, I guess I'll just say this myself, like, do we want to live in a plate? Like, how much can we call it a democracy if the majority of electorate's votes, particularly in the most representative branch of government,

are completely written out? You know? And so I think on a congressional level, there's increasing distaste for that. I think there's certainly a distaste for like the electoral college and how that does it on a presidential level. And so I think there will be pressure from voters to say, what are we doing here? And I think that pressure increases with this decision. But the short-term question is about the midterms and whether Republicans can simply use this to kind of finesse their way to an undeserving victory. Yeah, I think that's all right and super interesting.

I, on raging moderates and just in my conversations, I'm constantly asking lawmakers, like, what do you have? Yeah. Like, what's the thing that your campaign got? Right. Because status quo blows. Like, nobody is interested in. No one's having fun.

No, there is no status quo voter out there. Like, maybe a 90-year-old who's like, I want the good old days, whatever that was. But they probably have a grandkid that's telling them that they can't own a home. They don't have a job. and they're drowning in student debt and they don't have health care. So, like, that's not working either. And I think, you know, taking steps with, like, the affordability agenda that Greg Kazar and Pat Ryan just put out, like, those kinds of things that are forward-looking and

have policy heft to them matter a lot. But the institutional damage, I don't think we even understand how bad it is under the hood. Like, you know, the Comey indictment, which I'm glad to see, you know, Annie McCarthy, Jonathan Turley, they're out there being like, this is a joke, right? And it didn't take you 10 months to investigate a bunch of seashells or whatever Cash Patel was saying. But even if there's a democratic takeover of the DOJ, is it broken on a longer term level that we're not even able to kind of process at this point? Like, how do you get everyone back? The scope of institutional damage is like, is overwhelming.

Like I was saying this to, you know, like someone else the other day. I'm like, you know, whether it's like the kind of open grifton corruption. or pay to playness of it all, whether it's the change in federal workforce and Doge and all that stuff, whether it's the growth of executive power and the way that, like, I think some of those things were intentionally written so they can have a fight and have a fight in court to expand the president's role and actually make Congress more minimal, right? And so I think all of those kind of structural power questions are ones that Donald Trump has uniquely introduced because of his, you know, I would say, you know, I would

say like authoritarian need tendencies or his his unwillingness to, I think think about democracy in its three branches form. But to your point, it's not clear to me, I don't think the Democrats have offered a counterweight that recognizes that democracy in its current form is not serving even their own voters. And so that's what I think is we're leading to is, okay, What is the way, I think that, you know, this is kind of work we're trying to do in America, actually. It's like, what is the way that a post-Trump America?

What do we take from this moment? What do we, what do we leave? Like, what do we want to leave behind? And how much of this is here with us to stay, too? And I think that is something we're just on the early versions of because so much of his personality has wrapped up that debate. But it's not just about his personality. Like, right? Like these are levers that are now introduced for, you know, the next president, whether it's J.D. Vance or Gavin Newsom or whoever, right? And so I think that type of question of how do we institute, how do we improve our democracy will be something? And how do we make it more responsive? How do we think about political power are questions that Democrats are increasingly asking? You know, the kind of fight question has been more in the last year or so. They, their voters want not just to see their politicians.

like articulate anti-Trump rhetoric, but use their power in ways to, I think, that are more affirmative. And we weren't really seeing that as much in Trump won. But I think it's part of a recognition from baseline Democrat that, you know, talk isn't enough. And that, like, they haven't, in kind of engaging in a rhetoric battle,

they've let the Russ votes of the world reshape government in their image. Yeah, well, we've never had great long-term planning, right? Like, they're always been comfortable with the long game. That's the Dobbs decision, right? Like, if it takes 50 years. Right, right. Limit Leo's planning for 20 years. Yeah, 30 years for that. Yeah. And if there's a setback, it's just a hiccup. Yeah. Right. It's not like a complete meltdown. And so I have been appreciative and feel, you know, positive about the response, let's say, to the redistricting in Texas. Like, I like Prop 50. I like Virginia, especially because they ask the voters.

But now, like, I was reading maybe Colorado, they're going to go to Colorado. which is increasingly blue-leaning and say that it should be 80 here. Or Illinois could be 40. Like, they could draw new stuff, right? It's already so funking in Illinois. It's already so weird, though. Like, so guess what I'm saying? It's like, I mean, there's the kind of tactical political question of like how they can

respond, which is, which is important. And I'm not trying to minimize. But I do think that even the response pulls our structures further away from where most of the electorate wanted to be. Like, I hear so much about, you know, term limits and ending the electoral college and get money out of politics and, like, things that are D are independent that are, I feel like, part of people's recognition that like these folks are acting in their own self-interest consistently. And so I understand if you are a person who's personally invested in the Democratic Party success, you're just like, how do we respond? Like, how do we match Republican fire with five? And that has importance.

But I think when you think about swing voter, when you think about general election voter, people are more distant from this process. What I hear when I'm around those folks and when we do reporting about those communities is like the number one thing is, like, we don't think this is working at all. You know, so I'm like, there's the primary

and kind of midterm more like political invested question. And then there's a bigger one of like, when we get to the presidential election, Like, I do think another level of creativity is going to be required by those voters because the structure itself is one that is pretty unpopular. My last question was going to be, you know, from your work on America actually and just all of your reporting, what do you think is the most undercovered story right now in American politics? And it might be this, you know, that we actually need a vision for 2028. Yeah, I think some of the stuff and things we talked about, like I mentioned some of the issues that we hear about that rarely get talked about and like kind of political world. And I think there are things that are super tangible people. Obviously, we know

about affordability. We know about those things that I think are still top of the list. But I say issues like homelessness, crime. I mentioned like fixing money in politics or things that I hear about a lot. But if I think about like a kind of larger setting question, I think in like 2016 or 2017, there was such an obsession with the demographic changes in America. And there was an assumption that they were going to lead to this like permanent liberal majority. Now, we know that that's not true anymore. I think that's something that Trump, particularly in 2024, showed, is that many of those groups are swing voters, right? Like, they've rented them for one election, but they're voting for a Democrat in the next one. They've been voting for Democrats

all due these special elections. But those demographic changes are still very real, you know? And I somewhat think that the backlash to identity politics is such that we've stopped acknowledging just how big those changes are. And so, like, there will be a way that the influx of first-generation Americans changes our politics. Like, it's our already, right? And I think that even the ways we talk about, I think about the ways we talk about race and a lot of primaries, like, that is so built from an old school black and white dichotomy that's mostly built in like civil rights see politics. That is changing. Like, like, that's changing among younger black voters. That's changing among an increasingly born, like, black immigrant

population. That's increasingly changing from people who don't view themselves in a black, white, binary at all. And so, like, I just think that the way we talk about who we are is increasingly not compatible with who we're going to be. And so that's the story that I find undercover, partially because once the assumptions were proven to be false, aka all these people weren't just like secret progressives or like secret Obama liberals. Like, we now just are like, oh, maybe they're just secret Trump voters. I'm like, no, neither of those things are true. Like the reason those assumptions are not working is because both of those boxes are inadequate. And so, like, I don't know where that leads us, but I don't think it leads us backwards. You know, I think that leads us to something different.

And so part of what I feel like is the work we're going to try to do. And the work I just think I wish political media would do more of is, like, being open-minded to those type of changes rather than trying to reinforce old guardrails. And so, like, that's what I am motivated by is, like, I do feel like the question of, like, who America is shifting. But it's not shifting based on our past assumptions. And so let's shed, now that those are shed, like, if one thing Donald Trump is done, he's blown those up. So I'm like, at minimum, we got to move on. And the next version of something, I think, will be more nuanced, will be more complex. and the question will be whether our political system is built to reflect that.

It's actually kind of perfect timing with the 250th anniversary as well. You know, a nice round number. Also, we're out of time, but shout out King Charles. I thought it was great all day yesterday. The shade and the charm. The War of 1814, the War of 1812, all that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was at the British Embassy on Sunday for this White House correspondent thing.

And they wouldn't let us stand on the grass because the king was on his way. And I was like, you know what? Fair. Fair. He is at the end of the day still a king. And that the White House tweeted a picture of them and said two kings made me just want to die a little. As sad, this was awesome. Thank you for coming on and everyone should listen to America actually as well.

Thank you, you for me. Loved it. Before we go, reminder that Raging Moderates is on substack. Subscribers get those ad-free episodes. Is there anything more exclusive? in an ad-free episode. Access to me and Scott in the community. He's like on a live stream kick.

He did one yesterday. Probably be doing one tomorrow. We have a newsletter, the Monday Rage. It's really good. Join. Ragingmoderates. Dot profgumedia.com on substack. That's all for this episode.

Thank you so much for joining us today.