Raging Moderates with Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov - Trump’s War on the Press BACKFIRES — And the Networks Fight Back

Episode Date: September 21, 2026

Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov open a packed week for Trump both foreign and domestic. Trump addresses the 81st UN General Assembly tomorrow, with meetings also planned with UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham and New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Later this week, Chinese President Xi Jinping visits the White House for a state dinner with a guest list that includes Tim Cook, Sam Altman, and Jensen Huang. And Trump is claiming he has closed a deal with Denmark giving the U.S. "permanent control over security and all other needs" in Greenland — expected to be signed at the UN this week. What should we be watching? Meanwhile, Trump has banned CNN, MSNOW, and Politico from the White House, accusing them of reporting "fiction and lies." The three outlets are now suing for access — and today, major TV networks declined White House pool duties in response.  A new House Ethics complaint is accusing Representative Lauren Boebert of sexual relationships with three staffers and a $200,000 hush payment to one of them. Boebert's spokesperson is calling it a "politically motivated stunt." Jess weighs in.Plus, Scott clears the record on the current stage of crime and homelessness in San Francisco. Finally, the campaign to convince Kamala Harris not to run in 2028 is gaining momentum. After Gavin Newsom said he'd stand down if she ran, Democratic superdonor Reid Hoffman has now said it would be "a very challenging path for her." Meanwhile Harris has been making public statements about the growing dangers of AI — one of the biggest issues of the midterms. And with or without Harris, Democratic donors are now reportedly open to an AOC run in 2028 — what does that signal? I Disagree by Jessica Tarlov is out now!Order it here: https://sites.prh.com/idisagree For ad-free episodes, exclusive livestreams, and to connect with Scott, Jessica, and the Raging Moderates community, join us at ProfG+ on Substack: https://ragingmoderates.profgmedia.com/ Get The Monday Rage newsletter: https://profgmedia.com/s/monday-rage/ Follow Raging Moderates on IG, Tiktok, and Facebook: https://www.instagram.com/ragingmoderatespod/ https://www.tiktok.com/@ragingmoderates https://www.facebook.com/ragingmoderates Follow Jessica Tarlov on Instagram, Substack, and Bluesky: https://instagram.com/jessicatarlov https://substack.com/@jessietarlov https://bsky.app/profile/jessicatarlov.bsky.social Follow Scott on Instagram, Substack, and Bluesky: https://instagram.com/profgalloway https://substack.com/@profgalloway https://bsky.app/profile/profgalloway.com Subscribe to our YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@RagingModerates Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Visit sonos.com and build your system. Sonos. Love the sound. Feel the system. Welcome to raging moderates. I'm Scott Galloway. And I'm Jessica Tarlev. How the book launch go, Jess?

I'm so sick of myself. Do you remember this feeling where you're like, I cannot listen to myself anymore. Don't turn off the podcast, guys. No, it's a lot. It's a lot. It's a lot of running around. But it's been great, like, doing the live events and meeting actual people who have read the book or, you know, are fans. A lot of raging moderates listeners out here in Los Angeles.

And San Diego was awesome. I thought, oh, this is a nice quality of life. What am I doing with myself? But, yeah, it's going well. It was fun on Belmar. Oh, you were great. Great. I meant to tell you. I thought you were really good. Thank you. And Bill likes you. You can tell he lets you disagree with him and doesn't get upset.

The hallmark of a win there. Well, it's in the Great Series Entourage. R.M. Manuel says to Vince, they don't pay you to act in the film. They pay to market it. And what I found with books is they don't pay you to write the book to pay and market it. And so it's important that you get out there. Anyways, congratulations. So we're 43 days until the midterms and we'll be doing our best to keep you updated with everything you need to know. Please hit subscribe to support this show. All right, let's get into it.

Trump will address the 81st UN General Assembly tomorrow in New York and while he attends. He's also expected me with a number of world leaders, including UK Prime Minister Annie Burnham, and also Mayor Mamdani today. Later in the week, Chinese President Xi Jinping will visit the White House. The guest list for the planned state dinner includes Tim Cook, Sam Altman, and Jensen Huang. This all comes as Trump says he's closed a deal between the U.S. Denmark and Greenland that gives U.S. permanent control over security and all other needs in Greenland. The deal is expected to be signed this week at the U.N.

Lots of stuff going on this week. What are you looking for, Jess, or what do you take of all this? How sad it is that he thinks that this Greenland deal is going to be the kind of win that will divert everyone's attention from the dumpster fires that are going on everywhere else. Greenland, or I should say Denmark, by extension, has always been signaling that they were willing to increase military cooperation. And then Trump, of course, had to come out there and be like, no, we're going to own you. And lo and behold, they're not, we're not going to own them, which we shouldn't. Sovereign nation and all of that. But obviously, you know, all eyes on China, that meeting is going to be the biggie at the state dinner. I want to get your take on what you think that those AI leaders are thinking as they head in. Jamie Diamond will be there as well, Jane Frazier, too. Do you think that there is any expectation of real movement, if there's any meaningful agreement on AI? My guess is it would be no.

And they kind of both just want to puff up their chests and be able to. go back to their corners without having gotten anything major done or any major losses. I assume the tariff detente will be extended or that would be the hope there for both countries. I, you know, hope in a prayer that someone mentions Jimmy Lye, but that seems doubtful. And I guess there's, you know, questions around arms to Taiwan and whether Trump will send up any flares or indications. as to what he's going to do there. But it feels like much of a muchness, frankly, and, you know, Xi Jinping is heading into a big political year.

And then the expectation is that he'll announce that he's going to roll for another five years. I think it would be next fall that that announcement would come. So he kind of needs things to be copacetic. I realize I asked you like 20 things embedded in that. But I do think that the suspension of press access is the big, story, even as it relates to UNGA, because he's going into this without pool coverage, which means that the only output that we're going to be getting for what's going on is coming directly from the White House, very 1984-e and incredibly dangerous. And I mean, I want to talk a lot

about press freedom. But those are my top-line thoughts as we head into UNGA week. It's a huge opportunity, but I doubt they'll take it. The silver lining and all of this around AI is that it could serve as new connective tissue between China and the U.S. from the store relations. The Chinese and the U.S. have a huge overlap in terms of a vested interest and not making it easier for a rogue nation to develop a super weapon. They don't want their kids depressed. They don't want their companies or cybercrime to start eating up more and more of their

GDP. So there's enormous, if I were counseling the president and the president were more strategic, than I think he is. I think he has an opportunity meeting with Xi to pull off something akin to sort of a September surprise, if you will, and announce a sweeping deal around cooperation around AI. I think that would be incredibly smart in terms of being a fiduciary for the American people and also politically really savvy. I don't think he's going to do it. I don't think he understands it. I don't think he cares. I think they'll reference it, but I don't think there'll be anything tangible. I think good governance would have been for him to have about 200 diplomats and technologists and social scientists drafting. dramatic cooperation agreement that they would announce at this. And I believe the Chinese would do it. I think there's huge overlap in terms of our interests here. And China regulates AI to a much greater extent than we do. They don't allow bots to pretend to be a human for a greater, you know, for a certain amount of time because they don't want people having these fake synthetic relationships. There could be, they could announce a really wonderful bilateral agreement of

cooperation around AI and establish themselves as leaders. AI is a big threat to both, both nations, because at a very basic level, AI is this incredible leveler. Only nine nations know how to take whatever it is, the cake to enrich uranium, to spin it, to nuclear fuel, to put it on a projectile, to deliver a nuclear device. AI is going to level up probably 50 nations' ability to do that. At the same time, AI also levels up a regional hospital's ability to reduce sepsis using AI. So the question is, how do you put in place cooperation such that you suppress the leveling up of very dangerous and very bad things? There are cybercrime organizations with 400 people that are very well organized and make millions of dollars.

Now it's going to be, now you're going to have basically all these startups who talk about the first unicorn from one person. Unfortunately, what we're going to see is probably me more cybercrime organizations, which is one person that used to take hundreds. So we absolutely have an enormous, a huge van overlap. This is an incredible opportunity to get the two to shake hands and agree to hard work of their diplomatic corps. Unfortunately, we have the bad news bears now underneath the government or underneath the president because they have decided to fail to as more important than confidence in a lot of our most talented diplomats and professionals with real expertise and contacts have just thrown up their arms and left. But who knows,

maybe they'll surprise us to the upside. The other thing that's kind of symbolically important is look at who's at the table, Tim Cook, Sam Altman, and Jensen Huang. So essentially, I mean, the Treasury Secretary isn't there. It just shows that America has now gone full Monty in terms of corporate capture, that the people who are seen as the most powerful people representing the most powerful nation, are the president and the head of a chips company and two of the new kids on the block who happen to be billionaires driving the economy with their hypers scaling capbacks that might end extinction or, you know, at a minimum raise their electricity rates. It's just very strange.

The Greenland deal is, that's just a press release. We had this before we threatened to invade them. I mean, this is just, we've always had a mutually benefit. relationship like the birds picking parasites off a rhino the u.s gets security access Denmark goes to gets to look sovereign greenland gets historically the least say of anyone at the table every one of the meetings this week jess the UN she greenland is sort of a test for whether humans can still do the one thing that got us ahead or the reason we competed and won against the hominids

and that is cooperation. So this is a test if we've learned anything over the last 30,000 years, and that is an ability to figure out a way to cooperate with people we don't trust

because the alternative is worse for everyone. And so the UN is basically the table in the high school cafeteria where we invite all of the, you know, the out people, the uncool kids,

and we find there's real benefit to having the uncool kid or who you think is an uncool kid at the table every once in a while. So this, again, is it's either going to be an example of we're learning or are starting to go back to the ultimate mechanism for progress, and that is trust and cooperation and communication, or if Trump, again, just shows that he's, in fact, a fucking Neanderthal and has decided to devolve digress and go back to a middle kingdom. It fits actually kind of perfectly in how you were describing what's going to go on this week, that he is going to Gracie Mansion. So it is very rare for a president to go. Trump has visited Gracie Mansion before pre-being president.

He went to see Bloomberg, I think, a couple times. But every time that he has been in the room with Mom Donnie, he has turned into a giddy little girl, to say the least. and he's smiling and asking for photos and thumbs-upping them while Mamdani maintains a certain steelyness, at least in the photos that get leaked out of there. What do you think that meeting is going to be like? I know Mamdani pushed last time he wanted all of this funding, federal funding, for the Sunnyside Yards development. I Trump apparently said yes, agreed to it. There has been no movement since.

So I imagine that will come up again. But it is a strange photo op, I think, that he's going for at this particular moment when you think of, you know, how low his approval is. He just went below 30% for the first time. It got 29% in a poll that was out this morning. And Mom Donnie is like king of the socialists. So, you know, what is the thinking? Like, oh, I should be shoulder to shoulder with this guy. Do you think he's going to try to ream him out to have a big, you know, manly chest moment?

Or is he, you know, going to be that little girl, just happy to be invited to the party? He's very drawn to success. He's drawn to youth and people are handsome. And I think it's, Mumdani is a generational talent. And he's arguably the most over the year, if you were to say, who are the three's most successful politicians in the world, mom Donnie would be on anyone's list. He's just, you know, he's, he's, he's beloved in New York. He, he manages his brand really well, whether it's astroturfing the shit out of anyone who

criticizes him online with fake accounts, which I sort of, I sort of respect, whether it's very tightly controlled media appearances. He will not come on our podcast. Everyone comes on our podcast. He will not. Al Sayette is coming on our podcast. Secretary Clinton will come on our podcast. You know, Republicans running for president will come on our podcast, but Mamdani will not go into an uncontrolled environment. He is perfectly manicured. The Democrat who's like that is Ossoff. Assoff is also, as a filmmaker, very tightly manicuring his appearances. And Trump wants to bask in that glow, and it's his home city, and he likes a winner. And Mamdani gets something because Mom Dami can say, you know, I'm the guy who gets along with the world's most powerful man

and can reach across the aisle. And so they both, you know, one plus one equals three here. This is a smart move. This is a smart move for both of them. And if Mamdani, you know, can, hopefully can show some of that political savvy and get, you know, whatever it is. Or just say, hey, can you, can you, we'll work with you informally with ICE, but can you not have people dragging people out of preschool here? You know, he, I think, I think Trump's the kind of guy where, you know, you yuck it up and he'll agree to something. So I think Mom Donnie should, should, quite frankly,

to sort of take care of, you know, take advantage of his hot girl status and get the old man to, you know, get him a job interviewer, look at her art because he's super interested in art. I think that it also is going to be a big opportunity, for Mom Dani to go at the president for what's going on with the press pool and this all-out assault on the First Amendment that, you know, it's been spiraling for the last few days. It started, you know, on Friday when he put on Truth Social that he was going to ban CNN and MS Now and Politico. It came in like right before we did Marr, actually. So we talked about it a little bit. And frankly, like,

shame on me. I thought it was another one of his false flag threats where he just said, you know, I don't want these people. And then folks started showing up to the White House and their badges didn't work. And now, as it should be, the other networks are standing with CNN and MS now in solidarity. So there is no White House pool rotation from CNN, Fox, NBC, ABC, or CBS. Like I just said, all the footage is going to come from the White House. That's exactly how they want it. And it's crazy to me. I was watching Scott Besson this morning with Joe Kernan on CNBC. And, you know, Kernan likes Trump a good amount.

It takes a lot to get him fired up. And he is fired up about this assault on the First Amendment. And Besson said, you know, I don't really know the details. I was away when this happened. You know, they're also spineless. But this quote from Trump, it just sticks with you and it sits on you. Like, how did we get here? He says about what's going on, it's sick.

I mean, there's something wrong with a country that can allow people to write purposely negative stuff. Now, if they want to write them, that's fine. But I don't have to let them into the people's house. Into my the people's house. It is not your house. You are a short-term tenant. You are a renter at the very least. It's scary stuff to me.

I don't, I mean, do you have any feelings? Well, this came up on your appearance on Bill Mara, and I forgot who your co-panelist was, but he... Chris Rufo. He created a comparison between... He talked about the importance of free speech, and he said that the president should allow these credible news organizations in, as should Robert Kraft, should allow McLemore, is that his name, into Gillette Stadium. And in my view is that as the mother of all false analogies or comparisons. Gillette Stadium is privately owned.

Robert Kraft owns it. He can decide who the fuck he wants in there or not. And as a Jew, if he's decided I'd rather not host a raging anti-Semite, he gets to make that call. The White House is public space. The taxpayers pay for it. And a key component of a healthy democracy is press. And no, the president does not have the right to start cherry-picking only friendly press. My sense is, and I'm curious because you're closer to this group,

than I am, that even Fox doesn't like this. And eventually, everyone's going to like, okay, you throw a party and you think only people who like you and tell you how handsome you are going to show up to your party, well, you're not going to have a party. No one's going to show up. My sense is they're all going to rally together. The majority of the press is going to rally together.

And at some point, you know, other than the daily wire or the daily color or whatever or, you know, at some point, these press briefings are, just going to look very sad and very weird. What do you think is going to happen here? Well, they all already have banded together. So there, no one is covering today. So UNGA is not going to be without a press pool.

And the White House Correspondent Association statement I thought was great. And the thing that stuck out to me the most is when they wrote, this is about more than the rights of journalists. It's about the right of the American people to receive a full and independent account of activities, policies, and decisions of whoever occupations. the nation's highest office. And Republicans know better. I mean, lo and behold, that has been the message or the biggest truism of the entire Trump era that they know better. But majority of them just feel like their backs are up against the wall and then they have to dig in. So they've been on

this crusade where they're arguing that the Biden administration banned over 400 press outlets, which is completely untrue. They did not cut off. access, the majority of these folks who were credentialed just didn't reapply when basically Biden made it, the Biden admin made it mandatory that you reapply on an annual basis. There was one, one outlet that was banned. So a little bit different than over 400. But they're digging in and going into their corners about it. Everyone will stand in solidarity.

I imagine this can't last that long. But it sends a really chilling message, and it does, you know, link you back to what I was saying earlier on in our conversation, think about how bad it must be out there that they would rather do this than talk about actual policy or have real coverage of whatever is going to go on at the UN this week when he meets with world leaders who are all standing with Mark Carney over the United States when they're talking about, you know, adding Canada as this extension satellite nation for the EU when people are disappointed. with how we're behaving towards Ukraine when they are frustrated about what's going on in Iran

and that there seems to be no resolution or end in sight. Like, they would rather be fighting about, you know, 1984 terms. So bleak for them and bleak for us that we're in this position, but very thankful that there is the solidarity across all of the major press outlets. Support for the show comes from NPR. Trying to follow the political news every day can be a lot, especially with all the outrage and noise. Here's a cheat code that could help you out, the NPR Politics Podcast. There are daily political podcasts where you can catch up on the biggest political news of the moment,

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Try for free today at Odu.com slash Vox. That's ODO.O dot com slash Vox. All right, I can't help it. We got to talk about this because it makes me happy and it shouldn't. This is a very serious issue, but it does make me happy. I'm sorry. Let me just put this out there. Lauren Bobert, your thoughts. A spicy one. A spicy allegation. Not just a fair in her office with a man, but with two women. And payments. And payments, $200,000. Yes. Listen, it's a serious complaint. You know, it's under. threat of perjury. So, you know, David Wheeler, who is the journalist, who made the complaint, knows what he's doing. He's also a political activist, and we should note that. I love this. He said

this chapter in Bobert's life is the culmination of a history of criminal activity by her and her family, deception of voters and constituents, and a pattern of sexual depravity, which we did see in that theater. Bobert truly believes she's not accountable for her actions, or do the laws apply to her? I think she's in some trouble. And I know that we have these moments where we say, oh, we love Lauren Bobert because she bucked the administration

on the Epstein files, for instance. But in general, she's been pretty terrible and she's been a unrepentant partisan who cares little about the truth or even really protecting and supporting her constituents in the way that. that she votes and the way that she participates in this do-nothing Congress.

It's an intriguing plot line to say the least. Go ahead and make your dirty jokes. Actually, won't make jokes. I find it funny because I enjoy the deserves accusations of total hypocrisy, all this virtue signaling around her concern for Epstein as she is harassing two women in her own office, including payoffs. And the whole theater incident, Iowa said that she's every 17-year-old boy's dream date,

go to Beetlejuice, let you feel her up, jerk you off, vape. I mean, she's literally every 17-year-old's dream date. And this is a different level of weird, though. I mean, let's be honest, Lauren Bobit, Lauren Burbitt is a fucking village idiot and an incredibly poor reflection on America

that we would elect this person to the most, you know, revered congressional body ever assembled. She, her personal life is exactly what you would think. And when she opens her mouth and talks about policy, you would think, God, this feels like someone who is just a mess in us terrible judgment and has no sense of morals or values. and it's just plain stupid.

And everything in her personal life says, yes, but wait, there's more. And it's just so, again, it's going to be another distraction. I don't know what will happen here, the Ethics Committee. I guess people will probably come back with, we'll let the voters decide they vote every two years. you know, I'm, I spent a lot of time in Colorado. She was actually my representative until someone raised their hand and she realized she was going to lose. So she pieced out to the more conservative district next year. But it just speaks to everyone wants to blame the candidates.

I blame her district. Like, what are the fact, what are these people thinking with this evidence, with her inability to string a sentence together? With the fact that she's, as long as she's been there, she's only passed one piece of legislation that was meaningless. And that's who they put in office because they're like, oh, she's a total, died-in-the-will Republican. It feels to me like we need to move at some point to, I'd like to see mandatory voting. Or you can't have a social media account or collect social security or benefits unless you vote and force people to at least have some understanding of what the hell is going on. And maybe that's contrary because if you force people to vote, you have a lot of people, you know, behind the curtain who don't know what they're doing.

but everybody talks about how smart the American people are. The American people elected this fucking village idiot, who is an embarrassment. She's an embarrassment to the country, to Congress, and what do you know? She's not sexually harassing or allegedly, not one, not two, but three different people. So the whole thing is like,

if someone had said their sexual harassment involving a woman, I mean, if someone had said, the surprising thing here is it's usually, the dudes, right? But if someone had said a woman in Congress has been sexually harassing male and female staffers who work for her and what is an extraordinary display, not only of inappropriate behavior, but just generally fucking stupid behavior, I mean, those are just the wrong people to harass on just a self-preservation level. You'd think, oh, okay, I've got a short list of one person, and it rhymes with Lauren Bobert. Because I guess,

Is anyone that surprised? I mean, it's salacious. It's great for page six, but is anyone that shocked? Are you shocked? Three seems like a lot. I mean, usually there's... You would have bought two? You would have bet on two?

I would have bet on one, like, a relationship, right? Because that happens with some regularity. And three seemed, yeah, seem like a lot. And there being two women in there. was also something different. So, yes, it's salacious. And I'm not as unsurprised, I guess, as you are. I do. It was jarring to me, to say the least. And it's always so interesting how people double down and they're like, you know, this is patently false, you know, we're taking it to the top. And then usually they shrink away from it. And it either kind of goes away, I guess, if an election,

comes or there's some kind of settlement or they figure out a way to work around. But this guy, David Wheeler, has been talking about how, you know, they yell a lot and make a lot of noise about the lawsuits that they're going to bring. And Trump does this too, where he says, you know, I'm going to sue them into oblivion. And if he does actually do it, he ends up losing. But most of the time, they just, you know, want to scream and yell and say, like, no, no, no, look over here or I'm defending my honor and hoping that the algorithm, you know, makes their story bigger than the fact that there's an ethics complaint under, you know, the threat of perjury. So someone's got to be pretty serious about it and buttoned up if they're going to make it.

So it was a strange one to come across the feed, to say the least. Yeah, it's as if Facebook, the Facebook comments section and can I speak to the manager became a representative's office. And the benefits here, the, the, the, What's positive is Marjorie Taylor Green now looks like Anne Richards or Hillary Clinton, and we're definitely going to have a very interesting season of the Real Housewives Rifle after she has kicked out or does not get reelected and decides to be on the Real Housewives. I mean, this is, it's like we thought Sarah Palin was an idiot. No, Sarah Palin looks like Christine Lagarde right now.

It's just, where do we find these? It's impressive we're able to find these people. So I'm, I trust and hope those three people feel like justice is going to be done, and it sounds like there's already been a payoff. But this is, again, we need, this is what happens when you take civics out of high school and replace it with computer science. At a younger age, we have to start educating people about, in my view, what is basic governance, how important it is, how many impressive people have served in the government, how fortunate they are to live in America, how unique and wonderful America is, in large part, because it has outstanding governance. And, you know, the framers said anyone could be elected, but let's put a big asterisk when Lauren Boebert gets elected. But I do think a lot of this, we have to hold up a mirror to ourselves and say, what is it about our educational system?

and young people and old people's understanding of governance and how important it is and start figuring out a way to support. Look at the L.A., and in my view, New York mayoral races. People will get upset because I think Mondani's great. Let's look at the L.A. more mayoral. Yeah. Everyone has been talking to me about this, by the way, being out here. They cannot, how depressing the L.A. mayor's races for them and that they, Like, how is it possible that you live in a crown jewel city and that you can't get decent candidates that you would be excited to support and how it's possible that basically next door, Dan Lurie, and I know that you have a more negative view of him and what he's done there than I do. Oh, no, I want to be, I need to come back to Dan because I need to put an asterisk on that.

But I'm sorry. Oh, no, I'm just saying that there are, there are examples of. of a Blue City Mayor, you know, just here in this state who is going after the homelessness problem at Matt Mayhan as well in San Jose. And you have Karen Bass out there saying, like, this is, you know, it's just intractable. Yeah, we know it's intractable to some degree, but there are people who are showing you that you can hold on to your liberal values and still care about people and prize, you know, humanity, but make it safe and get folks who are having mental health episodes off the streets.

So it's a real bummer for them, but literally everyone has brought it up to me, how upset they are, and how can we get better folks to run for office? Yeah, I just, a couple of closing comments on Boberg. She's literally the congresswoman that the algorithm, when the algorithms discovered that cleavage grievance in the Second Amendment are popular.

And she also, to her credit, represents a growing constituency, unfortunately, in modern America, and that is people who think being asked to behave is tyranny. All right, on the mail race. L.A. has probably got the economy and more culturally relevant than a northern European country. And you had a Karembass, a total incompetent,

no excuses for just the shit that's gone on there. A socialist, I just don't think that shit works. And then a reality TV star, who's gone, I think, got bankrupt twice, and, you know, has no business in elected politics who is outstanding in social media. I mean, if the mayoral election, and unfortunately, many of these elections have become the political version or the theatrical political version of Sophie's choice. And so I think we all have to say, well, at what point do we stop invading their privacy?

Do we pay them more? I like the idea of paying all Congress people a million dollars a year, senators two million, president 10 million a year, and then having a zero tolerance policy. for conflicts and see if we can get better people to run. Having said that, we also have some outstanding canon equality on the governor's races. So I'm torn there. But just you reference Mayor Lurie. I did a clip. I stayed in San Francisco. I went to go visit my sister. And I stayed at the San Francisco proper. I love the Austin proper. So I thought I'll try the brand in San Francisco. And it's in what is still an area that is struggling in San Francisco. And I took a walk.

my sister and I said, let's go to Cafe Zuni. I haven't been there in 25 years, and I love that restaurant. And so I said, let's walk. It was about a mile walk. And it was pretty grim. It was a night and the number of homeless, clearly veterans, clearly people struggling with drug addiction. It was crazy. I never felt unsafe.

I go to the data. The homeless are more likely to be victims of crime than perpetrators. But it was uncomfortable how many homes. It was really staggering how many homeless people. And I did an Instagram real titled San Francisco still sucks. I'm not exaggerating. We must have seen three to 500 homeless. And to be fair, everyone says Mayor Lurie is doing a good job and things have gotten noticeably better.

But wow, is it rough? And it went viral. And the next day, I get a call from a 4-15 area code. And for some reason, I usually don't answer calls. It's not someone I know. And it was Mayor Lurie. And he wanted to know where exactly I walked. And he wasn't defensive.

He didn't push back. He wanted to know where I walked, what I saw. And then he sent me some stats about the city. And I just want to read those stats because I feel as if I was probably unduly harsh on the city. It's like a guy who lives in New York and London shows up and acts like a total douchebag. So he wrote, car break-ins at 22-year lows, down 83% between 2017 and 2025, unsheltered homelessness at lowest levels in 15 years with the fewest encampments in our streets since the city started counting in 2019. The Reset Center, where law enforcement can bring individuals who are using drugs in public,

is referring 39% of admitted individuals to some form of services, for example, treatment recovery shelter and getting cops back on the streets in under five minutes. And on every major metric, crime is down in San Francisco. And also, let me just say, and it's not just because he called me, I said this before and I said in this clip, the city loves mayor Lurie. Yeah. And I think he reflects, acquits himself the way residents of a city want their mayor to acquit themselves. We don't give a shit about your views on Israel. We don't want you talking about Trump.

We want you figuring out a way to get the buses to run on time, to get the trash picked up, and reduce the homeless issue. You're an operator. You're an executive. But it goes back to them. We've talked a lot about this. Unless Democrats can show they can operate stuff at a ground level, people aren't going to trust them to give them the opportunity to operate stuff at a federal level. Anyways, that's my wordy apology to Mayor Lurie and the citizens of San Francisco. Life is too short for bad audio quality.

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Vice President Harris, there's a campaign underway by Democrats. It's usually Fox that wants to shitposts. there's a campaign underway to try and discourage the vice president from running again. Your thoughts? We want to win. That's what's happening now. And I mean, these governors are being super mealy-mouthed about it, like Westmore and Governor Pritzker was on this weekend, you know, saying like, oh, well, of course she has every right to run. Yeah, it's, yes, she technically has every right to run.

But eventually, folks are going to have to say outwardly, we are not going to do well if she is the candidate. And because South Carolina is going first, she's going to have an advantage because she remains quite popular with black voters. You know, Reid Hoffman throwing his two cents in there. I kind of think, though, that this isn't the time for it. I really want to get through the midterms. And then we can start the jockeying about 2028. And I don't know who's going to jump in first. I saw Governor Pritzker actually talking about for the first time that he lost a lot of weight using a GLP1.

That was something that was in the background. Like, you know, how is he doing this? So I'm glad that he's getting healthier. And if you are healthier, then people might look at you and say, oh, you know, you could be president. So, you know, all in the pro column there for him. But I was stunned looking at Nate Silver's newest Senate ratings. His model predicts a 65% chance that Democrats win. He has Michigan at 77%, Maine 73%, Ohio 70%, Texas 68%, Alaska 53, and Iowa 52.

Now, like, yes, please, can I have some more? That feels way too optimistic, even though the environment now. looks like Dems up six to eight points, depending on the poll, in terms of the environment. And, you know, again, Donald Trump would rather fight about whether we should have a free press than talking about what's actually going on on the ground for people. And the cash advantage, though, we've discussed it before. It's a huge, huge problem. You know, even in Texas, where Tala Rico is this enormous fundraiser, Republicans are

going to outspend Democrats in the Texas. Senate race this week, almost 26 million to one. So, you know, keep smashing that Act Blue donate button, but we need institutional support for this. And frankly, we need a lot more money to be able to combat this last-minute push. But what do you, well, I guess all of it. Kamala and then do you think those Nate Silver numbers are too rosy? Her leading in many these polls, I think it's just pure name recognition. I think the majority of Americans don't know who Bashir is. And they're not going to care until, you know, a couple weeks or a couple months before the election. So right now, I think most of the polls are just name recognition. It really is,

it's branding. And to be in the consideration set, 98% of our dollars go to a brand we've heard of. So the polling at this stage of the game is more awareness than it is who you'll probably vote for. And I would also remind people that who is polling number one at this stage in the cycle on the Republican side included Herman Cain, Rudy Giuliani. He was number one, and this is my favorite. Fred Thompson from Law and Order was polling number one at this point for the Republican nomination at this stage. Some of our finest presidents. And you know who wasn't even on the list at this point in the election cycle, Barack Obama or Bill Clinton. So with respect to Vice President Harris, I think she is an outstanding senator. I think she'd make an outstanding Supreme Court justice.

I think she is an awful presidential candidate. In 2020, she didn't even make it to Iowa. And also, her campaign staff, you're running a large organization here. There's a lot of very disturbing things that someone who's run small businesses. A campaign is a small business that you spin up with funding.

You hire people. People working for her didn't like her and said pretty critical things about her organizational and managerial skills. I thought she gave one of the great political performances of the last 50 years in her debate performance with Trump. The amount of pressure she must have felt on her shoulders,

she was given a raw deal by the Biden administration because of his narcissism. Had it been a competitive primary versus a coronation, I don't think she would have won. But having said all that, I think she should run. And where I am is the following, if she wants to. The amazing thing about the Democratic primary process is that when you let it run,

it not only elevates the right person, but the right person for the moment. And they learn from each other, and they get more skilled. And the idea of a woman, especially a non-white woman, being told by party elders not to run, you know, shut the fuck up.

The answer from the party should be, you're an impressive person who has served the party well. If you decide to run, how can we be helpful? no more or no less than any other candidates. And it may be her close personal friends say to her, they tell her what they think she should do personally.

But the party should be in the business of having the most robust Seals' training camp in history that produces the most deadly warrior to go into a general. And showing up in Iowa and pretending to like fried snickers and being asked uncomfortable questions on town halls and on debate stages, it produces an amazing warrior.

And if she wants to, I hope Cory Booker runs. I saw Corey on Meet the Press. He's very good. I hope they all run and they all engage in the full body contact violence that is the Democratic primary where, you know, 27 men enter one man leaves. But that one man that leaves is Mel Gibson before the anti-Semitic rants who's a fucking baller. We want, we want someone amazing. And guess what, Democratic Party? You are not good.

When you rigged the system against Bernie, that was not a good idea. Republican Party, when you decide John McCain because he's a war hero and we owe everything, he should be the nominee. That was not smart on your part. Let them cook. If she wants to run, have at it.

And she might surprise us, and who knows, maybe she's learned a lot. And maybe America is ready for a female president. I don't think they are. but I've been wildly wrong picking candidates. Let them cook. Let the competition go. The Democratic Party, their only response to candidates thinking of running is, how can we be helpful?

This is a decision for you and your family. Them deciding who should be in the race and who shouldn't, shut the fuck up. Your thoughts. I am cool with letting them cook, but I cannot accept this 2016 take on the, primary being rigged for Hillary. She won by so many millions of votes. Bernie Sanders doesn't even want to be a straight-up Democrat. The idea that the delegates would be for Hillary Clinton, who has been a lifelong Democrat

and has put a reputation gone at, fundraised for everybody, always helps down ballot. So that one I can't take. But otherwise, yeah, they're all going to do. Convinced a young father in Delray Beach to keep. Amist door to door for her. Yours truly. Yeah. She deserved the nomination.

I would draw the comment. Withdrawn and Dan Lurie. There you go. We had a big day. But I'm curious because we do have Abdul Al-Said tomorrow. So if our listeners have any suggested questions or things that they want us to talk to him about, leave them in the comments. I'm really excited. That's right.

Abdul's coming on. There we go. That's probably a good place. to leave it. Jess, congrats on the book launch. Thank you. And we'll see you tomorrow. Life is too short for bad audio quality. Luckily, there's Sonos.

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