Some More News - Even More News: Prop 50, Zohran Mamdani, and Other Big Election Races

Episode Date: October 29, 2025

Hi. On today's special Wednesday episode of Even More News, Katy, Cody, and Jonathan talk about California's redistricting initiative, Zohran Mamdani, Maine's mail-in voting ballot measure, JD Vance's insufferable dishonest tweeting, and Donald Trump's obsession with the cognitive assessment that he thinks is an IQ test. Get the world's news at https://ground.news/SMN to compare coverage and see through biased coverage. Subscribe for 40% off unlimited access through our link.As always, we recorded right before that big thing that happened.PATREON: https://patreon.com/somemorenewsMERCH: https://shop.somemorenews.comTreat yourself to gear that looks good, feels good, and doesn’t break the bank with Fabletics. Go to https://fabletics.com/SMN to sign up as a VIP and get 80% off everything.F*%k your khakis and get The Perfect Jean 15% off with the code Morenews15 at https://theperfectjean.nyc/Morenews15 #theperfectjeanpodFor a limited time, get 40% off your first Hungryroot box PLUS get a free item in every box for life. Go to https://hungryroot.com/smn and use code smn.Sign up for your $1/month trial and start selling today at https://shopify.com/morenewsPluto TV. Stream now. Pay never.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Please play responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connix Ontario at 1866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. But MGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. Oh, hello, everyone. In today's episode, we go through some of the big races and ballot measures in next week's elections, Zohan Mamdani, J.D. Vance's relentlessly does on his tweeting and Donald Trump's really hard test about animals. Oh, hi, welcome back to even more news, the first and only news podcast. I'm Katie, stole, that is.

Ooh, that's the name that I like to hear at the beginning of these episodes, because otherwise, who are you? Right. And who am I? Cody Johnston. Cody Johnston. Come at you, co-host in the house, in his house. Yes. Jonathan is also here.

Hi. Hell yeah. There it is. Awuga. Ah, wuga, my friends. I've been saying that a lot lately. As we told you on Monday, no some more news episode this week,

just more of this crew, which I'm sure we're all pumped for. Look at us being pumped. You know what? I've been doing this for years and I almost forgot about holidays. But we have a weird one for you today, folks. Thursday, October 30th is haunted refrigerator night. I'm going to be real. It never once occurred to me that my fridge might be haunted.

And now it's all I'm going to think about, especially at nighttime after I've smoked some weed. I mean, Ghostbusters, I feel like, did for the refrigerator. what Jaws did for the ocean. That's just a movie. That's not real, Jonathan. Like the ghosts that are here. Oh, yeah, like a little ghost dog in a refrigerator. Okay, Jonathan.

Now, let me tell you about what happened here recently. So, Katie, do you resent Ghostbusters and movies like it for sort of like downplaying the reality? For fictionalizing? Yeah. Interesting question. Sure. Yeah, I do. You resent it?

Sure? All right. Well, not the original Ghostbusters, because that's a classic. The second one has a bathtub thing, too. It's pretty scary. Second one's good, too. Or was too. Not sure I ever saw it.

I stand by the second one. Oh, yeah. It's good. I haven't seen any of the new shit. The Paul Feaston. No, they're bad. I have issues with the all-lady one. I do, too.

And they're different issues from the other ones. Yeah, yeah. You hate it because it's all ladies, and it ruined your childhood, right, Cody, that's what you were telling you. Yes. I mean, that's what I was telling you quietly about our man problems,

which includes Lady Ghostbusters. I can just say wokeness, actually. Then we can get a conversation there. Yeah, okay, we agree. Okay, all wokeness. I really wanted Lady Ghostbusters to be good. Yeah, it was a great cast. I liked it.

You did? Yeah, I remember enjoying it. I was like, okay, cool. But I, you know, forgot about it somewhat promptly after seeing it. On account of us having so many podcasts this week we decided to try and focus a little bit

no we're going to talk about elections because we got some elections next week and now is the time to talk about it elections we've got there's next Tuesday is election day there are a number of key races and propositions around the country that people are going to be watching

let's go through some of them let's talk about let's figure out what is going on with this voting situation is it possible who is it for what can you do to get out there folks and make a change you know this is me now this is how i am you know so the first one that we're going to go through is the big one in our backyards and front yards the whole state is california's prop 50 that is the ballot initiative put forward by Gavin Newsom that would set aside the state's current election maps, which were

drawn by an independent redistricting commission in favor of a map drawn specifically to help Democrats win more seats in Congress, which was done specifically to counter Texas's mid-decade redistricting. But since it's in the California Constitution that it's independent, we have to have a ballot proposition to get around that for the next few cycles. And so that's, it's the only thing on our California ballot, by the way, I don't know if you guys have received yours and voted yet. Yep, already voted. Yes, and no.

Yes, so recent polling suggests that the measure is likely to pass by up to 20 points. More than four million ballots have already been returned. State officials say the early return is likely due to the fact that it's the only thing on the ballot, it's easy to fill out and send back and we still have mail-in voting in this great state. So that's gonna happen probably.

It seems like it, yeah. It is probably going to happen. I have mixed feelings about it. It sucks because we have to do this. And we have to do this because of what conservatives are doing across the country, specifically in Texas. The most egregious example of gerrymandering, we've covered that on this show. It's absurd the districts they're trying to connect. And so here we are bending over backwards to do what we can to mitigate the damage.

from that and it sucks because I don't we do have an independent commission to uh deal with this and I wish we didn't have to be uh in this position because it can come back and bite us at another point in time it's not great but it is what we need to do yeah the alternative is nothing um it's got you know we and we also have we have you know gerrymandering is tends to be pretty anti-democratic for a lot of reasons we've talked about at the past but it's at least we can have a veneer of democracy over our anti-democratic actions. We're voting on whether or not to do it. It's not just them saying they're going to do it.

But yeah, if we don't do it, then the other option is nothing, which means that there's no combating what the geopolitics trying to do. It means Democrats need to win by 10 or 12 points in the midterms to take the house. Which maybe, you know, maybe they can do because of all the things we've talking about. But it's like, you know, everyone needs to play by the same rules. So either I would be in support of national legislation that every state has to have an independent commission, draw the districts to ensure ultimate fairness. But we're not doing that. They do not want to do that. So, you know, we have to encourage Illinois to keep going Virginia to do what they're talking about doing because they've got Indiana and what potentially Florida.

and who knows how many, and then once that voting rights act thing goes through that we talked about with the Supreme Court, that's what a dozen more seats in the South, it's getting bleak. Especially in my community, it's a little weird right now because there's so many no on 50 signs around. Which makes sense. They're going to have their representation taken away. I don't think it affects this district. Maybe not them specifically, but right. If the measure passes, there's, going to be districts held by five Republicans that are basically gone. Doug Lamalfa, Kevin Kylie, David Validow, Ken Calvert, and Darrell Issa. Democrats get stronger opportunities in all the swing districts, and they would see their margins of victory in some districts drop by 10 to 20 points, but they have such huge margins of victory there that it wouldn't matter. Also, they're

shoving a bunch of GOP voters into this one district in riverside where young kim the republican uh currently has the seat and it was kind of a swingy district before that was seeing some democratic challengers and now that effectively ends those democratic challenges um but that's how this works you got to put voters somewhere in order to it's just really depressing and cynical that like here's the voters in each area that will count and like it almost makes you want to just look at the popular vote in each state and then decide where the districts go you know based on based on that proportion probably wouldn't work that way but like right now you just got guys

drawn lines on the map carving up cities just seeing what's the most effective way yeah it's a joke it is what it is again I don't feel great about it I don't feel but it is you got to do it you got to but Katie consider if we didn't do that would you feel great then no so there's no feeling great so might as well yeah exactly it's funny the attitude because in order to kind of justify everything that's happened republicans have had to frame it as if not california but like democrats did this first that texas is only doing what it initiated because of how gerrymandered say illinois was but if you look at the entire country as a whole yes there are some democratic jerrymanderedish

states, but it's kind of not really in comparison to what they do in a lot of these smaller states and southern states and what they're going to do in Louisiana, once the VRA Section 5, I think, is gone, what they're doing in Texas right now, the idea that the playing field hasn't been level for them, and now they're flipping it around. It's almost like the, every accusation as a confession type dynamic where they have to be the victims

of how they're victimizing other people So it goes They don't care So yeah What are you going to do? Well, you're going to lie Is what you're going to do?

Yeah What are you going to do? Ah, yeah, it's just liable And what we're going to do is put a Prop 50 on the ballot in California and do our best to counteract it

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and put it everywhere exactly, but it speaks to what people desperately want and need and real actual change, someone that's actually speaking to the needs, to the crisis at hand. Yeah, it's cool to see. It's, I think, speaks to kind of what we talked about last week, I guess, a little bit, but just sort of like it's twofold.

The things he's saying are good and sound good to people and people, even little things like we're going to like tax like two percent on the wealthy like we're going to tax the rich a little more uh be able to say that very very uh openly and proudly and without fear of like well how are you gonna blah blah blah right uh why do people do this so being able to say those things and he's just very good at this he's a very charismatic person um he was on one of those flagrant he was on flagrant yeah he's one of those one of the good guys. He's great. He's so great at just being a person and that's the thing or like you need to

like say the things people actually like are like, oh yeah, I agree with that. I want to do that. And be a real person who can hang and who can also be on, you know, the Sunday shows and be asked maybe a dishonest question or maybe an aggressive question and respond in a way that doesn't seem defensive and doesn't seem like you're not sure how to answer. He is very good at redirecting stuff to get back to like the core issues that matter when he's being asked a dishonest question. She's very, very talented. Yeah, did either if you watch or listen to the Flagrin episode at all, I think there was some clips. I saw a couple of clips. Circulating. I can't. Yeah, but it speaks everything you just said that you can put him in different environments and speak to people because

he's real he had this one moment on there and this was clipped out so a lot of people probably did see it where i forget the billionaire there's so many i thought it was acment you know spending money it's trying to millions of dollars to stop him to try to keep him from getting elected and mom donnie is just like the irony is he spent more than i would have taxed him he has spent more trying to defeat me than what i would have even yeah and turning into a bit turning into a joke and they seem to enjoy it. Yes, he is

resonating. It is powerful and inspiring and people are working over time to try and discredit him. Yeah, the unfortunate thing is so there's like those two elements but we've been avoiding talking about this.

He also wants to do Sharia law and that's that's a problem. It's going to be a problem folks. because it's my understanding that Sharia law is quite unpopular nationwide not just in New York City so that's going to be a tough sell it's going to be a tough sell but you know kids these days they just don't understand anything

so they're going to go for the Sharia communist is it just the taxes that are like freaking them out I know they say a bunch of stuff about 9-11 and a lot of racist disingenuous oh yeah you got to the taxes but it's really they just don't want to be taxed a little bit more Child care, yeah, they don't like people having child care. They don't like grocery stores. I think it, yeah, the main thing.

I mean, taxing people, I think, is the big one. But also what he's going to use it for, right? Because even, I haven't even heard, I think, I feel like the child care is like an issue where, like, if you brought it to the forefront, Republicans and like any centers would have to be like, yeah, we agree. We should do that. But like the free buses people don't like, because they think, like, well, they're going to turn. to like a homeless encampment on wheels or whatever um the grocery store thing i think also there's the talking about defund the police the all the all the all the lefty stuff he said and stuff he tweeted in 2020 all the 2020 stuff exactly right what's scary for me it's like so much pressure on this one

person in this one place to follow through on these campaign promises while a huge well-funded machine will be working this overtime the entire time to stop him. And that is the next hurdle. That is the next thing that I think about is what happens when, if some, not when, if things don't go exactly as planned. Because you have to imagine that it's going to be difficult to, without watering things down, without compromising. It's a mayor. And there's, but there's all this national attention and all of us are looking to this as a case study. And so I just want to say that and keep that in mind because it probably won't be perfect. But it also doesn't matter whether it works or not because they're going to go with the narrative that it's a complete

disaster no matter what, right? We had we had more progressive DAs briefly in San Francisco and Los Angeles. No real indication that it was driving. those cities into lawlessness or that criminals were just running free out of the prisons. That didn't happen but they just said that that's what happened and it became this narrative, right?

We had, I mean, there was a, we did an episode about this a few years ago where just the media heard it so much, they kept saying it and repeating it like, oh yeah, there's this, there's a crime and shoplifting epidemic and defund the police really didn't work, huh? Despite the fact that we didn't do it anywhere.

And so they're going to do that they're going to do that here if he wins and implements anything even if he tries and fails to implement it they'll still say like this is why you can't have a young muslim progressive mayor look at what happens and it's just the city of new york no matter what if he wins that worked the his campaign worked he won uh against disgraced legacy andrew quote like i don't know how do you describe that that guy who just will not go away, I wonder if that's indicative of other types of his behavior, they will zero in on like, oh, you got to do videos like this, you got to do this, and ignore the message, ignore the fact that he is a uniquely charismatic, talented, like politician,

and ignore the substance of his campaign and just sort of go for the aesthetics and adopt that part of the popularity. No matter what, whether he is successful. or not successful, but all the successes will be diminished and downplayed and resisted and all of the failures that are probably common for mayors, especially mayors of New York. We're like, well, I try to do this. I couldn't do it. Those will be highlighted and they will, any instance of crime. Oh, any in if an individual crime happens during his tenure as mayor, it's his fault. will be looking for and begging for any, like, event, any individual, like, crime or event

or a thing that they can elevate to a high profile. Like, look, it's because of the policies that this happened. It's because of that grocery store that this crime happened. Exactly. Oh, God. Imagine if a crime happened on one of the free buses or at the grocery store. Oh, they'll love that so much. I don't want to go down this path anymore. Sure. While I acknowledge, and I brought it up. No, you're right. We don't need to. That is certainly going to be a part of this. But that doesn't mean that he won't be successful. That doesn't mean that there won't be material improvement to people's lives.

You got to give it time. You got to let the get- And probably some disappointments for people who were like, oh, I thought he was going to do more. I thought he was going to do this. He had to make this deal or give this up or do whatever. And I do think that that a little bit on all of us in general is to keep the eyes on the prize of being realistic about what works and what doesn't,

but saying look at why he got elected. Look at what people are begging for. Look at what people desperately need. And use that as the case study. Anyway, I find it hopeful. He has not won yet. If he wins, he has not won yet. And some of the early voting returns this weekend were heavily Boomer and Gen Z.

I think half of the returns were over 55. So, you know. Well, they got to go on, they got to go on the day. They got to go on the day to get the selfie, right? I guess, yeah. Well, we have to hope. I, that's what I'm saying. That's what I'm going to say for now.

Let's talk about some of these lines of attack that, not just in New York, that very prominent national Republicans are throwing at him because you got to go after the guy running for mayor of, you know, the biggest city. It's New York. Yeah. And it speaks to, you know, the sort of state of, I think, the Democratic Party where, like, we don't have a lot of strong leaders or people you can point to like, oh, you're like the person who represents the party. And this race in a lot of ways to a lot of people is that decision. Even though it's one, one mayoral race, it is like, well, where's the leadership going. Where's the direction of the party going. And so I think that's where a lot of the focus is coming from, where they're like, we got to destroy this. So this doesn't become the thing. I want to play a clip of Zoran Mamdani speaking, and he's talking about Islamophobia here, and there's a quote in here that is being used as this, this is such a scandal that he said this.

I want to speak to the memory of my aunt. Who stopped taking the subway after September 11th because she did not feel safe in her hijab. Can you believe? how awful that he would say that why would he say that 9-11 didn't matter and needed to happen and we deserved it why did he say that why did he say that

there were no victims on 9-11 other than his aunt so you're probably referring to this tweet from J.D. Vance where he said according to Zoran the real victim of 9-11 was his auntie who got some allegedly bad looks I just hate him so much

this piece of trash vice president we have is so fucking he's vile he's vile this is a that is a disgusting thing to say what a like weasley little lie like what do you we can watch the clip man what are you talking about perpetual victim jd vans actually i'm i'm the victim now because i'm i'm offended for america for this thing that he didn't say. Yeah, I'm sure if we watched the entire speech, this was 25 seconds out of a speech, the rest of which must have been about how 9-11 was good, and he liked it. And the only bad thing about it was all the alleged Islamophobia. Alleged, well-documented Islamophobia,

especially in New York City after 9-11. Come on now. It's just absurd. It is absurd. Obviously, everyone he said nothing of the sort it's it feels wild to even try to to even like give any credence to this to talk about it but like a this is a very important point that he's making this was a a national tragedy and the fallout from it put a target on the back of a significant population of people in this country in that city and his entire life he's done dealt with that you know uh standing in front of a community of people it's important it's an important point and especially as he's we're seeing it in full force right now it's being hurled at him all the time every day on the campaign um it's just madness he's running to be mayor of

new york he can talk about like the muslim experience in new york city it's so stupid J.D. Vance is a big pile of garbage, and it's so frustrating because he does this all the time. He pretends about things that we can see and hear very, very plainly. It's this new tick he has, apparently, because in this tweet, says, according to Zoran, the real victim of 9-11 was Auntie, who got some allegedly bad looks. Okay, great. Add a period to your sentence. You're the vice president shows some fucking decorum uh but a day later uh medi hasson just tweeted something about uh there's some like threads going on about charlie kirk again and he tweeted like yeah just a reminder like yeah charlie kirk was a racist and he said these sort of things was like a tweet being shared

around uh a reminder what a racist bigot kirk was and how much hate he incited against minorities that's true that's what he did he did it uh there are examples being shared in that thread so j d vans the vice president decided to take time out of his day to quote tweet that intentionally. According to Medi Hassan, the real victim of hatred was not the guy murdered by a left-wing lunatic, but people like Medi for facing criticism of their views. That's not what he said either. This brand new thing that J.D. Vance loves to do, which is to say, according to blank, something they didn't say means they're the real victim, but actually, I'm the real victim. Right. It's according to J.D. Vance, people of color being a victim of anything ever means that white people have never been victims of

anything ever. That's what you're saying. That's what? If you are a person of color saying this thing shouldn't have happened, you're actually saying that nothing that bad that has ever happened to a white person matters. That's what you're saying. And in fact, maybe it's good of those things, bad things happen to that. Like, it's just nonsense. And it's wild that he did it twice in a row. It's weird.

Like, he's like, oh, I can start doing this now. Here's my new phrase that I'm going to do. It's a very, very childish and immature way of thinking. Obviously, the stakes are all. He's 12, grown up stakes. But at the core, it's like, n'a, um, No, uh, because what about what happened to me? What about me?

What about me? The inability to wrap your mind around, I mean, basic empathy. The basic of like, oh, instead of reflecting like, it really bothers me when X, Y, Z happens to me. Now extrapolate that and apply it to someone else is getting piled up on by everybody. Just fucking grow up. Grow up. But it, but it does appeal. You're right.

It's the 12-year-old phenomenon that we're living through. It's also not even, it's frustrating. This is what you're saying is very true and frustrating. Thank you. It's extra frustrating from him because it's not that he has the inability to conceptualize these things. The inability to empathize or the inability to think in that way. It's the lack of willingness because he knows he's not supposed to. He's supposed to spread lies.

that's his job. So it's doubly frustrating where it's like, but you know better. You know what he's saying. You know it's not according to this person, this thing they didn't say. He knows. But he got his likes. He's become more and more this way from everything that I understand. He used to be.

Remember, he has a trans friend that was one of his best friends. Yep. And that now, but that's God. So it's not that I have more grace for somebody that is so. deeply ignorant to their core and always has been, but there's a special element of evil to consciously choose this day in and day out, to constantly choose this in terms of his own political career, weaponizing everything against everybody else. So yeah, fuck you, J.D. Vance. He is signaling to MAGA. I'm the guy. Once he's gone, I'm the guy. You can rely on me.

forget about all the everyone I know and all the stuff where I went to school all that stuff I'm the guy and I will not let you down because I'm going to keep I'm going to dunk on them I'm going to be dunker in chief and I'm going to keep doing the triggering

Dunker in chief DIC It works Biding his time He's got to feel all sorts of ways about everybody floating Trump's third term plan I know we've mentioned this before but like, oh, run as J.D. Vance as president and Trump vice president and then just swap

them out. The fuck. That's the, no. Even Trump was like, that's too cute. That's not. Yeah. But imagine being J.D. Vance where everyone's conversation is like, let's just fucking fuck over this guy. He's just praying for that guy. He's just got to like take that shit. Eat that shit every day. Yum, yum, yum. Let me eat this shit. He came out of the president. It's like, it's like a cuck chair, but the chair is the Iron Throne And he's like That's your chair, JD.

I love the taste of shit. According to me, I love shit eating it. This is delicious and nutritious. He's just joining in. He's got, is this weird like, he's like Ted Cruz, but he doesn't have the voice. He has a different annoying voice,

so he is succeeding. They both grew a beard because they know they have to. like they're they're just the same poster guy they both wish they were podcast hosts only Ted Cruz's podcast is pretty popular it's the most popular of all the of all the unpopular you know what's not so popular you know what podcasts aren't so popular triggered with Don Jr. Hmm oh people don't like that people don't aren't aren't interested in the vice versa. Unmuted with Marsha Blackburn with its 182 average monthly downloads

that's not a lot that's what the list says 182 the Washington Post listened to all the podcasts from potential 2028 candidates and a verdict with Ted Cruz and this is Gavin Newsom

are the ones that are like very popular hold these truths with Dan Crenshaw does all right and the rest are like I'm shocked that Stephen A. Smith's non-sports show has very little listenership. I am and I'm not.

where it's like, well, you do your little political rants anyway. I don't need to listen to a podcast of them. It's not great. So, you know, this podcast, it's very nice to know we have a stronger audience by like an order of magnitude than Don Trump Jr. We did it. We are the president's son now and we will do the podcasting. And the cocaine? Blasted nutrients!

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HungryRoot.com slash SMN. Code SMN, I forgot how it goes. Code SM, I forget how it goes. When I first started my Ambient Music Podcast, Stolected Ambient Works, Volume 2, it felt like I had to do everything. Logos, recording schedules, props. Setting up the Moogs synthesizer. It was overwhelming.

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Go to shopify.com slash more news. Nifty sound. Maybe I can sample that. Ooh, cool. This is it, folks! Halloween week! If you're not watching scary movies on Pluto TV for free, what even are you doing?

Taking your kids trick-or-treating? Stop trying to guilt-trip me! I'm getting down with fan favorite horror movies on Pluto TV, like paranormal activity, The Ring, The Haunting of Beach House, Scream! World War Zizi Top! Bloody ice cream Sunday. The call is coming from inside the spouse,

from dusk till dawn, Garfield and Odie get rabies. Death by killing, Chekhov's nail gun, Nary Shelley's Frankenstein, Killing by Death, Good Burger with E. coli. The Imaginarium of Dr. Giggles and 28 days later. You've got a few more days tops to watch scary movies before it's a whole month of Thanksgiving movies. So, you know,

Planes, trains, and automobiles. Home for the holidays, I think. Charlie Brown's probably got one. And that's it. Pluto TV! Stream now! Pay never! This ad is brought to you by Veeve Healthcare,

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Oh, yeah. Scandal city over here. Oh, no, we're going to go to Jonathan. Breaking news from Jonathan about this. Scandal City. Oh my gosh. They're saying that it's, well, he's telling the story about his aunt, but it's not his real aunt. And then he's like, yeah, it's my mom's cousin and we called her aunt growing up, period. This pisses me off. So much.

Oh, me too, but probably in a different way. I'm mad because he's lying. Why are you mad, kitty? Because he's lying. Yeah, exactly. I'm mad at the liar, is lying about it. Oh. Shut the fuck up, you ghouls. You know his point. You get. The point, right? When I was a kid, there were, like, 20 old people that I called uncle. Like, there's uncles all over the place. I am Aunt Katie to all of my friends' children.

And me, you know? Like, it's just what you call people sometimes. Yeah, I'm your aunt Katie, too. Exactly. Exactly. Ted Cruz, obviously, getting out there and saying that this is what an egregious lie from Zorn Mom Dhani. Ted Cruz is the Zodiac killer. So, whatever.

Ted Cruz is also furious about Zoron. holding his fist up in the air and aOC waving because they think that anybody doing anything similar to raising your hand is exactly what Elon Musk did, which is not correct because what Elon Musk did was do a Nazi salute. We can show it if you want. Multiple times. Let's show it. Oh, look at that. Oh, my God. There is doing it. It's so obvious that that's what's happening. And then they just love taking any photo of a Democrat with their hand up. But just to put a little cap on this. I saved. I clipped this the other day. And it's for our fellow podcaster, Ted Cruz. Maybe he's a senator too. I don't know. You wouldn't know it from talking to him. But here he is.

Actually, my podcast today, I do do a podcast every week, verdict with Ted Cruz. And now is Ted Cruz, a senator. We can move on. So what we're going to do now is I'm going to run through some of these remaining races and try to leave enough time to go through this Trump. funny thing real quick. So there's a couple of governor's races that are being watched closely in New Jersey. It's a somewhat competitive race between Democrat, Mikey Sherrill, and Republican Jack Chittarelli. You know, New Jersey's kind of odd. It tends to go blue in presidential years, but there's a Democratic governor right now who's

not very popular. So, you know, maybe a back and forth thing right now, Mikey Sherrill is leading by like five to tenish points in polls. And then in Virginia, there is Democrat Abigail Spanberger, who is leading Republican winsome Earl Sears. And that's probably not going to be as close of a race. Most recent polls show Spanberger leading by as many as 12 points. There's not many governorships opened from flipping GOP to Democrat this year. So that's a thing we're watching. And then you've got to keep the National Guard out of your state, you know, you've got to get some.

Democratic governors. That's one big reason to vote. Like, hey, which one of you will allow the National Guard to, like, trapes all over the place? Not you? Great. Yeah, I said that jokingly, but, like, it's actually a consideration. And then in Maine, they have an initiative which covers both voter ID and changes to

absentee voting. The first, the voter ID part just requires that you show ID, a form of ID in person to vote. And then the absentee voting stuff just makes mail-in voting way more restrictive. It restricts the number of days. You can request a mail ballot. It takes away the automatic mailing to them that you can sign up for. There's seven or eight different initiatives. It doesn't expand it, which is going to do.

This part of it specifically is egregious. I mean, all of it is, but it also ends the program that allows voters age 65 or older or disabled voters. to have ballots automatically mailed to them. It's like, why? There's, there are very, very good reasons. I know why. Very good reasons why you're mailing ballots to everybody, but especially people that might have difficulty getting to the polling place.

Yeah, they're not going to provide easy IDs for voting. They're not going to replace this with like, oh, by the way, we're going to make sure that every single person has their, their ID or it has access to getting to the place they need to get for they're just not going to do that. The voter ID law things. Because at first blush, I get the instinct to be like, well, yeah, you should

I guess have an ID to vote. Except that we've shown over and over again that voter ID laws does not affect, it doesn't mitigate. People aren't cheating. People aren't, you know, stuffing ballot.

It does nothing to curb illegal voting practices, but what it does do is create huge barriers for people getting to the, getting, being able to vote. It disproportionately affects communities of color. It's creating an extra barrier to a right, which is the right to vote. And it's very transparent. They just want to make it harder for people who would vote that way to vote. municipalities are going to be limited if this passes to one ballot dropbox and then towns can't include prepaid postage on ballot return envelopes. So yeah, you can get your mail-in ballot, but you either have to drive to this one drop box or go buy stamps, which you don't do anymore. Zero reason to do that. It's not like they don't have the money. All right. Do you want to talk about this Trump test stuff real quick?

Why not? You know what? Sure. We're here. Why not? Should I start by playing the clip of him on Air Force One? I think that's a great idea. Let's do that.

Little Marco is standing behind him. Yeah, there are a lot of clips we could show the Trump president guy. Donald Trump, I think is his name. He's always yapping. He's always yapping being asked stuff on planes and in the White House. And many of his answers don't make any sense. Many of his answers are spooky. he's asked recently about running in 2028 and he like kind of like shot it down we don't need to

get into that but here's a question and here's him talking about about his his mental acuity they have jasmine crocket a low IQ person they have aOC's low IQ you give her an IQ test have her passed like the exams that I decided to take when I was at World to read. I took, that was a very hard, uh, they're really aptitude tests, I guess, in a certain way, but their cognitive tests. Let AOC go against Trump. Let Jasmine go against Trump. I don't think Jasmine, the first couple of questions are easy, a tiger, an elephant, a giraffe, you know, when you get up to about five or six, and then when you get up to 10 and 20 and 25, they couldn't come close to answering any of those questions. It was really hard. It was a really hard. It was

really a hard test he struggled with him an American hero Cody do you have the test up I have a test I have a test this is the Montreal cognitive assessment

and I don't know I don't know the version that he is talking about maybe it's not a widespread use I don't know if he took the same one I'll just say that in his example he said lion

elephant giraffe. He said tiger elephant. Oh, sorry. Yeah. No, he even got that one wrong. Okay. Or maybe, allegedly.

He said, tiger, elephant, giraffe. On this version that we have, it's lion, rhinoceros, camel. So, I'll say he got the order right. It's a great job. He got the kind of vibes of the animals. Correct. Rhino, elephant, perfect. Okay.

Camel, giraffe, long necks, perfect. You nailed it. Two cats. Tiger, lion, excellent, the right order. But they're the wrong animals. According to this test, again, we don't know the exact test. Maybe he nailed it. He took this test weeks ago.

So his memory is such that he even remembered there was an animal question on the test, which, by the way, he's talking about IQ. This is not an IQ test. Yeah. This is what I'm getting at. It's, he should, this is a cognitive decline test, correct? That he decided to take a test. My favorite part is that he said he decided to take. decided to take this test. No, you didn't, man. Your doctor told you you need to because they need to

assess your cognitive abilities for reasons, man. Like, you didn't say, like, give me, give me the IQ test. And then they gave you this cognitive assessment test where you have to draw a clock. I've never heard a president talk, and he's done it in both terms now, talk about the cognitive decline test being given. And maybe he thinks it is an IQ test. I don't know That's what That's how they sell it to them That's what he says

You're like you want to touch your IQ again See if it's gone up Also IQ shut up It's stupid people who talk about IQ We've talked about that We know what that is Oh yeah for sure

And the fact that he only refers To brown and black women As low IQ people Like exclusively Notably Notably exclusively Jasmine Crockett AOC

He would do it to Like Marco Rubio right behind him Just being like Yeah Yeah, it's getting harder every day. This is getting harder every day. Oh, God. Yeah, it does seem like a little bit of telling on himself here.

Yeah. Not a little bit, a lot. A lot, but also, like, in a way, because, I mean, the gag, the joke, the, the comment, the meme is that, like, okay, Trump, draw a clock, because that is a part of these cognitive assessments, draw a clock. And then they give you a time. You have to put what the time is. And he hasn't said that yet.

he's focusing every time on like the animals or like the camera TV stuff yeah the objects and I wonder if he knows he's like don't just don't say the clock it'll make me don't brag don't brag about how you can draw a clock I don't know if you guys have gone back and watched it recently but the original person woman man camera TV clip it hits me every time because it's like three minutes long and then it keeps cutting back to the reporter like smiling and nodding at him explaining like and then they go back like 15 questions later they say hey remember that thing

person woman man camera TV I swear like if you haven't watched it recently and you want to just like all right let me let me feel superior to this man for a bit it helps I know he's not funny because he's a monster I know but that one's a that's a good one you gotta laugh a little bit

You got to have a little bit, you know. Also, he, in that Walter Reed Medical Center visit, he brought up, in reference to it, that he had an MRI done, which is not something you just get at your annual or bi-annual physical. They have to think maybe you got something in there. Yeah. It's potentially something there looking for, again, like sort of signs of, I don't know, signs of Alzheimer's. I've heard some tech people mention who work with these machines or screening for cancer or something like that. Or I'll just say, since he decided to take this

cognitive test, maybe he decided to get an MRI because he, you know, I heard those are big these days. Give me an MRI too. He's making the decisions, right? He's telling these doctors what tests to give him so maybe it's just his idea i can't imagine requesting an MRI uh just for the hell of it i can imagine him requesting an MRI just like i i just want to lay in there and i want to hear those thumps and loud beeps for 20 minutes uh yeah no they they ordered a bunch of tests for to assess his uh his health so i don't know what i don't know what i don't know what it means but he's a funny guy sometimes it's fucked up and sad yeah he's never been healthier never been it's alarming it's alarming the way he talks about this stuff sometimes it's why this third

term stuff is so funny like you're going to be 82 and i know you're a cult leader and people are going to go down with the ship no matter what but like a few years ago a guy's candidacy completely crumbled because he was just seen as too old and out of it to do it. You're going to campaign again for a year do all that stuff? It's his favorite part. I know.

And he's going to keep giving speeches anyway. Yeah, he's going to love it. He's going to... Well, folks, here we are at the end of our program. I don't think he's got the juice to do it, but one day at a time. Tiger.

We don't know if he hasn't have the juice. You know how to take that test. You've got to take another test. He's going to decide, give me the juice tests. Give me the juice Apple, orange, I can tell the difference No one does it better than me I can tell that that's a grape

No one's gonna come plums See if he can notice that Sir, sir, that's a blueberry That's Ruby Red And no one ever tell me It's not Ruby Red It's not Ruby Red sir Okay, we're done

You know what? We did it We're here We're at the end of the show We survived the conversations We survived the ads All that's left is for me to tell you What? We love you very much.

Much.