The Breakfast Club - INTERVIEW: Ex-DNC Chair Jaime Harrison On Civilian Life, Biden's Decline, Toxic Democrats, New Podcast + More

Episode Date: August 29, 2025

Today on The Breakfast Club, Ex-DNC Chair Jaime Harrison On Civilian Life, Biden's Decline, Toxic Democrats, New Podcast. Listen For More!YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BreakfastClubPower1051FMSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport. The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then, everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, terrorism. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System

on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello, it's Daniel Fischel. Rider Strong. And Will Ferdell from PodMeets World. We are back in Las Vegas and giving the people what they want, a full week of Y2K content. Tell me why. Well, for the Backstreet Boys residency at Sphere, of course. We joke and say this is our second marriage, but it takes a lot of communication.

Plus, it's carrot top, baby. And finally, Ashley Simpson-Ross joins us to talk about her upcoming sold-out Vegas residency. Listen to PodMeets World on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty, and I'm the host of the on-purpose podcast, and today I'm joined by one of the greatest athletes of all-time Novak Djokovic. He's won 14 grand slams in a glittering career. Novak, Djokovic. When you reach your 30, you start counting your days to your retirement. I'm 38 this year.

How long can I push my own limits? Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hi, my name is Enya Jumanzor. And I'm Drew Phillips. And we run a podcast called Emergency Intercom. If you're a crime junkie, And you love crimes, we're not the podcast for you. But if you have unmedicated ADHD...

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Every day I wake up. Wake your ass up. The breakfast club. We're all finished or y'all done? Morning, everybody. It's DJ Envy. He's just hilarious. Charlamagne de Guy.

We are the Breakfast Club. La Rosa is here as well. We got a special guest in the building. He's at our table. He's at our table. He's an attorney. He's a politician and he is the former chair of the DNC. Yes, DNC.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have Jamie Harrison. Thank you. Thank you all so much for him. How are you, my South Carolina breadroom? Man, I'm good. I'm good. You know, I'm not traveling as much. I'm like shudderling the kids back and forth

from soccer, practice and swimming lessons and violin lessons and all that other stuff. Now I can just be a dad and then I got my podcast stuff. So, you know, it's different, but it's good to be able to be at home with my kids and my wife. And, you know, of course, my blood pressure still goes up when all those, I see all this crazy shit that's happening in politics. How do politicians adjust when you get that transition? Like, do you ever fully just relax? It's a hard adjustment.

It really is because you, when you are in. in the mix all the time and in the storm like all you know is how to deal with like buckling down for that and so when you get a time where it's sort of peaceful you don't know what to do with yourself right and so you get online and you start seeing things and it starts stirring you up and you just get a little unhinged and so I'm just happy that I got this you know podcast and all those other stuff that I'm doing is it gives me an outlet to get some of that out because other Otherwise, I mean, I'd just, I'd be bouncing off the walls. Is this what you saw yourself doing after being formed at DNC Ch?

You know, Charlie, I didn't know what the hell I wanted to do. I mean, I had hoped that Kamala Harris would have won. And she would say, Jamie, why'd you go be ambassador over there? I don't know. Some, you know. Some, you know, somewhere, you know, my wife and I can relax and invite y'all over, you know, come down to the ambassador's residence in the Bahamas. And we, but I don't know.

I am, I didn't know what I want to do. and I think I'm at one of those I'll be 50 next year I'm at one of those midlife not a crisis but a crossroads and you know you're just trying to figure out what I'm going to do with the next phase

of my life and the one thing I like a Democrat oh no it's like the whole party yeah you're right it is a whole party but you know the one thing I do know is and this is the you know it's like 10 toes down

on it I see where the country is going and I see so many reflections of what we grew up in in South Carolina. And I just know that I'm not going to allow my sons to grow up in a world like my grandparents grew up in. So I got to figure out what it is that I have to do in order to prevent that from happening because more, little by little, every day we see something new. But that's my one commitment that I know that I am definitely set on. Like, you know, we've got to figure our ways for this to be better because right now is scary.

So the chair of the DNC, what was your position? What was your job? Well, you know, the chair of the DNC is very different when you have the White House and when you don't have the White House. Break it down. So the Democratic National Committee is, in essence, it's the organization, a national organization for the Democratic Party. We've got 57 states and territories that all have state Democratic parties, and they all work with me. Now, I'm not their boss. it's sort of a partnership

but collaboration. And what we really do is we're the infrastructure for the party. So the people who knock on doors, the people who make phone calls, the volunteers, making sure that resources are on the ground to do those type of things. And when you have the White House, what you become is, in

essence, an extension of the White House political team. Your boss, like instead of people say, well, you're the chair of the Democratic Party. No, I'm a conduit in this system. them, right? I get my instructions from the White House on what to do. Now, Ken Martin, who's a new DNC chair, he doesn't have a boss, right? Because there's nobody in the White House. When you

have the White House, the president is the head of the party. When you don't have the White House, it is very diffuse, it's broken down. And so what you do at the DNC is you build the infrastructure for the next campaigns, the next elections that take place, like the door knockers, whether you're going to do the party hasn't done registration really the way that needs to but all of those things that you see on campaigns that's what the DNC does and it works with those other sister committees the DCC which is the congressional campaign committee the DSEC which is a Senate campaign committee so you don't control the whole thing you just get a slice of the ply and you just try to focus your energy on building up that infrastructure

So there was always rumored that the DNC were the ones that, you know, quote unquote, picked who they wanted to be. Man, that's a bunch of baloney. Stop it, Jamie. That's not baloney. Oh, man. But that's what they say. They picked somebody who they feel will be the president. You can tell the truth.

Well, I am telling the truth. Tell me with the power I have to pick. If I'm the DNC chair, what power do I have the pick? Like, people say, well, you could have told Joe Biden to not run. Like, seriously? Yeah. Yeah. You could have said that.

I could have. Nobody was against him during that time. And you could have and should have? I could have. And do you think he would have listen? This is the most powerful. No, no. Let's your point.

He did listen. Somebody did listen to him. He did listen to somebody finally. No, I think. So everybody should have told him earlier. I think ultimately what the president saw was that this fight is actually tearing the party apart. And I don't want that to be on me. Stop it, James.

No, I'm telling you the truth. You're not beholding to them no more. No, it's not about being beholded to. That man was too old. Everybody knew he was too old. But Charlemagne. He should have been a transitional president from the beginning. Charlemagne, I get all of that.

I get all of that. But you know what? Somebody should have stepped up. If people thought that Joe Biden was too old, then some real people should have stepped up and said, you know what? I'm going to run. I'm going to change to him.

When the Dean Phillips does that, what do you'll kick him out? Look, is Dean Phillips serious? It don't matter. No, no, no, honest. No, honest. No, Jamie, you're acting like that is, You're acting like that is the normal process of things.

Yes, just challenge the sitting president. No. You know y'all crucify people for that. Well, you're telling me, you're saying, well, that's not the normal. And you were saying, is it normal for the DNC chair to say, Mr. President, you need to sit down? Yes. That is not normal. No, no, it is not.

If George Clooney can say it, if Shalaman and the God can say it, if all these people who are not in politics can say it, but Jake Tappap a book, I read the book, said Brother Biden walked up, you, shook your hand. That's a bunch of bullshit. That's a bunch of bullshit. I don't believe that, Jamie. But why don't you believe me? Because I don't know what happened. He said that Jake Tapp and Alex Thompson wrote in their book,

Original Sin, that Biden shook the DNC chair at the time Jamie Harrison's hand and didn't recognize who he was. And Jamie said that it was bullshit. I said that it was bullshit. Every time that Joe Biden, see, Joe Biden always related me to Jim Claverin, right? So every time he thought he was Jim Clyburn. No, no. Come on.

I do that. I was like, yeah, you got to do it. I walk right into that. I walk right into that show. You're going to be clipped on. I walk right into that show, man. No, but every time, because, you know, Joe and Jim have really close relationship. Now, they trust each other and all.

And so every time he's going to be like, how's Jim doing? And, you know, every single time, that's his lead-all question. How's Jim doing? And you tell Jim he needs to give me a call. Every single time. And so what's present by an old, yes. I mean, it was damn old. But when you take a look at it, Charlemagne, when you look at what this man was trying to do,

I'd rather take an old Joe Biden on a respirator right now than a goddamn Donald Trump right now who's destroying this country. That type of rhetoric is exactly why y'all lost. And what I mean by that is America shouldn't have to choose between a Donald Trump and an old man on a respirator. I shouldn't have to choose between authoritarian strategy and an old man on a respirator. Charlemagne, you can't win something if you don't have somebody to get into the contest to run against. And if Joe Biden would have said, hey, I'm going to be a transitional president. I'm only going to be here for four years.

That would have gave you as the NC chair and the party a whole lot of time to be a good candidate. But he didn't, right? That's right. We could have, if I was six foot five or six ten, I'd be playing basketball right now and, you know, a million dollar house, but I don't, right? So that did not happen. So when that did not happen, then what you got to do is play with the cards. It's like you playing spades, right? Man, if that would have gotten a deuce here and this and that, then I could have won that hand.

No, you play with a hand that you dealt with, right? And so in the end of the day, Joe Biden decided to run, nobody decided of significance, decided to challenge him. So therefore, that is the horse that you have to ride. Do you put any blame on the Democratic Party? Because there clearly was a lot of people who saw a decline and decided not to say anything. But if they would have maybe rang the alarm, then maybe other people would have been like, you know what, I am going to run. I don't know about that, to be quite honest, Charlemagne. I mean, the reason why you elect the president is to get shit done, right?

That's the reason. Not because they look good in a suit, not because they're young or old or whatever, is to get stuff done. And if you take a look, objectively speaking, you take a look at all that Joe Biden got. done legislatively and you compare it, compare it to Ronald Reagan, you can compare it to George Jeffrey Bush, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton. There has not been a president that got more done legislatively than any president since Lyndon Baines Johnson. I agree with you. But getting things done, don't win campaigns, sadly. But that's why you send somebody to Washington, D.C. to get stuff done for you, to do stuff for your community, to move things forward.

And we see the contrast now of somebody who doesn't get things done or gets things done that actually hurts people. Like, why send a young person, you know, Jim Carver, I remember once when I was a young staffer in his office. And he said, I was bitching about, you know, some of these older people just need to sit down and let some of these young folks stand up. And he said to me, he was very quiet. He listened to me just rant and read. And he pushed back in his chair. and he said, Jim, let me ask you a question. Which would you prefer?

An old third good marshal or a young Clarence Thomas. And I sat there and I thought about it. And I said, okay, I see what you. He said, you know, yes, age is important. But it's also about your values. It's about who you are, what you will fight for, who you will fight for. And so that's a part of the package. Yes, Joe Biden was old.

I get that. But we also know that this man was committed to certain things. and make things better for folks. Did he do it perfectly? No, we don't, none of us do anything perfectly, right? There's nobody that has walked this earth that is perfect, but the son of God, and he, and hopefully he'll come back again sometime soon. I wouldn't waste my time.

Well, I hate the old conversation because it just wasn't, he just wasn't just the fact that he was old. It just wasn't the fact of his old, because we know a lot of people at an 80-year-old and are on point. He just felt like he wasn't on point. It felt like my rest of peace of my mother-in-law. I feel like he had early signs of dementia she had. So the signs that I seen with her were the signs that I was seeing with him, forgetting names, shaking people's hands that weren't there.

It just seemed a little bit. And it had nothing to do with old. It had to do with the fact that I just didn't think he was 100%. I mean, listen. You're going to say I agree, but you took it to me back. No, no, no, no. It's somebody who interacted with the president a lot in 2024, a lot. I mean, I flew on Air Force One to Eddie Bernice Johnson's funeral with him from Charleston to

Dallas and we spent an hour and a half and he basically was giving me a history lesson of what's going on all across the world no notes and it's just a very casual conversation but yes I knew he was old right and he did some of the mannerisms that old people do but in terms of like his mental acuity and his sharpness he knew it all and you better if he asked you a question you better know the answer to it right and so like seeing the the frame that was built around and then seeing the reality of my interactions, my personal interactions with him, it was not always the same, right? It wasn't. And so that's part of my frustration is like, guys, I understand that this guy isn't perfect. But you know what? We also have a vice president. So in the end of the day,

if he can't, if he can't perform, you got a vice president that is there who can't. I don't. To me, it wasn't anything. His age had definitely played a part in it. But it's the fact that Democrats suck at messaging. And all the good things that somebody like the Biden administration did, y'all didn't know how to message, and y'all just suck at campaigning. And I think that you're about to make the same mistake because you're still on some we good, day, bad stuff. Clearly America don't care about that. Well, listen, what I think we have to do on the messaging side, one of the things, the problem that Democrats have, and I say this as a party, and I said this as a party chair, is that we send people to Washington, D.C., who want to get stuff

done, who are policy wonks. Many of them are really policy nerds, right? All they want to do is They want to go to D.C., they want to write their bills. They want to get something passed and solve an issue that people in their communities are dealing with. The Republicans are reversed. They want to go to Washington, D.C. to have power, right? Either power to block something or power to move things forward. And they know that, you know, they don't need to be versed in all of these policies and all that. And so they just focus on the politics of it, whereas Democrats don't like to focus on the politics.

They just like the focus on the policy. But that's not always good because you also need the politics part. Like you've got to be able to sell what you've been able to do. One of the things I tried to get the president, well, people in the administration do is, yeah, I said, Mr. President, and I said this on this flight that we took, we were down in Charleston, visit Mother Emmanuel, and then flew to Dallas. Is that when he pooped his pants, allegedly? Man, I don't know what the hell are you talking about. I'm serious. I'm serious.

They said that the last time he visited Mother Emanuel and me, he pooped his pants. Charlotte, man, you're saying something that literally. I'm not even joking. Man, that's some crazy. That's some crazy talk. That's some crazy talk because I was, again, with the president all day. We even went to, what's his soul food restaurant that we went to? Hannibal.

Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. That's I'm telling you. I'm not even joking. I heard that they said the last time he was dead. He said he pooped his pants. They said he was taking so long to come out.

So local law enforcement was asking the secret service what's going on. and somebody in Secret Service said, look, the president just... He shot it. Oh, man. I mean, so many headlines asking, they're trying to figure out did he poop his pants.

Man, that's crazy. I'm just, I'm not, I'm not spreading no gossip. I'm just, this is not a secret. No, well, I, I never heard. You just smell. No, no, exactly. Y'all are crazy. So I didn't hear it.

You smell. You're absolutely crazy as hell. Just crazy. Let me get to my story. Yeah, go ahead. Hell, what was I'm trying to say anyway before? man and the pooping the pants.

How are you lying about something, man? You said you told him to do something. You told the administration to do something. Oh, yeah. So, because part of it is about selling what you do. And I told the president, because as I went across the country, people weren't connected. We passed all this stuff, but people weren't connected to the stuff that we actually

pass. Like the student loan stuff. There are a lot of people who qualify for all of the student loan relief, but they didn't know how to get it. Right? and so I said well Mr. President why don't and I said the DNC can actually do this we can open up we can call them Biden empowerment centers all across a country basically where people could come in and say I'm trying to get some of that Biden student loan money I'm trying to figure out how to do a small business $20,000 at small business grants but I don't know how to how to get that money I'm trying to do something on in terms of the broadband and all that other stuff and I said you can have these all across the country so that people are now then connected to the resources that you are actually bringing into the community because part of the problem is that people didn't know how to

get it right you had the money there but can't people can't access it he was like oh that's a great idea that's a great idea i thought it was going to move forward i thought that we would do something about it but the one thing that and i'm writing about this now in my book the one problem that you have is like if these ideas don't come from certain people that are in in the sort of universes around the president and the vice president, then they never see the light of date. They never crystallize. And that is part of the fundamental problems

that we have right now within our party is that we got to break through some of these things. You've got these gatekeepers who want all of the power, all of the control, all of the influence, and don't want other voices to come break in to say, you know, we're not doing this right. We need to talk to these people. We need to bring these people into the room.

And so that's part of my big frustration as DNC chair. It was that, you know, there are a lot of things that we wanted to do, a lot of bells that we were ringing very early on about this group, this group, that group. But the president or the vice president never actually really heard them because the gatekeepers kept that information from it. You know, did you start your podcast at our table because you wanted to kind of counter, I guess, the manosphere? Yes. No, no, what I wanted to do is I wanted to build our own frame.

Right? I get so tired of our folks. I love how that South Carolina came out of you and you told the truth initially. What? But now you're giving us the political. No, no, no. You're like, yes. And then you're like, what, actually? No.

But what I want to do is build our own frame because what I got tired of is, you know, we would have our Democratic candidates who were going CNN or MSNBC. They'd get five minutes to talk about whatever. And then the media itself would build a frame to define who that person was, right? And the same reason why I had Hunter Biden on my, on my podcast, who was one of the first interviews. because you could say Hunter Biden and all you know about Hunter Biden is what you heard on Fox News

from people who oppose them or maybe something that you may have read from somebody in from the administration but you never heard the man talk in his own words you never heard him go out and defend what he did or to accept blame for what he did you never heard him talk about his father and defend his father and all that stuff

and I always feel like give people a vehicle so that they can put in their own words where they are and then and then you can make a decision based off of that but but what you see right now in politics really is that the media will build a frame like when i launched my podcast they said jamie harrison uh uh going to be the joe rogan of uh of the lab i never uttered joe rogan's name right but the media wants to create these dynamics and this and that like I've never watched Joe Rogan show other than little clips online.

I don't want to be anybody but Jamie Harrison. And I want to have my show to talk about the things that I think are important that I think people in the community want to talk about. As a person who have to focus on campaigns and stuff, how much influence do you think that those podcasts or even celebrity has

on, you know, candidate? Well, you know. Everybody says he won the election because he went on all these different you know, the Theo Vaughn, the flagrants when they're new shows. I think those things have influence on the margins, right? There are a lot of people who now get their media and their news from

social media and podcasts and clips that they see on TikTok and Instagram and all those different things. And so understanding that you know, most people these days they get the bit of information that they do consume either through a little headline

or they see a little clip for 15 or 20 seconds. And so knowing that that means then the party has to adapt itself to understanding that's where the electorate is that's how they're getting their information and it is hard as hell it's like you know trying to turn a uh turn a battleship to get the party to understand like where things are going and what you got to do um and so you know i wanted to start when i was dnc chair i wanted to start a a youtube channel called d tv where we could have had shows at the dnc we had this beautiful studio in the basement of the DNC

where we could have shows and we can bring in the Jasmine Crockett to the AOCs and all that and different voices in the party that are reflected the diversity of party and talk about our stuff in our own words but I got from some of the folks in White House well we shouldn't spend resources on that right

how come Merrick Garland doesn't get any smoke? He should get plenty of smoke I wish now we're talking Jamie okay I wish Doug Jones would have I thought that was a big mistake of the Biden administration appointing Merrick Garland and it's because we always

want to be like the above the fray we always want to be like well let's do it by the book let's do it academic but sometimes shit you got to fight right you just got to fight and I wish Doug Jones or somebody of that ilk would have been the Attorney General because

Mary Garland was awful he was abysomely awful he didn't investigate the Epstein files dropped the ball and he indicted Trump too late on January 6th because he didn't want to seem too political. Political. Meanwhile President Trump is out here like I'm locking all y'all love. I'm locking all my political

opponents. Chris Christie, Bolton, everybody. Obama? Oh, I mean everybody. So why weren't y'all saying things like that? Like why at the head? And I'm not saying you even got to say it publicly. No, no, no. Well, listen, there were times in which you know, I said to the president or

I said to the vice president or said to the staff certain things. Like, you know, I remember having conversation with Anita Dunn on the TikTok stuff. I was like, that is dumb as hell for us in an election cycle to be going after TikTok. I was like, y'all wait until if you're going to do something like that, do it after the election. Like sometimes politically stuff when you know that young people, that's where they're getting their information and you know that's what they want.

Like, why are we doing that? Like, why are we trying to do these things that make it even more difficult for us to win? Yeah, but that's frivolous stuff. I'm talking about things like, hey, why isn't Merrick Garland going after? this person that y'all told us is an extensive threat who we saw leading the attempt to cool of this country on January 6th. President Biden, why are you saying things like you don't want, you know, to investigate that matter?

Why? Well, because, you know, Biden also, again, being 80 years old coming from a different time in terms of our government, he was old school in terms of looking at, you know, the difference or the line between the White House and the Justice Department. I mean, that's the way that things used to operate. But we now know that we're in a different era. like it is a different frame and we see that Trump has turned all of that on his head and that sometimes you you got to lean in and lean in heavily on some of these things and you got to get

somebody over there who is not just who who sees justice as being blind but also is not politically naive yeah as well and that and that's part of the part of the problem with mary garland i mean i had problems with mary garland and brock obama nominated him to go to Supreme Court instead of nominating the black woman that time around, right? I thought that was a perfect opportunity for us to get a black woman on the, on the Supreme Court. But again, we wanted, we always are, as a party, we're always thinking ourselves out of things, right? So the calculus was, well, let's find some middle of. Hello, it's Daniel Fischel, writer strong, and Wilfredel from PodMeets World. And we're bringing you Viva Las content. That's right. We are back in

Las Vegas, the city of sin, and giving the people what they want. A full week of Y2K content. Wait, we're back in Vegas? Tell me, Y. Well, for the Backstreet Boys residency at Sphere, of course. We sat down with Kevin Richardson and A.J. McLean just minutes before they took the stage and our very own Wilfredel basically became the newest member of the band. Boy band, please. Plus, the man who has the longest running comedy show on the strip joins us and gets his props. It's carrot top, baby. And finally, we all

L-O-V-E-Hur, Ashley Simpson-Ross, joins us to talk about her upcoming sold-out Vegas residency. It's a full week of nostalgic interviews you don't want to miss. Listen to PodMeets World on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport. The Holiday Parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then, at 6.33 p.m., everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Apparently, the explosion actually impelled metal glass.

The injured were being loaded into ambulances. Just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, and it was here to stay. Terrorism. Law and order criminal justice system is back. In season two, we're turning our focus to a threat that hides in plain sight. That's harder to predict and even harder to stop. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System

on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty, and I'm the host of the on-purpose podcast. I'm joined by one of the greatest athletes of all time Novak Djokovic. The world's number one male tennis player. He's won 14 grand slams in a glittering career. Novak Djokovic! You've been through so many injuries, loss. Oh, he showed himself.

What has Novak Djokovic done? What goes through your mind when you lose? I just want to be left alone. What has it taken to become Novak Djokovic? It's a consistent practice. It's prayer work. mindfulness, meditation, conscious breathing, it requires more responsibility from you on a daily basis to prepare yourself for the biggest battle. When you reach your 30, you start counting your

days to your retirement. I'm 38 this year. How far can I go? How long can I push my own limits? Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hi, I'm Kurt Brown-Oller. And I am Scotty Landis. And listen, we host Bananas, the weird news podcast with wonderful guests like Whitney Cummings. And tackle the truly tough questions. Why is cool mom an insult, but mom is fine? No. I always say, Kurt, it's a fun dad.

Fun dad and cool mom. That's cool for me. We also dig into important life stuff. Like, why our last names would make the worst hyphen ever. My last name is Cummings. I have sympathy for nobody. Yeah, mine's brown oler, but with an H. so it looks like brown holer.

Okay, that's, okay, yours might be worse. We can never get married. Listen to this episode with Whitney Cummings and check out new episodes of bananas every Tuesday on the exactly right network. Listen to bananas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The road guy that the Republicans are not going to oppose,

and guess what they did? They oppose them. In hindsight, You admitted it already. You said Merrick Garland was terrible. It was terrible. Why can't you say that in regards to Biden not being a one-term president? Well, because I, listen.

Those two things are the reason. Those two things are the reason Trump is back in the White House. No, I really don't. Big part of it. Listen, man, if folks would have, and this is the amazing difference between Democrats and Republicans, Trump got convicted, 34 times convicted felon, 34 times convicted fellow. did you hear a peep from the Republican Party the next day saying that Donald Trump

should not be our nominee? No, because they knew he could win. That's the difference. There were so many of us who knew Biden couldn't win. That's the difference. How did they know that he could win when he lost in 2020? Who? Trump?

Because you could clearly see the momentum between the two candidates. No, we all had this conversation. Momentum in politics goes just like it goes just like that. You could see that, James. That's the same reason. They wasn't messing with Biden.

We knew that. And that's the same reason why when the 107 days, people thought Kamala was going to, you know, make this break fast away because of the momentum. At the same time, at the same time as Trump conviction, that was around the same period that Joe Biden gave that State of the Union speech, when everybody was like, oh, God damn, that was a good state of union speech. I have not heard a better state of union speech than that time. I never did that. No. I never thought he could win. Well, regardless of whether you thought it not, his numbers were good.

It was great. We were just happy to see him get through it. I'm from Delaware, so I'm a big Biden supporter. I read the original sin. Man, the original sin is a bunch of shit. I mean, that's a good thing. The podcast is going to be ficy. Keep on.

Come on. I mean, like, Alex Thompson and Jake Tapper, seriously? I'm just telling you what I read. Seriously. I don't know why I was. A bunch of anonymous sources, because nobody wants to go on record to say anything. Anonymous sources. Because I didn't tell you in my book, there won't be anonymous sources. It's straight for me.

Can I say something? Whoever the future of the party is, whoever's going to lead the Democratic Party. And the DNC won't pick them. The American people will. You have to be able to throw that old regime under the bus. You're going to have to. You're going to have to be willing to throw that old regime under the bus and talk about all the things that they got wrong.

Yeah, but why don't we talk about, see, this is the thing. Let's talk about the stuff that we're getting right. Part of the reason that the brand for the party is, there are a lot of reasons the brand for the party is suffering. But part of the reason is that we are always, like if you look at the Republican side and the flip side, they are not talking about, well, we're getting this, we got this wrong the last time and we get this wrong.

Man, they get shit running all the time. No, but they don't talk about it. Part of the reason why they win is because they're not talking about it. It's like you've got a brand new car, and every day you throw mud on it. And then after three months, you'd be like, well, why is my car not shine anymore? It's because you, God, damn it, you throw mud on it every month.

Like, Republicans don't throw mud on their car. But Democrats, man, we will hand-ring and be like, oh, I wish we would have done us and I wish we done us. And that's your fault. Lean into what you do and that you are doing well and have that be your lead foot instead of. But that's your fault for being the party of purity. I don't know about the- When you walk around and act like you're the party of purity and y'all don't get anything wrong and you don't lie about nothing, then people are going to hold you to a different standard.

We can't be the party of purity on one side and then whine and complain about all the stuff that we get wrong the next time. Those two things can't coexist in the same space. So who do you like in 2028? What candidates do you like in 2028? To be honest, I don't know yet. I really don't know yet. I mean, there are going to be so many people who come through South Carolina. You don't at least have like a person.

No, I mean. I think you sat down with one person and people love us. I don't even name. Democrats don't know whether they come and are going. This is terrible. Oh, come on, man. This is the same stuff that happened in 2020. This is the same stuff that happened in 2008. It's the same stuff that happened. I mean, right after, yeah, in 2008, when the Brock Obama, you had like 12 people run then. You had 20 people run in 2020. But there's a lot of formidable candidates out there. But the problem is the Democratic brand is so toxic and disgusting and bad. It's because we sit here and talk about how toxic and bad it is instead of talking about the good stuff that we actually do, man. That's part of the problem.

Again, like your brand is going to be bad. If every day all you do is talk about how bad things are. Do you think they got it wrong on the border? Oh, yeah. There are things that we should have done better on the border. Yes, I agree with it. Do you think they got it wrong talking about biodynamics when they know that people weren't feeling that in their pockets

and they know that people weren't feeling that, you know, at the grocery store? I think what they should have done is what I said earlier, which is connecting the economic. people to the economic stuff that they got done, then I think people would have felt better about it, right? Because they know that this stuff is going on it. Like, you know, all the stimulus checks.

Like, the Biden stimulus checks were far bigger than the stimulus checks coming to Donald Trump. He should have. And that's one of the things he regrets. He said, I wish I would have loved. And this is a lesson we should have learned in Obama. Because you all remember, when Obama was president, we passed that big stimulus bill,

and then all this money was flowing into all of those other stuff and Obama did not put didn't take credit for it he did not take credit for so you would have thought then Democrats would have learned from 08 and 20 to do better but we don't one thing we know Democrats don't learn no we can be we can be a bit hard-headed in that extent but I'm hoping and I think this new generation of Democrats that we have who are scrappier who are willing to fight willing to do what what is necessary will learn the lessons from it's just hard to believe y'all Jamie now

simply because we know what y'all watched the last four years even when I see somebody like Corinne John Pierre come out with her book and I'm like you sat up there and lied for him all of this time and now you want to be honest and say you're an independent and it's the same all of y'all did that for the last four years man I ain't lie about

I ain't live about a damn thing well you ain't tell the truth well what you just kept quiet okay don't let him talk to like that James of disrespect come on man did you try to tell the truth and they just didn't listen because I also saw that you said you were taken for granted. You were a rubber stand. So were you telling the truth.

And if so, what were you telling the truth about? Well, telling the truth about where we are, where the electorate was, things that we needed to do. I mean, when I tell you this job, in many ways, great opportunity to connect with folks, but also extremely frustrating because you can see the things. It's almost like you see a car wreck that's happening and you're yelling and screaming and it's like nobody's listening. right because only again the select few those people in the bubble who thought they know better i give you a perfect example and uh i have here ernie who's helping me write my book um and uh i remember

you all remember the january 6th and all so the anniversary of january 6 was in uh 20 22 and i wanted this ad and after the show i'll i'll play it for you guys this ad that really goes after the republicans on on January 6. And I wanted the DNC to play this ad because, you know, I told the folks at the White House, I said, I want you all know that black folks are watching how we handle this situation. Because we know if all those people who broke into the Capitol, beat the shit out of the police officers, defecated all over the walls and the floors and did all this stuff, if those folks were black, it would have been the bloodiest day in the history of this nation. Absolutely. And I told the folks at the White House, my, my comment.

to it. I said, black folks are watching and how we Democrats handle the situation. Are we going to be forceful in terms of pushing back against it and making sure that we hold people accountable for or are we going to brush it on the rug? And I was told when I had this ad. And the ad was it wasn't as hard. I knew that they wouldn't go for the real hard ad that I wanted. So it was sort of a mid-level, but it went in a little bit, but a mid-level ad. And they were like, well, we don't think the DNC needs to do that. We don't need to focus. on that right now and and my pushback to them is folks I want you to understand this like we are trying we we need to send a signal to the our folks that we

see you we hear you we're a fight for you and just as hard as the Republicans are fighting against you we're gonna be fighting for you like this by brushing that under the rug and saying well we shouldn't talk about that right now let's talk about binomics or something to that extent I mean that is sending a signal to our folks is that you know you really don't give a damn what do you feel he's not being truthful about when you said you don't you don't feel like he's being truthful what do you think he's not being truthful about the condition that they know president Biden was in no man I just I just fund me you can

ask anybody you ask my wife I just fundamentally disagree with that like it just pisses it's hard for me to believe that it just piss personalities like us who've I've never met Joe Biden just watching him on television they cancel me for that It's just crazy that all of us can come to this conclusion, but y'all will win him every day. I was calling for him to step down in 2023 for no other reason other than you will not win the election in November, 2004. Charlemagne, like, of course.

Like, I've been on record. He's old. I get it. He is old. He walks, you know, he's old. It wasn't just about the age. It's not just about the age. There's a lot of things, right?

There's a perception that the DNC is too tied to corporate donors and specials. Yeah, man, that's bullshit. shit to. Okay, tell me. Pull the records. Pull the receipts. If we're tied to corporate donors, pull the receipts. How much money did we get from corporate donors? How much money had an APEC given to the Democratic Party? I don't know because I never talked to APEC in my four years as DNC chair. Wow. Okay. I just wasn't, how can the party claim to fight for working people while taking so much money from Wall Street and Silicon Valley? Look, where do we? You're telling me that, hold of you're telling you're going to sit here right now. I am telling you. Because

Listen, you're giving me a talking point, Charleney, but give me the receipt. Show me the amount of money that we have gotten from corporate donors. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. I can't believe you, Dave, James Day. No, show me that. Hold on. Hold on. Now, mind you, the DNC raised, the DNC coupled with campaign raised over a billion dollars. Tell me how much of that billion dollars that we got from corporate donor. Hold on one second. Hold on one second

We hold it We're holding I thought I'd be playing space And somebody just reading it You're trying to find Yeah you're trying to find I have it up Hold on

Now Combined spending on Combined spending on Congressional races in 2020 No I'm saying the D&C I'm not saying congressional races I'm like You see

D&C Democrats? No, you said the DNC. What you said is... No, I said Democrat. You said the DNC. No, I didn't. I said the DNC? Roll the tape. I don't know what he said. You said, y'all. You said the DNC. Okay. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. No, because you're saying that the DNC is corporate... You're right. You're right. So let me ask the question again. There's a perception that Democrat politicians are too tied to corporate donors and special interests. Yeah. So how can the party claim to fight for working people while taking so much money? Well, there are some Democrats in California. There are some Democrats in

Congress who do take corporate PAC dollars like they do and in part of their fundraising. That happens. But when it, like I can't control what individual members do, right? But in the end of the day, you know, if these people are still passing health care and passing, they're not fighting for tax cuts for these wealthy corporations and all that. They're actually trying to increase the taxes on some of these folks. It's kind of hard to say that these people aren't fighting for their constituents. man. Right? So again, like I can only control what I can control within my spirit, right? I know what

the DNC did and what I tried to push the DNC to do in my time, which is focus on working people, focusing on people like my grandparents, focusing on people like my aunts and my uncles and my cousins and nieces and nephews in South Carolina, trying to make life better for them. That's the party that I was happy and proud to be the chair of. Okay, can ask you this question? Yeah. Was there a private deal between the DNC and the Harris campaign that you would cover

$20 million in her bills? No. So basically and I saw Shane's newspaper article. So looking at the finances for, there are some joint finances between the DNC and a presidential campaign. When they come together, they create what it was called a joint fundraising

committee so there's things bills that they share right so some polling some advertising some things so that they can jointly fundraise money and that's and i know that your your folks are going get a little eyes glaze that is because they form a joint fundraising committee because that allows them to raise more money collectively than they could as individuals right it allows then the dnc to go to some of its uh the donors uh who can write a million dollar chat Right. And then they send that money to the DNC. It's dispersed. No.

They're individuals. There's folks that. So individuals can write a million dollars checks? Yes. Okay. Individuals can write million dollars checks because the way that the finance laws, and that's something that we really need to take a look at. But the way the finance laws work is there's a certain amount that they can give to the DNC.

There's a certain amount they can give to every state party. And all of that money is collective. And then we can use that money on behalf of the presidential candidate. So it's a joint fundraising committee. So that means sometimes they're joint fundraising expenses that come out of them. So expenses that we share. So coming off of Kamala's race, there were some things, some outstanding bills that we still had that were joint bills together between the DNC and the Kamala's race. And our agreement was to pay the remaining of some of those bills.

Was it 20 million? No. When I left, it was about five. so now i i can't speak about any other other whatever but when i left it was about five million which in in the grand scheme of things five million dollars is a lot for us as individuals but in this campaign universe do you think we need to get corporate dollars yes okay i i do believe i do believe that we need massive and we would have done that had we passed the uh the john Lewis and all the other bills that Democrats voted unanimously for in the House, but we couldn't

get it past the Senate because of filibuster, because of mansion and cinema. So I do believe that. Listen, I raised $132 million when I ran for U.S. Senate. I mean, when I think about how much money that is and what that could have done in South Carolina, that's sinful, that amount of money, $132 million. I think we need to cap the amount that we use in our election. No other country on the face of this planet spends as much money in Canada. campaigns as we do. Is the DNC beholden to billionaires too much? Or just wealthy people in general?

No, I mean. Because there's no, there's no working class person writing a million dollars. No, no, but the bulk of the money that the DNC raises is from folks who are giving five and ten dollars. Like the sheer volume, about probably about 30% of the DNC's money that it gets, it comes from major dollar donors, right? People who can write 25,000 above. The number of people who can write a million dollar check, maybe it's 100, 200 people. Like, it's not a lot. And those people, basically, I've met with many of our large donors, they're not asking for anything policy-wise

because the DNC is not a policy arm. Like, we don't write policy in the DNC. The money that we use goes into the infrastructure of the party. And so many of those folks don't have any type of ask other than when, and we don't want to see Republicans take over. Why am I getting your substack? Not even signed up for it, James. Did you give money to the DNT?

Were you on my email list for my campaign? I mean, listen, we have a campaign. I don't think there's nothing wrong with it, by the way. No, no. Well, listen, we work with substack on my list, right? Basically, what I use was my campaign list. If you subscribe to my campaign or you help my campaign out, Remember, I mean, I have an email list of over 7 million people coming off of my campaign.

It's because, again, we've raised $132 million. And a lot of people wanted to send Lindsey Graham home. And so now since I'm on substack, now since I got my ad, and we haven't talked about at our table, the podcast. Make sure you go wherever. We're talking about it the whole time. Yeah, wherever you get your podcast, make sure you subscribe. But so basically, and I'm writing every week, every week I'm writing a piece about last week I wrote one about

identity the quote unquote identity politics this week I have one on how the 2006 elections in the 2026 elections may marry each other so we're doing that on a weekly basis so do you think if folks don't want it just unsubscribe I've mentioned APAC earlier so I want to bring it up

here do you think APAC and like other powerful lobbies like that have too much influence over Democrat leaders I think and the party the general no I think APEC is a lot of power over both parties, right? Or people

in both parties, because I don't want to use the party as a whole, as a label. There are people in the parties in which APEC is very influential on, in both the Democratic Party and the Republican party. And so, you know, organizations like that probably do

have a little too much influence. And the only way that we curbed at is to change the campaign finance laws in this country. So that it is more grassroots focus and oriented and less about these big packs that have come up. I think one of the worst things was the Citizens United decision because it made it into a while while west and allowed folks with who could raise these money, unlimited influence to impact elections, to impact campaigns, to influence our members of Congress. So I think if Democrats can take back the House and the Senate but also

get past a filibuster. There's a big problem that we have right now is a lot of the bills that we wanted to pass to curb some of the stuff. You can't because it gets filibuster in the U.S. Senate. If Democrats lose again in 2026 or 2028, should the party completely

rethink its leadership structure? Even the role of the DNC itself? I mean, Shaluteman, I mean, in the history of this country, the DNC's, I think, is 170 years old. Like, you're going to win a

elections, you're going to lose elections. I mean, winning elections and losing an election didn't something new that happened, right? different though you got some you got to admit this is different i mean don't trump is different right the question is once trump's gone does it go back to the way that it has gone to the past i don't i mean that's a big question i don't know that um but one of the things i tell folks is yes there's an urgency of the moment but like you can't freak out about like all you know all hell's gone loose in terms of like the parties and how they operate, right? I do think there's some fundamental changes that need to happen. I think, you know, when I go back to the DNC,

part of what I want to do is put some reforms in to separate out to give the DNC a wall between a presidential campaign and the DNC or a president and the DNC. Because I think the DNC has to focus more, not just on the White House, but on the entirety of the party. And I don't think we do that when we have the White House. And I just want to ask you to be clear,

So you said the DNC has never taken corporate dollars in the past. No, the DNC, I mean, I don't know if there is some. No corporate PAC money. There may be some corporate PAC money. No, you said it wasn't. No, no, no. But you said that the DNC was controlled by corporate PAC money. If there is corporate PAC money, it's probably less than 5% of the money that the DNC.

No dark money influence, no. But what do you mean? Like, you're throwing out buzzwords, but I don't know how you mean. I'm just asking a simple question. Has the DNC ever taken any corporate back money? No, DNC has taken corporate back money in the past. I mean all of the parties have taken corporate pet money. But when you look at...

You just mean that they're not controlled by that. They're not controlled by that, right? Because if it's a small percentage, I mean, I can give you a dollar. That doesn't mean you're going to do what I told you for that dollar. Because I know you're getting paid a whole lot more, right? Gotcha. Yeah. Well, if you want more of this, you can check out this new podcast.

At our table. At our table. At our table. And also check out Jamie Harrison's documentary in the bubble that I executive produced. Yes, she did. Salute to Emily. Emily's in the building. Emily Harrell.

Emily just said, clearly she didn't want to be on camera, but okay. Another shot of the route. You got to put her on camera. Right. Well, sorry. It was a pleasure, Jamie. Don't be a stranger. No, I would love to come back.

And when the book comes out. Please do. But in Charleston, I do, I would love to have you, you know, as my South Carolina home boy, be a guest on at our table. Let me ask you the questions. I'd love to do it. I'd love to do it. I enjoyed your conversation with Hunter Biden.

No, it was good. It was really good, and it was good to get Hunter unfiltered, and he had a lot to say. He had a lot to say. And I think he's a good guy. He just, and maybe I don't know if it's just, look, I have family members who've had drug addiction issues and problems, right? And they're very honest. And they're very honest. They're very honest.

What are you saying? What? Just say it, Jamie. No, no, I'm just saying. The Crackheads are honest. Oh, man. Jesus Christ. It's Jamie Harrison.

We got names for doing this. Dude. Jamie, it's just saying it. It's okay. Come on. It's okay. It's okay. What?

They are honest. Some of the most honest people, I've learned some of the best advice ever. Yeah, but we don't need to be like derogatory. You're saying it in a fashion to be derogatory. You know, sometimes folks just fall down. What do you mean? No, man.

Come on, man. Sometimes people just fall down, right? And it's about all of us to help them get back up. Absolutely. Right? But I'm not going to go around and be, like, derogatory to people. I don't know. I don't know that was derogatory.

Cracket? Cracket. Cracket? What else do we call them? Cracket? No. You can call them addicts, right? Addics anymore, so.

Politico did an article saying there's a new memo that identifies 45 words and phrases for Democrats to avoid. What are your thoughts on this? Yeah, y'all don't speak plain. No. Oh, but come on now. Are these some of the words that they tell you you can't use? Yep. Yeah.

Cisgender. Man, I don't know what. Radical transparency. I don't know what half of that stuff is. Exactly. Neoliberal. I mean, they come up with all kinds of stuff. Got you.

But it's the academic part of the Democratic. What's wrong with you? I'm trying to figure it. I want to learn the right thing to say. No, I just, I don't learn crack user. I don't know. You don't want crack in it? Crack hand adjacent.

you know how we use crackhead at home how you use crackhead at home how do you use come on now hey man get a crack at a couple dollars to come to fix my car cut the grass but that's not a bad thing I said I learned a lot from people who used to you how about this I've learned a lot from people

who used to use crack I have used crack as you say use drugs Jamie was I never came here that's right it's the breakfast club good morning Hold on Every day I wake up

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