The Bulwark Podcast - Jessica Tarlov: Republicans Are in the Barrel

Episode Date: November 7, 2025

Our economy may be in the early days of stagflation, Democrats are winning the shutdown fight, and Republicans aren't getting help from the tariff king—who is just sticking his fingers in his ears and lying about the price of Thanksgiving dinner going down. Maybe it's time for the Dems to declare victory and let them reopen the government. Plus, Jeanine Pirro's complete humiliation over the sandwich guy case, and Rep. Jared Golden's retirement is a bracing reminder that Democrats must keep recruiting moderate candidates who can win in red districts. Jessica Tarlov joins Tim Miller for the weekend pod. show notes Jessica's "Raging Moderates" podcast with Scott Galloway Catherine's newsletter on stagflation, tariffs and how SCOTUS may save Christmas Tim's playlist Go to https://www.american-giant.com and get 20% off your first order with promo code BULWARK. Thanks to American Giant for sponsoring the show!

Hello and welcome to the Bullard podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Delighted to welcome today. Am I the Tim Miller or am I, Jesse Waters? I don't know. We'll see. She's the co-host on The Five on Fox News. She's a host of co-host also of Raging Moderates with Scott Galloway.

She's the only woman in America who is on stage at the Fox Patriot Awards yesterday. I saw that on my TV and will be on stage today at Pod Save America's CrookedCon. That's code switching. That's ability. It's a crossover for the ages. It's Jessica Tarloff. How you doing? I'm great. It's so nice to be here and meet you in person. Welcome to the Bullard Studios. It's very cool. Have we not met in person? Is this it? This is our in-person meeting? I feel like we have spiritually we've met. Yeah, we've known each other a long time if you go that way. But no, first in person. And it's a weird, you know, it's like a strange TV thing that everyone kind of feels like they know each other a bit. Like I was just in the elevator with

Ali Vitale from MSNBC. And she's like, I love your coat. And I'm like, are we just girlfriends? Because, like, I've been watching you and you watch me. And you're tall. You're pretty tall. So are you. I don't know what size you were going to be. I'm nervous about that at CrookedCon because I'm a tall lass. And I feel like everybody is going to be mini. Love it as kind of a weenie lad. Yeah, but Hassan Paker is huge. Is he? Okay, we'll see.

He's supposed to be. According to that. We're on a panel with Hassan Piker. I know. Another person I've never met. Do you have any thoughts about that? Yeah, I have thoughts about that. We'll see how it goes.

Then we'll share the thoughts with you guys on Monday. Okay, I want to start with the most important news of the day, which is justice has finally been served in America. And I'm so happy for the sandwich man. I was disappointed. I was not able to come here yesterday a little early. But you wanted to be at the courthouse. I wanted to be out there, out there with, you know, throwing flowers at them. I want to just do a little flashback from two and a half months ago.

Your former colleague, Judge Janine, get it, girl. Judge, U.S. Attorney Box of Wine was announcing, sorry, she was announcing this indictment, and I want to listen to it. And then he took a subway sandwich about this big and took it and threw it at the officer. He thought it was funny. Well, he doesn't think it's funny today because we charge it with a felony, assault on a police officer, and we're going to back the police to the hilt. So there, stick your subway sandwich somewhere else. She's such a cutie.

So there. I think we are laughing. Are you laughing? I'm laughing. I'd speak for myself. I actually, and she released a statement this morning saying, you know, it didn't go the way that we thought. You shouldn't be able to. assault and officer, and obviously listening to someone argue that who's scared of, like, bodily harm.

He's wearing a bulletproof vest and a guy in a pink shirt is throwing a sandwich. Though I know there was a lot of mustard, which was a point of contention. He said that that feels like a lie. I feel like that was a lie under oath. The mustard part? I do. I think if there was a crime committed here, it might have been the prosecution's lead witness lying under oath because he said that he could smell the mustard and onions on himself.

But we can see in the video that the sandwich is still wrapped on the ground. It is a packaged item. So how did the mustard get through? Well, I think this is what the jury took into account when they were evaluating this. But, you know, I think that there are a few good things. Well, one that Sandwich Man walks free and talks about how important jury trials are. Yes. And they are oftentimes cited as the way that you push back against creeping authoritarianism.

And I think that that is a good lesson for all of us. And you see that with people who have been. and unfairly prosecuted. Like, Comey says, let's go. Yeah, right. Like, sit me in front of them. Tish James is like, I'm not afraid of this. John Bolton, maybe a little bit more afraid of what's to come.

But I think that airing this stuff out publicly is so important in this moment. There's too much that's going on behind closed doors with this government. And I feel much safer about the fact that we can, you know, see a jury result. You can have people talking about it in front of cameras, and that makes me feel better about all of it. And that he's free to go practice at cravath or where he's off to. It's all very positive. I mean, it was a little bit. It's funny.

And it also is a little bit absurd. And he was, so she in that announcement, Ms. Piro announced a felony prosecution. They didn't get that. No. It was a misdemeanor. They still took it to the jury rather than just like cutting a deal with him. I don't know about you. Were you a troublemaker in high school?

I mean, no. I was a little bit of troublemaker. So I had a couple of misdemeanor charges against me. Like actually, not from like your mom. No, like really. Oh, I thought you meant like, did I come home? You know, minor in possession of alcohol. Okay.

You know, not showing up to court when I should have showed up for a traffic ticket. Yeah, watch out. I was practically trying to Aragua. But, you know, I had a couple minor. None of them went to a jury trial. You know, it felt a little bit. but, you know, political, a onerous to try to take this to a jury trial.

Well, totally. But they had invested also in the El Chapo-like video about what had happened. Oh, I forgot about that video. Oh, it was like an OG special. I feel like for this administration before we got like Christy G. Noem on top of buildings, like in Chicago and Portland, looking down at the masses of Big Bird and, you know, Pikachu or whatever. But they were amped about this.

And it feels so long ago. the thing. They have totally warped my perception of time. This was a couple, two and a half months ago or whatever, but the beginning of the National Guard going into cities is actually a very seminal moment in D.C. being the smartest place to start since Trump is actually in charge of it. And Muriel Bowser had a different take than the other Blue City mayors about this. But I think it's a good line in the sand that we have this. And now he can become a spokesman. It kind of petered out the National Guard troops. Why do you think that is?

Like, you just remember the intensity of the feeling around it back then. Yeah. And I think maybe part of it is just that it's like there was a lot more bluster than there has been actual action from the National Guard Troops side of this. But we'll get to the immigration stuff later, which is totally different animal. Yeah. But, like, it's mostly been guys in fatigues doing selfies, you know? Like, that's been the most of it. There have been a few other things.

But, like, that's been the gist. In D.C. or in all the cities that they've fanned out. I mean, definitely in D.C. Yeah. L.A. was like that because they ended up only at the one building. Yeah, right. Like they were doing perimeter. Yeah.

I mean, I went to watch, last time I was in town, I'm away from the child. You know this. And now you don't look to see a movie anymore with small children. You only get to see children's movies. So I was away, and I had a little free time. I went to see one battle after another. Oh, how did you feel? I loved it.

Yeah. But I walked out. I went to the one down in Chinatown here in D.C., I walked out, and it's like, you know, there are four dudes. in fatigue, standing outside the metro, getting yelled at by a crazy guy, and then other people are videoing it. And it just, it didn't. It doesn't hit the way that they expect it to. But I think that it's all kind of looping back to this idea of things being out in the open.

Like, it's so good for it to be on display this way. And there's been so much activity on the part of the regular populace in filming things and posting things and commenting on it at a moment. where the administration is making you more and more afraid of what's going to happen to you if you do those things. And, you know, if we had had this conversation last week, I think we would have had a totally different mentality

about the trajectory of the country and what's going to happen in the midterms or how people are feeling. But, you know, no Kings Day. You know, I'm not trying to get like so amped up about it. But, you know, you have 7 million people turning out and then you see this election where a lot of people turned out and basically said varying degrees of I'm not into what's going on in this country.

And that makes you feel, I don't want to say good. I'm not like that happy about things. But we're moving. I feel like we're all speaking a similar language now. And for a long time, I did not feel that way. And they seem weak also. So let's go to the election results. And they do seem weak.

I was watching you guys yesterday on the five. And, you know, the right-wing kind of processing of this, there's a lot of cope happening. I was listening to them, and there's a lot of feeling of, like, well, this was on home turf, which is true. Like, it was in states that come, well, one, you know, that the Democrats rule, you hear that a lot. You hear a lot of kind of like, oh, well, Zoran. It's going to be a political cudgel for us, and we'll be able to use him. Some places. You know, but there wasn't a lot of, like, man, we're losing our grip on things.

of power. I don't know. Do you feel that? I totally feel that. And I believe I said it before I was drowned out. But I don't think that the argument holds, actually, that this is blue turf. Because the lesson of the 2024 election was that what was solid blue turf is not so solid. And in Virginia, there's literally a Republican governor. Yeah. And New Jersey was the place, I think it was the state that had the biggest move. Number two. I think New York was number one. One second, like shift towards Trump from 2020 to 24. And the five counties that he picked up, the Republican, like, had never won before, went back and went back hard towards Mikey Sherrill.

And a lot of serious people were saying that Jack Chitterely could win this, right? If there was a last-minute push and there was polling that had them within, you know, three to five points. And you don't know if it's a big turnout day, you know, four-year-side, what could happen there. So I don't want to reduce the impact of it. because also the wins were so big. Like 15 points is the biggest margin in Virginia since JFK. Like, that's a big deal. And Mikey Sherrill at 13 points, no one had that.

So I'm into it, but, you know, it's boring for, you know, my colleagues certainly, but that's my specialty. I like to abhor everyone for 90 seconds at a clip. But like Mississippi, Georgia, Ohio, Texas, these aren't blue places. What was the mood over there? Can we do? Is there any shot in Freud? were things were people kind of sad on Wednesday?

No, well, I wasn't... Was Greg Gutfeld moping? Can you give me something? No, I can't give you nothing. I mean, you saw what it was, and I think that there is a strong... Cope, which is interesting kind of in a way, and it didn't feel like they're like, oh, this was a big rebuke, and we need to change things. Right, even though Trump's first comments were that, you know, when he is talking to the press

before he had the private meeting with the GOP senators, where he said when the cameras aren't here, I would like to talk about... the shutdown, which I think is really hurting us. And until last night, he thought affordability was something he had to talk about, but now it's no more affordability. So I don't know how that's going to work out for him. But, you know, I'm struck by the difference in response to the 2024 election for people who vote like we do versus people who are supporting Trump because I think, and I'm Granger

was a bigger election, it's a presidency and, you know, a lot more results from all over the country, but I thought everyone was really introspective and thoughtful about it. I didn't see anyone get on TV and be defiant, like, no, Kamala had it right, and Biden had a right. You know, everyone said this was a debacle. Some people have been taking a long of time. I heard some, I did hear some leftists talking about the Zoron victory, like it was the biggest victory in history and that we don't have to. As a New Yorker, it is killing me. It was good. It was a good picture. A lot of votes. A lot of votes. I don't, I don't try to downplay. Well, a lot of votes.

But, you know, the point. He got a lot of votes. He deserved it. He deserved it. I think, Mayor Lindsay, I think so. So that's good. That's good. There were a lot of votes on the other side, too. Yeah. So, you know, if Sliwa had dropped out and if Cuomo had campaigned or been less repulsive, frankly, I don't think it would have gone that way. Or if you had a normie Democrat get in or a technocrat type, like a Jamie Diamond or Jessica Tisch, I think it would have been different. But I don't want to minimize it because I think it's exciting to have young people. also, because we're about to go do a panel on how to be cool again. That's easy for me. Is it? I was like in straight panic. You're in a panic?

Is that why you're kind of in the lace? It's the black lace. You're feeling like this is cool? No, I don't know. I'm like a 41-year-old mom. You're cool. I think you're cool. Yeah, but you're like a dad in your 40s.

Yeah. You know, I had a couple misdemeanors in high school. That's true. I had nothing like that. I left in New Orleans. But, yes, I was nervous about, you know, how, well, you're wearing, no, they're like in between, but like, millennial women only wear like the really tapered jeans and young people don't like that.

So I was like, I can't do that. So I wore like baggy or leather pants. Anyway, I'm probably trying too hard. You can take my fucking skinny jeans off of my, pry them out of my cold dead legs. Okay, I'm not going to do the big pants that the kids wear now. No, it doesn't have to be big. Yeah, the boys do. The boys were all wearing huge pants now.

Like when we were in high school? Yeah, tiny shirts. Well, no, because in high school we did big shirts, big pants. Now they're wearing tiny shirts, big pants. pants. I had baby teas that I was way too chunky for, and like a seatbelt belt from urban outfitters. Everything was very chic.

You were too chunky? Like, I don't. I find that hard to imagine. Like, puberty-wise. Not like I need to be sent away somewhere. It was not, you know, it was like that in-between phase. Yeah, sure. You have a daughter.

Like, where your mom's like talking to you about a bra, but you're like a little bit unsure. I don't know anything about that, actually. Yeah, this is, this I'll experience all this for the first time. in five years. I had all brothers went to an all-boys school, so I know nothing about what you're talking about. It's going to be a journey. Yeah, you should text me. But yes, it is a bit. Do you think this is like too dramatic for the morning? I like it. Thank you. The election results are really good. And they're they're coping really hard, at least publicly, but I think behind closed doors that people know what's going on. If they're ever sad, just like, I just like a little

video. Just like one little sneaky video of them being sad. okay. It's fine. They're mean to you, so it's okay to do. Just one, just for fun. They like Schadenfreude. They posted one of their coping things was the White House posted a thing about people crying from last year's election. They posted like random TikTok girls crying. Oh, no. Yeah, the White House, our government, the federal government's official page posted like a sizzle reel of, you know, 20-year-old woke girls being sad. And so if they can do that you can sneak us a little bit of anyway I'll work on that

everybody I'm in Washington here on Friday for CrookedCon shout out to our boys over crooked media and it's chilly it's really fall it's not fake fall it's not fake winter like we have in Louisiana and so I've been turning to my fall wardrobe for these travel trips which

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I don't think. There's been a little bit of lip service to it. We brought on Catherine Rappell to the Bullwark. She had her first newsletter yesterday. She was awesome. She used to go on Fox. I used to be on with her. Yeah, she's great.

So I want to read a little bit from her first newsletter. Layoff announcements have reached recessionary levels. Subprime borrowing is back. Electricity prices are skyrocketing. To the extent we can actually measure anything right now, which is hard because of what Trump's doing, we appear to be suffering from the dreaded S word stagflation. So that's bad. That seems bad. Then the election results seem very bad.

And Trump was asked about this yesterday, and he was like, well, Thanksgiving meals are cheaper than last year. Not true. And then he goes, so I don't want to hear about the affordability. I don't want to hear about the affordability. I don't know if it's really possible for Trump to deal with bad news. Like, this might be a – they might be in a real pickle here. Because, like, Trump's superpower is being able to, like, talk about, like, the shitty steaks that he sold and, like, his shitty hotels and talk about how they're the finest things ever. Yeah.

He's good at that. He's good. He's good. He's good. He's got to hand it to him on that. He sells well. He's a good. It's like, you think that this steak tastes. terrible, this rock hard steak, but it's actually the greatest finest stake ever, and I know because I'm Trump, right? And he's, and he has been good at that in, like, talking about his last term during the campaign. It was the greatest economy for African Americans. You know, he does that whole schedek. Lowest unemployment. If the economy's actually bad, though, if we actually

are in stagflation and people are feeling real pain, like that schick doesn't really work, right? No, well, I think that's what you saw manifested on election night. I mean, you have your normal kind of recouping of the resistance. whatever it's going to look like this time around. But people showed up and said, we hired you basically for one job, maybe two jobs. So there was an immigration job, and we wanted you to close the border. And you did that. And you did a good job.

And I think it's important to, you know, I wish the asylum system was working better. But like, if you let in, you know, a quarter of a million people on a monthly basis for three years or whatever, then there's got to be closed for a little bit to kind of figure out what's going on. But the main job was to lower the prices of gas, eggs, school supplies, like all the things that we need on a daily housing. And none of that has happened. And I always try to, and part of this is a function of working. And he's single-handling made it worse, actually. It's worth mentioning with the tariffs. It's not just that he hasn't made it better.

Well, the Supreme Court- He's made choices that have made it worse. May save us, which I haven't uttered in a very long time on the tariff front. But, yeah, it's definitely made it worse. And you've seen some Republican senators find their backbone about it, you know, voting to. Well, they voted to like. You're on Fox. So you see it a little bit more than me, but I don't know.

What? Well, they voted to scrap the Brazil and the Canadian tariffs. I don't know how that actually works. The problem is I feel like all this stuff happens in government, but he doesn't care. So it just keeps going anyway. So it'll call it Mark Carney and be like, I know that you saw this, but actually it's still on, baby. But I try, and it's connected to working in conservative spaces for sure. But, like, there are good reasons that people voted for Trump in 2024.

For sure. And so I want to, I want the country to succeed. I want to give the benefit of the doubt where I think that it's warranted, but I cannot get to the silver lining of what's happening now. Not only in their communication strategy, but actually on the ground. I'm not an economist, but, like, not a dumb dumb. Like, I understand how it works, and everything's been going in the opposite direction that they've said that it should. And Scott Galloway, who I do Raging Moderates with, you know, talks about the Magnificent 10. I thought it was the Magnificent 7 originally, but it's 10 now.

He says 10. Anyway, I wouldn't fight with Scott about this. But he says, like, it's, you know, propping up the whole market. We have this K-shaped economy, and it's very easy for the administration to just, you know, pay attention to the top of the K, because they don't really care about the bottom of the K, bottom of the K votes, usually. But I can't see, like, the trees through the forest with this. Yeah, to me, it's like, what's this 12-step program line? Like, the first step of solving you have a problem is admitting a problem.

And I don't think Trump is ever going to admit that he has a problem. And they don't seem like they're interested in admitting they have a problem. They being kind of like the broader media ecosystem around Trump, the people around Trump. And so if you can't admit that the economy is going the wrong direction and you don't have any solutions. Maybe you're just trying to get really rich while you have power? Yeah. Or fingers crossed street and court sails or like, whatever, screw it. I'm not running again.

Good luck. You know, maybe, maybe not. Right, I don't know. Like the crypto people are doing great and the Trump family is doing great. Because they are the crypto people now. It's crushing, yeah. Oh, so good. Barron's like a billionaire now, just himself on, you know, on crypt with the

crypto coin scales. Yeah. So, like, they're running a massive scan. They're enriching themselves to a degree that never before seen in our government. So they're doing fine. And he's in his little media ecosystem where nobody tells him things are going bad. So why would they try to do anything different? To me, it seems like we're on an inexorable trajectory towards bad stuff, unless he gets bailed out by like whatever, an AI boom or something.

Well, it doesn't look that way where the layoffs are going. Yeah. Event. Um, I, yeah, I, but again, I'm like trying to go for the benefit of the doubt, like small, not small people, smart, some smart people, I don't know, it's really hard as economic, yeah, but like Scott, that's true. She is smart and small. Like Scott Besson is a smart guy. He did admit. Is he? Yeah, like technically. He was pretty bad. He was pretty bad as a hedge fund person. I don't, yeah. I mean, he's like made a billion dollars and has a Barbie dream house. He sold the Barbie Dreamhouse. That's so sad. It is very cool house. I mean, his, he did well, but, like, his fun didn't do particularly well.

When he went out on, I mean, Soros has done great, and that's where he was for most of it. Anyway, I don't know. The Jews control it all. Anyway, you can't. Do you? Yeah. I mean, that's what I've heard. Okay.

We'll get back to that. I just don't, I don't think it behooves our side. Yeah. to just shit on them all the time and say they're just dumb. They have no idea what they're doing. But isn't that true? Sometimes, but... I mean, Howard Nutluck has no idea what he's doing.

I'm totally with you on that. Like, I think that he is one of the biggest thorns in their side. Like, on top of the fact that he doesn't do that well on TV, which is all that really matters in this. I think Besson does much better. But he does have moments where it cracks through. And, like, he admitted, I think he was with Jake Tapper, where he said there were parts of the economy that are in recession. Yeah.

And you're like, oh, you noticed that that was happening? He's really condesc-scent. I just don't like his affect. It could just be me. It's hard for me to get through. It's a very condescending affect. I saw him in person. I did not realize he was so tall.

Yeah, really tall. Yeah. Like, I'm 5-11, and he's probably, like, 6'5. It's huge. Big guy. Big guy. That affect all the time, though. Really?

It's the vibe. I mean, we didn't chat or anything. But you know when someone's like vibing a certain way, he also, you know, maybe didn't want to hang out with me, which is totally fine. So things are bad, though. We agree. And they don't have a plan, especially, well, they have a plan. Which is what?

Well, there's this plan that Stephen Mirren, who's the economist and like ex-Hutchman guy that's behind all of it has, and there is a paper that this was based on, right? And the thing about the paper is that it has to go, you know, like, I mean, I think that they're, I'm very happy in my marriage, but I think that there are, you know, multiple happy lives that we can all have, right? Like, you could have found somebody else or, you know, the sliding doors of it all. I'm getting to something about it. Or I'm taking this clip and just, just saying.

No, it's fine. He always says to me, you never bring me up at the normal times when people are like, how's life and you're not like, I'm so happy. Like, I have beautiful daughters and a wonderful husband. You're like, with this proposal, the tariff plan to fix the economy, it's like a thousand things have to go perfectly right. And you have to be able to control how every other nation is going to respond to how you're behaving. And like, none of those things have gone right. Like, I don't know if there's actually a pot of gold with $17 trillion or whatever he says that it is that they've brought in from tariff revenue that they're spending on SNAP benefits.

You know how they're saying that they're like feeding women and children with tariff money that no one knows if it exists? Anyway, they were going with a plan that had to be pinpoint precise, like a sniper rifle from thousands of miles away. And that is just bombing at this particular moment. And I know that you're not supposed to kind of live or die by elections, but they have an election coming up. And this is going to be the number one issue. And Democrats seem to have found a way to stop talking about cultural issues and talk about cost of living issues, which

it is a miracle. And I don't know how they can stand up to that. Well, that's a shame. Which I'm not mad at. Let's be honest, traditional phone systems weren't built for how businesses work today. When you miss a call, you're not just missing a conversation. You're losing business. Quo, formerly open phone is the modern alternative, designed to help you work smarter, build stronger relationships, and never miss an opportunity. Quo is the number one business phone system that streamlines customer communications. No more juggling two phones or being tied to a landline. Quo works through an app on your phone or your computer so you can run your business from anywhere. Your team can share one number and collaborate on calls and texts like a shared inbox, keeping response times fast and customers happy. Whether you're a solo operator or leading a growing team, Quo keeps you connected and health. helps you deliver standout customer experience. Get started for free. Plus, get 20% off your first six months at Quo.com slash the bulwark.

That's QUO.com slash the bulwark. And if you have existing numbers with another service, Quo will port them over at no extra charge. Quo, no miss calls, no miss customers. The shutdown ties into kind of all this. And I have, I think, I think maybe a contrarian take. in the pundit space on this, which is like... Open it.

Maybe it's time to declare victory. It feels like a win. It feels like the Democrats won the shutdown. Like it's a... Trump got blamed. And I was watching you guys all talk about it. And there's like the back and forth on Fox. They're coming up with the reasons why the Democrats are losing.

And it's like a whole different world over there. It's just like the Schumer shutdown. Yeah. You know, and this is part of the reason why I'm kind of like it's crazy. Like the shutdown conversations like literally exist in two completely different silos. 100%. And everybody watching Fox is convinced it's entirely the Democrats' fault. Everyone watching MSNBC is convinced it's entirely the Republicans' fault.

There's nobody's broaching any possibility. What's CNN doing? Nobody's debating. I don't watch CNN. I don't know. You tell me. I don't. Is anybody?

I don't know. Sorry. Abby's show. I feel like some people do. We love Abby. On the airport. Abby is the airport. Yeah.

But so nobody's negotiating. And I guess there's some secret Senate negotiations happening. But nobody's like, nobody feels any pressure. to negotiate because in their media circles, everybody's like, you're killing it, right? You know what I mean? But I just look at that. I'm looking at things right now, and it's like,

people are being materially harmed. Yes. Not just, I mean, myself, because flying is horrible. But that's, you know, that's a first world problem. I get it. There are other people that are being materially harmed that, like, need their benefits

or need their paycheck that they're not getting or working without a paycheck, various things. And it's like, there's not another election for a year. And there doesn't seem to me like Mike Johnson is going to bring up a bill to bail out, you know, to extend the Obamacare subsidies. That seems like a zero percent chance that that's going to happen. I don't know what he'll do if soon gets him in a room and is like, this is what we're doing. Because, I mean, at least the reporting that I've seen is that there was a Senate GOP luncheon. They have lunch like every day, though.

I live and they act like it's such a big deal. And it's like every day there's a report out of it. But anyway. You poor Mitt sat alone at those luncheons. So sad. Money more. Now I guess like be home and be happy. Yeah, I got lots of grandkids. Like a thousand.

So cute, too. That there's an appetite from Republican senators to put up their own Obamacare subsidies bill. And I hope that if that happens, the Democrats are like, sure, I'll sign on to yours. Like this shouldn't be, it has to be my way, you know. But then I don't know what happens in the house. Yeah. I guess if you're just, if you're looking at the, what were the Democrats' goals out of this? It was like one, to help people whose health care premiums are going up.

That was like the stated goal, right? Number two was to fight the lawless administration and say that they're fighting it. Number three was to gain some political advantage when it was the only opportunity when they had to do so because the Republicans control everything, right? Like those, if we're just being honest, like those were the three elements. Two and three have been achieved. Go ahead. Well, one thing that we don't discuss that hasn't been dropped from the list of demands is to restore the Medicaid cuts from the big beautiful bill. Like, that's how the right gets that number about like $1.5 trillion.

Sure. So that's me. I understand it as a point of argumentation, but like that is not happening. And I feel like it has a lot more of a feasible chance of getting passed or, you know, something getting done if you're just sticking to the Obamacare stuff. For sure. Yeah. But do any of them have a feasible chance? I guess I don't know.

And it's sort of like, if I'm on the Democrats now, I just feel like the political part of this has been achieved. The substantive part has not. It's the Republicans' fault, though, that it hasn't. Right? Like the Democrats have given them plenty of opportunity to say these are your voters, most of these people whose premiums are going up. It's real people. We're trying to help you. It's a lot of, you know, frankly, just like look at the demo.

It's like a lot of older, you know, white people like that are. In red states. In red states whose premiums are going up. It's a lot of like I was watching the CNBC thing. And so I don't mean to minimize. There are a lot of people who the Obamacare premiums going up is really bad for them. And it's a real thing. It's a real thing.

There's also like it's particularly bad for like early retirees. It's like this donut. It's like CNBC did a thing on like a couple that was like 58 years old living in, they lived in like some red state like North Dakota. And they're like we were planning on you. using our early retirement to vacation, but now we're not going to have any vacation money because we've got to spend them on the premiums. And I'm like, okay, well, good luck.

Sorry, tough cookies. But the Democrats have made their point on this, and John Thaun can come to the table. The other side of this going to know is like... Well, do you think they should open it up without an Obamacare subsidy's bill? Yeah, I just think that they should be like you can just vote for have a couple of these old fucks vote for cloture and just whatever, not support it. like if you want to vote for it if you want to open things up on a party line like go for it filibuster for spending bills and get on with your day yeah and i guess the argument there's so

there are two arguments for the democrats now to keep this going one is maybe they're going to nuke the filibuster which the democrats want because they have a lot of bigger wish list if they ever get back in power okay that's an interesting strategic inside the beltway reason to keep this going the other reason to keep this going is don't trump's at his lowest approval rating of the second term right now if you look at the silver and eight silver kind of average he's He's gone from... The bulletin. The bulletin.

He's gone from negative 7 to negative 13 over the last month, basically, since October, which is basically the shutdown time. So he's being materially hurt. So those are arguments for, like, doing it. It's like, okay, well, we'll just keep waiting until you guys will do the health care subsidies. It's hurting you, not us. But on the other hand, I'm just kind of like... Well, it's hurting people. It's hurting people, which is what your job is supposed to be about.

Like, I saw yesterday that Democrats were like, oh, no, I think we should go a bit longer on this. Like right after Sean Duffy got on TV and was like they're going to be, you know, 4% of flights are going to be taken offline and that's going to be like 10% of flights. And we both had terrible travel to D.C. last date. Though Amtrak did come through for me. Great. But having to go from Ligordia to Moyniance. We do.

There were a lot of angry travelers on the train, though. Other libtards like myself. But we had a little a little family time there. you know, and I feel like trains are super friendly. They are. It's a little more communal than the airplane experience. I'm still always afraid that my stuff is going to get stolen. Yeah, the bags.

The bags. There's not a lot of security there. It does feel like a weakness. Like I would go, if I were a thief, I would go on Amtrak, and I would also go outside of all of these play places. Like, we park our super fancy strollers on the street in New York City and go in and do like bubble class. And you could just walk by and take.

a bunch of op-a-babies. And they're worth a lot. This is why you got to the cool panel. It's why I'm wearing leather pants. I was crooked, right? Yeah, because you're, you're, you got a criminal mind. You might not. Kiker is not going to be talking about stealing strollers.

What are you doing if you're Chuck Schumer today? I'm still torn about it because the thing that gets me more about than the flights. And it, it is a big deal. And, of course, the air life. Like, we're joking about our stuff. If I miss CrookedCon, who cares? Sorry, I can't get here because of our, you know, our government doesn't work. Yeah, that would have fine.

You'll find someone else. But other people have real jobs, real lives, real things. Listening to these interviews of people in food pantry lines. Yeah, I'm saying. That's real stuff. And that doesn't mean there shouldn't be a conversation about why one in eight Americans needs to be on SNAP or if absolutely all of them do. But, like, that has to be dealt with. And the courts are saying you need to deal with it, but that going back to the lawless

administration, they don't care about court orders. Right. Which is why I would never vote. It's just to be 100% clear. Like, because, you know, if any Dems are listening. Like, I would. If any Dems are listening? You're Dem members.

Like, I would never, uh, well, I'm, I'm being humble. You can't vote for this government. So tell them to nuke the filibuster. Yeah, or you could give them a cloture and not vote for it. You know what I mean? Like they could, you know what I mean? You could just vote for cloture that that's happened before. And that's like a dorky thing nobody would understand.

And so I don't, you know, you wouldn't get, I don't think, I don't think you'd suffer any political consequences for that. I'm just saying that would be an option. I would never vote for this budget and this government, obviously. But, like, what's the hope? Like, the best case scenario feels like at this point that John Thune and Mike Johnson give you a vote on the Obamacare subsidies in a couple weeks and you take it, and you take it, which is, I guess, a good deal.

That's fine. Would it actually pass? I find it hard to believe that it's going to pass this House of Representatives. I find that very hard to believe that we've gained one. Over the course of this whole fight, we've gained one vote from Republicans, Marjorie, Taylor, Green. That scores on one person who has come around to the Democratic point of view. So you'd need a couple more in the House, I guess.

But that's feel it's unlikely. I don't know. I think it has to do with Trump. Like, how much does Trump signal? I mean, he broke in 2018, 2019, right? I mean, we had a 35-day shutdown. We're on day 37 right now. He broke when that happened.

He preserved snap because you're supposed to when that time happened. but he's that much more evil this time around. But, you know, a couple weeks of people not being paid and starving is really serious stuff. And I feel like the stakes, like we're in full political jockeying time. And it's uncomfortable to me. And I say this as someone who gleefully says, like, in the latest NBC poll, you're being blamed by 12 points. So, you know, I'm telling on myself a bit. My point is they've lost.

Like, they've lost. Like, they've already lost. And I do think that the Democratic base is happy right now with the party. They're saying you are fighting for the right stuff. You're not rolling over. There's no like Chuck Schumer telling us we're going to stand up to them. And then he's like, actually, I'm going to give them exactly what they want in 20 minutes. Right.

So I imagine it comes to. If we were playing the Sims, I would be like, keep rolling because they're in pain right now. So there's no. So I understand the perspective, which is like the Republicans are in the barrel. Yeah. Like on this. It's just, I don't know how much, yeah, the people are being hurt. I just don't know how much more politically to be gained.

Like, he's already down at minus 13, and there isn't another election until next November. And I just, I think that the next November election certainly will be about health care costs, premium costs, premiums going up, economy. But it's not going to be about, like, the strategy of how the shutdown came to an end. It's not going to have any impact on next year's. Also, in a lot of cases, even if there wasn't over. Obamacare subsidies plan that they could sign or a bill, it wouldn't solve the problem. Like a lot of these premium increases are baked in at this point now that the exchanges are open. You know, it's not bureaucracy is a very slow moving.

It's not like something like you flip the switch and it's like, oh, actually we're going to go back to this level, which by the way is totally unacceptable level. And I wanted to ask you about that because it feels like, you know, we're having this fight about, you know, making sure your premium doesn't go up 114% to 400%, you know, depending on where you you are. But, like, Obamacare is still too expensive. And there's no reform plan coming. I mean, there's nothing coming from their side at all, which makes us look good. But that's something that's been bothering me. And we have all these elected officials. They come on the podcast and they're talking about, like, we need to make sure we save people's health care.

And I'm like, it wasn't good to begin with. Like, thank God, 20 million plus people have Obamacare. But what are you going to do about the fact that they shouldn't be paying a thousand a month anyway, let it want $4,000 a month. Well, here's why they don't want to talk about that, because this is the issue that divides the Democratic Party the most. And it's like, are we going to, like, there are things to do, you know, like, it would probably be cheaper to do Medicare for all than the current system, but there'd be a lot of other negative consequences of quality of care, et cetera.

Like, there are other more, you know, bringing transparency, like my people that we would propose, you know, the raging moderates, like bringing more transparency to bring cost down. But to me, the point is, if I was the Democratic politician going on your podcast and you were asking them about that, I also would not answer that question because it doesn't matter. We have no power. And they're probably because of all the power. And they're the ones that claim that they're a populist party now that cares about working people. And they're sticking everybody with the bag right now with tariffs as making their groceries go up. The health care previews are going up.

Make them own it. And, you know, this is me and John Stewart got into this a little bit a couple of a month ago where he was like, don't the Democrats need to put out a round. radical, we didn't get into it, we just had a discreet, where he was like, don't the Democrats need to put out like a positive vision for how to actually fix this and make it better? And I was like, no, no, I mean, it would make me feel better. Well, do you feel that way? Your feelings aren't really the most important thing right now, I'm sorry.

Yeah, no, I hear that a lot in life. Pain for the administration is the most important thing. But do you think that you feel that way because you're not, you haven't been on our side forever? Like that you just have a more, this has to be defeated, like, I feel responsibility to have a better democratic platform. Like I want to, you know, read, I mean, I'm not going to read the whole thing, obviously, but like, you know, around the DNC and you get like the platform and you look at it and you're like, oh, I want to have really good exciting ideas. Not just, I want to get the talking points, right? And I want to say, you know, I'm slashing red tape and I'm going to build houses, everything. But I also want to see, like, these are my three reforms that I'm proposing in the health care space that are going to make sure that you have, no.

No. I think this is like a never-trump or thing. And that's why John Stewart feels like we should have good policy, too. And this is where I think the Democrats should listen to me more than that. And you're crushing it. You do a great job poking the bubble of their just really hollow arguments that they make on fonts because the bubble is hollow. You do a good job of popping it. But then, though, there is like a democratic good government impulse, which I like in respect and is cute about like, we really do need to have a white paper to fix this.

And I'm kind of like, no, actually, you don't. I mean, probably in retrospect, sure, if we're doing a rehash of the Kamla campaign, could they have done things that were different? You know what I mean? She had a talking and a policy problem. Yeah, sure, right. So you could have done both, right? But now, we are where we are. Like, the people wanted this.

Like, the job is to stop it. there's a good day on Tuesday and stopping it the shutdown has been good and to me it's kind of like okay let's pack up our toys let's take a win

and I'm not this is not me being like oh norms Tim we should start to compromise and stop fighting it's like no this battle is one one battle after another

like this battle is one next battle is now to make these guys own whatever they decide to do on the health care and make these guys own the fact that people's premiums are going up, make them own the fact that the economy is terrible, and in 2027, a bunch of

Democrats can come out and have some great ideas about what to do going forward, and I can critique them and question them and all that. But, like, that's a problem for... I think that's fair. Also, shut down politics never factors into an election. Like, everyone forgets that it happened. You're the raging moderate. I want to do some with or moderates here before we get out of here.

What's happening with the moderates? It's happening with our people. And Jared Golden, Maine. He's like everything that everybody in the post-2020 election said that Democrats needed. Literally. He's a working-class dude. Genuine article. Yeah, he's a working-class dude.

He's got tats. He could go into the manisphere and hang out. He cares about economic issues. You know, he's an economic populist. Bucks the party when he has to have served. Yeah. And he's out. He dropped out because some dweeb in Maine is crying marrying him.

Dunlip or something? I don't even know who he is. I don't know anything about him except that he looks and sounds like a dweeb, and he was going after Jared Golden because he bucked the party like three times. And it was like nothing. There was no meaningful thing that was going to help people's lives that Jared Golden stood in the way of. It's just some resistance people didn't like the fact that Jared Golden sometimes didn't echo the latest talking point that was on blue sky.

And so he gets bullied out of this race and he's like, this is not fun. I'm not enjoying it. I want to hang out of my family and fish or whatever. He likes to do in his free time. And that sucks. Yeah. And it sucks. And I had Pat Ryan on over on our YouTube over to say who I love, yeah.

He's out there's recruiting. And I was in his ear. I'm like, we need to go recruit Jared Goldens. Like there need to be more Jared Goldens. And we had one, we had basically two Jared Goldens, him and Murray Guzgibras. There's a girl, Jared Golden. Yeah. And one of them's gone now.

And it's concerning. Are you concerned? I'm definitely concerned. I mean, in learning from the lessons of 2020, for concerned, also in the lessons of, like, actual winning, to be more ruthless about it. Like, Jared Golden had the reddest district that Adem carried. Yeah. And, you know, Nancy Pelosi announcing her retirement this week, there was obviously a ton

to focus on in terms of her legacy. But my favorite thing besides for the children about Nancy Pelosi is that she always told her caucus, I'll do whatever you want. You can call me the devil or I'll campaign with you. Just win. We can't do anything unless we're in office. And Jared Golden did the impossible three times. And it feels, and this links to the Mamdani race in New York as well, that three quarters of the party or our coalition, whatever is, because I know there are a lot of people who are still identify as a conservative that are with us, understand the task.

which is run the person that fits the constituency. Yeah. And then we'll see what happens. Like, if you have a pro-life Democrat who still votes for pro-choice policies, what the fuck do you care? Yeah, who cares? Like, and Ezra Klein did a thing this week about Joe Manchin. We're talking about what the Democratic Party is. And I had been saying that on Fox forever.

I said the guy votes with you 93% of the time. You would have never gotten the Inflation Reduction Act without him anyway. Like, leave him alone. He wins a Trump plus 42. state, and you think that you're going to ever have a prayer of carrying it. So that was concerning. But I feel like the election results, like, before that, we had that deciding to win memo, right, where they surveyed 500,000 people, which I didn't even think.

I worked in research. I didn't think that was possible. And then there was the other working class focused one that American Bridge did. And the results from that were all, like, you're woke and weak, right? And that we have to change the definition of what it means to be a moderate. And it can't be a strongly worded letter. Like, you can talk the same as a firebrand. You just back policies that 55% plus of people support.

And that seems like such an easy path forward. And Jared Golden was doing that. Pat Ryan does that, you know, Tom Swazi does that. He wins a district that he has to, you know, say, I'm endorsing Cuomo and I don't support Mondami. And then he, you know, congratulates him like a normal human being afterwards. and we should all be able to kind of shake hands and pack it up. I agree. Delle, he probably should have been for Mondani.

He was the nominee. Swazzi should have, but that's more of a neutral thing. I mean, to get reelected, it should be a deal. Would you rather have him? I mean, that's how they felt about it. I mean, besides the fact that they felt or feel that Mondani is a threat to Jews in New York City, which a lot of people feel, only got 30% of the Jewish vote, which is unprecedented in mayoral politics. but he's listening to people at home.

Laura Gillen's listening to people at home who are concerned about these things. So I don't think they're doing it just to be mean. I don't think they're going to be mean either. I guess my point is just I think the Swazi thing probably was not that strategically helpful. If the center, if those of us, the raging moderates, are going to demand that the DSA crowd get on board and not do vote undeclared or whatever, then like sometimes you've got to suck it up and do the other deal, particularly. And it's a place like New York. But anyway, this is what has me worried. And I think that the Democrats could end up winning in spite of themselves, like they did in 22, because like that's just how politics is.

Like if the economy is as bad as like what we are saying, it continues to get worse, like the next midterm, whoever Democrats put up in Maine might win that golden district and they might win the Senate race, maybe. But like just being strategic about it, I feel like that the main Senate primary is right now just like a microcosm of how both factions in the party are fucking up. it's like the platinum side he seems like a fine dude I don't like I don't know about the Nazi tattoo or whatever like whatever he's like obviously compelling talker and people like him and I don't want to take anybody's excitement

away from them but like he's running and again it might work in Maine because it's a blue state common one right but if the left Susan Collins wins every time right exactly but the left is like hey we need more economic populism we need more guys who are like working class people

and and it's like okay, but then you also need to offer some cultural concern. Like, it feels like the Tim Walz thing over again with Platner, where it's like, isn't it enough that he can fix a carburetor? And it's like, no, actually. The, like, people in the district to vote for Trump have different policy issues, substantively different issues,

and Platner is running, like, basically on AOC's platform, but just in a dude with tattoo's body. And, okay, like, that's not, if you like that, that's fine, but that is not like going to be, it's not a path to, win in red areas. It might win in Maine. It might work in Maine. It's not a pattern in red areas. And then the Democrats, like the desiccated Democratic establishment is putting up Joe Biden. They're putting up a 77-year-old who has a low approval rating. Who's the

governor of Maine? It's like, can we not do, is there not a different option? Like, why is, why are both sides doing the thing that they've failed at? Again. Well, people have most of the time a financial interest in doing those things. Like, I'm sure you saw the read out from Comer's panel with the Biden folks and like Mike Donald's like, yeah, I got a $4 million bonus if Joe Biden wins the election. Like, did that affect why you thought he could run? No. Like, that's impossible.

I mean, I guess very rich people wouldn't think the $4 million makes me a difference, but I think that they do. So there are financial interests to stay in your corners. There are people, you know, financial backers that make a difference. But like in Maine, Jared Gold, should have run for Senate. Yes. That was my dream scenario.

And I think Janet Mills has done a ton. I think Janet Mills is great. Like she has a record that people like, people enjoy her, whatever. But like, it's hard to comment. No, she's very popular. She's not really. Compared to other governors, her favorability is pretty low. Is it?

Yeah. Oh. I thought it was like in the decent area. I don't know. Either way, I think she saw Platner as being the only option. even though I'm being emailed by Jordan Wood constantly. So I don't know. Is he making?

Just like, ah, I need some raging moderates out there. It's like this could be a moment. This is where I'm with you. It's like the environment is good. So I was talking to Pat Ryan. It's like Maine should be a win. Ohio should be winnable. Iowa should be winnable.

They should all be winnable. Those are getable this time, this midterm, first Trump midterm. But the candidates need to be fighting and they need to be able to appeal to some people that voted. for Trump on some issues. Yeah.

And it's like I just, and I'm not seeing a ton of that out there. I don't know. I certainly see it in Roy Cooper. Roy Cooper is great. And Roy Cooper is a good time in a good choice. And Sherry Brown is fabulous, I think. I was surprised that he wasn't, you know, far ahead considering the environment and how beloved he was.

And like he couldn't run against a plus, you know, Trump plus 10 swing or whatever in Ohio, which is, you know, understandable. But I don't think you should be in this level. of distress. I think Jared Golden, the loss of Jared Golden is a big deal. I'm always in distress. No, I mean, it's healthy, but should also look at it. Like, there hasn't been anything that's happened where I'm like, this is the stupidest

thing I've ever seen on the plate. I just want more. I'm greedy. I'm greedy. I'm pissed. These guys are fucking in charge. And I just want everybody to be like, no, let's get ruthless. Let's get ruthless and let's press the back to the advantage.

It does. I mean, the shutdown feels. And it was good, and it's a win. And I want to, like, take that into, and so I were, I just, like, Gavin Newsom is demonic. Boom. Yeah. Like, great. And I think Abigail's, I think we're about to see Ruthless Spanburger squeeze out, dark Spanberger is going to

squeeze out three or four more seats, which I'd like. All that is good. So there's good stuff happening. Yeah. I just, I'm hungry. I'm voracious. I want more. And I don't want people to feel like, oh, no, things are, things are going pretty good.

No, no. I don't think people are going to take their foot off the gas. And it is important to dwell on something like Jared Golden saying. Like, also the threats to my family are unacceptable, like the political violence scene and all of that. But I think when you look around and you're like Ruben Gallego, who I love and like what Newsome did, like, we're meeting the moment, I think, more or less. Is that too moderate a thing to say? No. I want to be positive.

I think the bulwark audience will love that. They need that. Jess. Okay. Jesse. We get to call you Jesse when you're not in the five. Right. Because girl, Jesse, boy, Jesse.

Girl, Jesse, boy, Jesse. We love it. We love it. Like, are you ever nervous that somebody's going to yell at you? Do you have to deal with that in your life? No. Everyone is so nice. I love that. Yeah.

Isn't that great? Also, because, like, the five is your, like, dysfunctional family. Yeah. So they're like, oh, it's like crazy and Jesse. I was like a little worried for you that it's like that sucks for your life that you're always like looking around. I've had weird, like, safety stuff happened, but not, no one to my face. All right. Just like, you know.

That's good. In the mail. I'm glad we got this hang. We're about to go to do the crooked stuff together. Everybody, we'll be back here Monday for another edition of the Bullwork podcast. go check out Jesse on Raging Modders probably You can watch the five if you want to You probably see clubs with the five

I feel like that's how everyone knows me They're like I didn't know you could speak for more than two minutes She can, she did it Maybe We'll see you back here on Monday We're cool We'll have a way less cool guest on Monday See you all then

Peace Peace Which is for the road We're mad across the dash In the youngest sun And if they turn green Don't be afraid Nothing can hurt you but yourself

Nothing can hurt you but yourself The board podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.