The Bulwark Podcast - Mark Leibovich: Democrats Are Too Afraid of Hurting People’s Feelings

Episode Date: February 18, 2026

Most Democratic politicians are scared to criticize each other. They also fear dinging former presidents, or the various groups that make up the party’s broad coalition. And too many Dem candidates are afraid to color outside the lines, even if voters want them to be less establishment and more like regular people. Can the party get it together before the midterms? Plus, Trump’s threat of war against Iran, and his reported intent to kill Netflix’s bid to takeover Warner Discovery—potentially giving him power over CBS, CNN, Fox, and TikTok.The Atlantic’s Mark Leibovich joins Tim Miller.show notes Mark's Atlantic piece, "The Democrats Aren’t Built for This" Jonathan Alter on Trump's attempt to scuttle a Netflix-Warner deal Tickets are now on sale for our LIVE shows in Dallas on March 18 and in Austin on March 19. Plus, we have a handful of seats still available for tonight's show in Minneapolis. TheBulwark.com/Events.

Welcome to the Bullard podcast. I'm your host Tim Miller. Delight. Welcome back to the show. Staff writer at the Atlantic author of, thank you for your servitude in this town. That first one is, that's not a,

that's not an S&M book. Well, it kind of is, I guess. It was about the Donald Trump Republican Party. His name is Mark Leavovich. You can put it in whatever category you want,

you know, you could adapt. Sure. I guess my point is it didn't turn me on. It might be for some people. Some of the senators. I can't imagine. Tom Cotton seems to like it.

It's good to see about even too long. You wrote an article that the headline was taken from my colleague, Sarah Longwell's quote about how Democrats aren't built for this. So obviously I had to have you on. You know, there are a couple of work mentions. As a matter of fact. But before we just, you know, kind of waft in the Democratic malaise, can we talk about the Trump administration for a second? Sure.

What's been happening? You know, you're a keen observer of this stuff. It feels to me like there's been, you know, vibe shift out there from last year to this on Trump. We've been talking to that a little bit. But then other times I wonder if that's, I don't know, that's Hopium, as they're saying. And I'm just wondering what you're feeling around the corridors of Washington. Do you think, is Trump losing his grip at all? Or are we all just doing Charlie Brown with football again? I'm certainly wary. I think a lot of us are wary of the second factor here. But, I mean, I think

I hope you might not be the right word in this context because it's not really anything great or sort of resolved that the opposition is doing. But, yeah, I mean, I think there's a perception that the administration is screwing up in a big way. It's reflected in the numbers. It's reflected in the inflation numbers, the immigration numbers and what have you. But, yeah, I mean, we've been here before. I mean, there is a large group of people in this country that hates everything that Trump is not. I mean, the original premise of Trump running against whatever it is that we represent, that liberal elites, whatever represent, still out there.

I have a liberal elite now? Did you just we me? Was that we and you? No, I didn't. And I didn't mean to we myself. Did I say liberal? I guess I did. I mean, just like, look, the people who are not MAGA, the people who are not with him, the people who are Trump haters.

The people who read. Whatever we are. people who aren't buying that, right? It certainly feels, and, you know, it's more than just feels. It's data-fied in some ways that there is a shift happening. He is a lame duck. I mean, he's been a lame duck for, you know, since he started and started to show more. The level of defiance in the Republican Party is out there.

It's still pathetically small. But, you know, I think the Tom Massies of the world, the Don Bacon's of the world, the, I don't know, Tom Tillis, whatever. I mean, I think that that all has an effect. and I think the retirements have an effect. But yeah, I mean, it certainly feels like something is happening. But again, buyer beware on this. I don't mean it to say that something is good in the air out there.

And I do think it's a little offensive to Tom Massey to lump him in with Don Bacon and Tom Tillis. We can hash that out another time. But I guess it just meant there was for a period of time in the beginning of Trump 2.0. And this kind of does relate to the Democrats article. Like there was a feeling of just total Like everyone was just frozen Yeah like they kind of couldn't believe the The victory the magnitude of the victory

How quickly everybody got in line You know took a little bit longer For the protest movements to sprout up right like That's like feeling that he had It was like holy shit I don't know Maybe this country does want A moron reality show to be a dictator I feel like you're probably at some dinners

in February 2025 where that notion was being popped around. I don't think people feel that way anymore. No. Like that level of kind of Trump momentum has, I think, been reversed. Yeah, I don't know about reverse, but it's certainly not as not like it was a year ago. And I think, I would say not just February.

I mean, I think going well into the summer, there was a level of Democrats and just non-Trump voters, basically, independence, whoever they were. being not just back on their heels, but thoroughly demoralized. And also, I think the time in the wilderness, I mean, there's a natural period in the wilderness that parties that lose elections go through, right? I mean, it feels like this has gone on much longer than the usual maybe. I think it was much deeper. Yeah, there's a shock to the system, you know, when someone tries to overthrow American democracy and then comes back and gets elected, you know. I mean, like, given the dominoes that fell around the media, around law firms and universities, and what have you, I mean, this all has a real effect. I mean, I think defiance has proven to be an extremely important and empowering tool of all of this. And it hasn't come easily, but it's happened gradually.

And I think, obviously, as you, you know, see, you know, Minneapolis and things like that unfold, that itself becomes a galvanizing force for, you know, the opposition. One more news item before we get to the opposition. I saw this this morning. It's from Mike Allen, who you profiled, what, 15 years ago now? Yeah, it was a long time ago. Yeah, he's at Axis. He says this. Jim Van de Haim and Barrett are reporting that the chance of war with Iran is higher than most America is realized.

Chance of a deal is small. This would be more of a war than an operation, a la Venezuela. That's Mike Allen. I have two questions for you. One, what do you think that says about what Trump thinks his political standing is that he's more seriously considering this. And part two, when you profiled Mike Allen 15 years ago, did you ever think that he was going to be breaking the news that Donald Trump was going to be doing war with Iran? I mean, yeah, why not? I mean, I didn't, I don't think, I didn't foresee,

I mean, let's see if there's a war with Iran. I mean, you know, there is the caveat here, right? I mean, it was quite a, it was quite a report. I read it. I mean, I read Mike. I read his thing every morning. Still at it. Still at it. And he's, you know, he's damn good. I mean, I have to admit, I skip a lot of the AI stuff, but it's, you know, it's helpful. It's one of my morning reads. What about the end of the day newsletter, like little life advice? No, I tend to skip those a lot. But I'm sure it's great.

I mean, occasionally it's worthwhile. I think Trump certainly seems to be proceeding like he doesn't really care. I mean, I think he cares on some very basic level, certainly about his own popularity. But he seems to be like taking these big sort of legacy swings. I mean, I think, you know, if he can liberate Iran, if he can, you know, would have, what whatever he thinks he's going to achieve here. And look, it's like a very real geopolitical issue. I mean, there is a real argument to be made for aggressive intervention over there and given what's going on. So, I mean, I don't want to make light of like the imperative here. This is not a glib situation at all. But it's also not something that people voted for. I don't think it's not something that people expected the president to be spending time on at a time when they're still feeling great economic strain, clearly having some very, very negative feelings about. how immigration is being dealt with and so forth. So I don't know, just sort of add this to the list of a president who seems like he is focusing on things that are out of line with how most voters feel.

I also just should throw out there. We do have a Congress still. I moved out of D.C. You live there still? That's right. We do still have a Congress? Yeah, I think so. It's unclear.

I don't think that the authorization of military force in Iraq in 2001 is applicable here just because they start with the same letters. I don't think there's like an IRA provision in there. No, no, although, you know, three out of four letters is pretty high. I mean, that's 75%. You would think they would have to vote to go to war with Iran. I will say my evening walk, sometimes I'll take an extended walk and I'll walk across the National Mall and I'll look to my right. On the left is the Washington Monument, the right is the U.S. Capitol. It's still an incredibly inspiring and beautiful building.

And you see the light on on the top when Congress is in session. And then you think about Mike Johnson sitting in there. Well, yeah. a little less awe-inspiring. Once you start focusing on the people who are operating inside there, it gets a little problematic. But it's a beautiful and very, very inspiring building and idea behind the building. You know, when you get to the reality of what's going on in there, it's a little bit different.

Well, look, I guess I would just say this will have much more in Iran on Friday, a little more foreign policy-focused show. But I do think, as this gets to the Democrats, this is another area of foreign policy where sometimes Democrats have felt a little bit unsure about where they want to go. full bore after Trump, you know, the feeling starts to set in of, what if he succeeds? What if he does liberate the people of Iran? Right. I want the people of Iran to be liberated, but I feel like I have the credibility this is a next neocon to say, I think you can go full bore against us or full war at least saying, hey, the American people need to have their say on war with Iran. I don't know

that people voted Donald Trump in for regime change war in the Middle East. And I think that, like, sometimes they get lost on the clarity of that message because of what you're talking about. There's like legit policy concerns here. But if Donald Trump doesn't go about them the right way, if he does it in a legitimate way, if you can't trust him, if we have a former drunk weekend talk show co-host running the war effort, like there are a lot of reasons to be concerned. Yeah, which is why you would think in a very quaint scenario, maybe Congress should get involved. Maybe they should be debating this.

Maybe individual members of Congress. Congress should weigh in on this in a thoughtful way, but we don't seem to have that going on here. No. In the Republican Party. All right, y'all, sometimes you don't want to compromise on comfort. I mean, right now I'm in a goose sweatshirt, okay? When you're getting on an airplane, I've given up on doing what my mother wanted me to do and dress up. But at the same time, you don't want to look like a total slob.

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And I'm going to read them. I'm going to read all of them. I'm not just skipping the good ones. I'm reading every single one. Okay. Spineless, complacent, paralyzed, afraid, incompetent, suffocated or given up, sold out, sellouts or suckers, immobilized. Number 10 says, can I say no balls? Apparently he can, no balls. Finally, Lauren, age 41 from Iowa, offers a little positivity, says she sees some young Democrats coming up she likes. So that's the state of affairs among Democratic voters. in a focus group you're hired democrats right look i think that and this gets the thrust of your article and i think why it's important to kind of you know force the conversation about this is like i think that because democrats did well in virginia new jersey and because they probably will do well in the midterance

because people are so unhappy with donald trump that there is not a lot of effort or reflection among the elected democrats at least there's some exceptions which we'll get into in thinking about Hey, what can we do to change our party's brand as well? Because that's going to be a problem over the long haul. So talk to me a little bit about your article and how that pairs of what we heard from these Democrats. Yeah, I mean, first of all, what you described in the quotes that you just read, completely reflective of how Democrats writ large are perceived. I mean, I basically set out maybe August, September, talked about 50 Democrats, candidates,

elected officials, operatives, you know, smart people, academics, voters, the whole nine yards, went all over the country to try to take the temperature of the party to see if Democrats could, you know, refashion themselves into a viable alternative to what is, you know, an increasingly, I think authoritarian party that is losing popularity that I think the country desperately wants an alternative to. All those things are true. I mean, I think Democrats are an incredibly unpopular party, but I think a lot of the reason they are an unpopular party is a lot of Democrats kind of hate themselves because of what their leaders or what their perceived leaders have done to them. Now, look, you have been involved, you know, I guess after 2012 in being sold.

I was in the most famously failed autopsy of all time. The worst autopsy ever, worse than, you know. Well, right. Are there any famous bad autopsies and crime? Yeah, probably. I'm not a true crime person. Yeah, me neither, but I'm sure they're out there. I would say this.

I mean, every election begets some kind of autopsy. I mean, yours was literally called. I mean, it wasn't literally. It's where it became called. Oh, my God. This shows you how long it is. I can't remember what it was literally called anymore. It was called.

Okay, it's going to come to me. You talk. It's going to come to me. Whatever it was, it was the opposite of what Donald Trump represented three years later when he started running for president. So I guess what I'm saying is like the soul-searchinging. the sort of what is the party brand, what are we going to stand for? The growth and opportunity project.

Yes. That's what it was called. So my desk here at the Atlantic is towered with growth and opportunity projects in various iterations, circa this year, right, or last year, whenever they were written. I mean, if you could, if you could just resurrect a party based on pure tonnage of white papers and autopsies and after action reports, Democrats would be set up for years. So the fact of the matter is, is, and this goes to what Lauren said at the end of the descriptions you were just reading, is parties are defined by the candidates. People didn't go to the ballot box in Virginia last November because they were excited about Democrats.

They liked Abigail Spanberger. You know, they liked Mikey Sherrill in New Jersey. And the fact is, you know, no one knew who Barack Obama was in 2004 after George W. Bush wiped out John K. and no one foresaw Donald Trump. So, I mean, it's a pretty simplistic kind of answer, which is that parties become defined by the candidates that they nominate. But I also think on a very pure kind of nuts and bolts level, Democrats have had a very good recruitment cycle, right?

And it seems like there are a lot of very good Democratic candidates who are well tailored to their district, certainly in the Senate races. They're much better positioned than they would be if they had less good candidates running in, say, Alaska or you're smirking. Alaska is the one I'm going to give you. I want to talk about this because the parties are defined by the candidates. That's absolutely right.

I'll come back around to some nice things about the Democrats at the end because I think at some level, some of the folks in your article and some Democratic voters are a little hard like their expectations are out of whack for what a minority party can really do. But this is the one area where I just, I'm not buying the party line on it. And I'm trying to plug this quote here is Telariko, who told you, there's an opportunity to redefine the Democratic Party right now. And to me, I think the only people that are taking that opportunity are on the populace left. And so they deserve credit for that.

I think that, you know, that's not exactly my cup of tea always, but Graham Platner is redefining the party. Zoran is doing his job, redefining the party. The commentators in that space are really focused on helping redefine the party going after, you know, the billionaires. I don't think anybody else is taking that opportunity. Even Tala Rico, who I like, kind of just sounds like Churchy Beto. I don't.

Churchy Beto. And I love Beto, by the way. I love Beto. Like, so that's not even really a critique. Yeah. Yeah. It's just, it's not redefining it. And I agree with the point, right?

And I think that, like, Democrats really could be taking the opportunity this year to try to bring up a new batch of candidates to redefine the party and the way that Clinton did and the way that Obama did, like meaningfully on issues. And I don't really see anything different. All these people, again, I love. So, well, that it's just what it is. In Abigail Spanberger or Mikey Sheryl's platform or James Tellerico's platform than in Hillary Clinton's platform. I really don't. Like, I don't see how they're redefining themselves that much from the Democratic establishment. You mean the party or?

No, these candidates, they sound kind of like all, every Democratic candidate that my adult life, except they use the word affordability more. And they talk about billionaires a little more. So I guess that's redefining, but not really. Well, yes and no. I mean, look, they have biographies to stand on. I think if Roy Cooper gets elected in North Carolina, he has a biography to stand on if Mary Pelper. That's a good.

I'm always remiss and not mentioning Roy Cooper. That's a good recruitment. I agree. I mean, the energy, like you can, really there are like three people maybe in the entire Democratic Party who can blow out an arena pretty much coast to coast. And that's Bernie Sanders, which is pretty amazing. AOC, you know, Mom Donnie. I mean, it's different because he probably, there's no reason he would leave New York at this point.

Yeah, maybe Barack Obama, but he's, you know, he's a museum piece at this point. I mean, respectfully to the president. There's a new museum he's opening. But, yeah, no, but I mean, Abigail Spanberger is not going to blow out like an arena in Boise, Idaho or, you know, Bakersfield, wherever like these, you know, fighting oligarchy rallies are held. But the fact is, I mean, you know, a lot of these candidacies, a lot of these races are defined by people who voters essentially know trust. and, you know, maybe aren't that excited by in the way that, say, Jasmine Crockett might excite a young voter, you know, say at the University of Texas or something. But, you know, they have proven very formidable in actual election. So I guess, I guess did I just push back on you, Tim?

I mean, I hate to be just respectful. Yeah, please push back on me. No, so I would say that, yes, I mean, probably the most compelling sort of, you know, crowd-pleasing, loudest sort of, you know, younger, cooler group. I mean, you know, that probably is going to gravitate to a more progressive, maybe even Democratic Socialist candidate. But ultimately, I mean, at least if you go by the last year, you know, plus, there have been any number of flavors that have prevailed. And frankly, like the very progressive candidates, like what's your name, Afton Bain in Nashville, who was nominated, you know, overperforms. She lost to whoever she was running against in a plus Trump 22 district lost by like 10, 11 points. And she was like the AOC of Tennessee.

Like that's what she was called. So who's to say if she might have done better or if she were, you know, less aligned with her. The Republicans are to say, I guess I would just say. Like James Blair has a report out that he was briefing Congress, I guess yesterday, Republicans of Congress. One of the things that he said was he thinks that they could have lost that race in Tennessee if they hadn't mobilized more. If the Democratic candidate hadn't been, you know, had her vulnerabilities. Correct. I think it's probably true.

You know, look, I do think there's a little bit of excessive use. euphoria to some of these over performances across the country, but they're real and they're consistent and they're massive in some cases. So, I mean, who's to say? I think this relates to my other nitpick that I get frustrated with that you cover in the article, which is, you know, these questions about coalition politics. And I think you had Simon Bazelin saying in there that it's a reflective of a broader problem within the party that we're scared of ever making anybody in our coalition upset. And that was just something that really resonated with me. She was like, by the way, I want to put this in a positive way.

Some of the things that Zoran, you know, pushed do upset me. They're not my preferred politics. She was on the podcast. We disagreed on them. But at the end of the day, there are only two parties. Like, you're in a big coalition. I think a lot of the Democratic leaders failed on this test, actually, like Hakeem and others. But from my perspective, it was like, okay, well, Zeran still better.

I don't live in New York. Zon's still better than other folks. And like, that's fine. It's good. The fact that he upset me was part of the things that was made him interesting. Right. He had positions that people that have different views of me got excited about, right? Sure.

And to me, that kind of goes back to my issue right now with the recruitment is that it does still feel like everybody in the Democratic coalition is a little bit afraid to upset everybody else in the Democratic coalition. And they've gone from, you know, where like the safe thing to do is just say Trump bad all the time and then have kind of generic policy programs to now the new thing that we're doing. is Trump bad, billionaires bad. Besides that, I'm just going to do generic democratic politics all the time. Right. Affordability. Goodbye.

Right. So that's the change. And it's like that is going to be good enough in 2026 to win the house. Right. I guess probably. Probably. Right. But like in order to start winning in other places, in order to get people to give you a second look, another guy you wrote about was, was Sherrod Brown in Ohio in that John Hustead race. And I forget who it was the quote, it was maybe trippy. It was just like, we can't get Democrats in a roll. Ohio even give us a second look because they think that we're aliens that are obsessed with transgender. Yeah, who invented AI to take your jobs or something like that. Yeah, right.

And so getting back to a place where Democrats can win in some of those states is going to require doing some things that make a couple people mad. Because, like, that's how you get attention. And that's different than winning in New Jersey and Virginia. And I'm just, I'm still not seeing any of that, really. I mean, look, there is a sameness to a lot of these democratic messaging, billionaire bad, right? Yeah, affordability. That's fine. It's fine.

And then everyone's like, you know, I've not done seven million doors. And we've gone back and we've not done seven million doors like seven times. And it's like, really? I'm sure people love that. I mean, I still like it very sad and pressed when I hear politicians, probably anyone talking like this because they're not human beings. But I mean, I don't know. I guess there is this consultant pollsterocracy out there that that knows better than I do.

But I mean, I do think that there is a real shortage of, for lack of a better term, just realness. I think Trump blew up every kind of pollster metric, market research metric, whatever you want to do. And, you know, ironically, because he, you know, he lied all the time. I mean, people saw him as like just sort of existing in his reality and just reacting as he did. And, you know, they saw that he was pissing people off and he wasn't dying and he wasn't, you know, disqualifying himself every week, as the media said. And I still don't think there's a candidate out there that I can point to that is undisciplined. I mean, man, maybe Platner. I don't know. I mean, I, but it's just, I would like to be inspired by someone who feels less savvy for

for lack of a better term. Was there nothing, nobody else and you're traveling around. I mean, Platinum is a mess. I like that about him. I mean, Platner is, is. Let's talk about that. You went to, you went to me. Yeah, of course, I went right. Yeah, you had a little, you chatted a little bit about LGBTQIA. Well, yeah, I wasn't planning on it, but out of nowhere, he said, I do love the gays. And so I quoted him. And I parenthetically said, good to know. So I'm, you know, I was down with that sentiment.

And we love straight oyster, man. I guess I can't speak about oysters. I mean, generally speaking says like good oysters, right? I mean, that's amazing. Love oysters. Yeah, no, oysters. My child will put down a dozen. Really?

I mean, oysters are great. I love them. Not everyone's cup of tea. But no, I mean, I think, I think people. do in some on some level, especially in a place like Maine, where it's actually a small enough population where you can actually get out there and really meet a lot of people. I think people appreciate the sort of messy journey that Graham Platner has had in the course of his life. I mean, people have pretty readily forgiven what some would have said were,

you know, campaign killing problems. I mean, I still might kill his campaign. Who knows? But I mean, about some of his old Reddit posts and, you know, an alleged Nazi tat. to something like that. But I do think that rehabilitation stories, I do think that stories of people who operate outside the line, both biographically, but also in their day-to-day campaign behavior, would be a powerful thing. But I do think the Democrats, for the most part, are extremely scared.

And that's how they proceed. And even the best and, you know, maybe most effective in winning candidates, because, you know, again, the people who run these campaigns are smarter than I am will do well despite that. But, I mean, as a consumer of this, I would always default and still have a great appetite for someone who feels more real. And the Plano thing is interesting, right? Because on the one hand, sometimes you can overlearn lessons, right? Like there's a sense of, we need a Trumpy figure who just let it rip all the time on social media and is rough around the edges.

It's like, well, okay. But that like worked for Trump, but it didn't really work for Herschel Walker, for example. Right? And so it's like, is Plattner doing it the right way or is he doing it the Herschel Walker way? And I think over the last few months it seems like he's been pretty good. Like there hasn't been like a series of gaffes like you saw you saw from Herschel Walker. And I think that you would imagine that there would be some lesson that Democrats would take from this, right? They would look at it and be like on paper, you would think that at least some lesson about what your voters are looking for.

Right. Like on paper, you would think the voters, you would think that like a strong candidate would be a relatively popular governor who went to the White House, gave Trump the what for over trans issues. Like, you know, that's fine. And about 25 years younger than the current sitting governor of Maine who is running for Senate from the Democratic Party. Exactly. So maybe it's that. It's youth. But I think it's also just like Democratic voters are looking for different types of profiles. I mean, it's just we're watching it in Maine. Yeah, no, absolutely. I mean, look, Plattenor, you know, is. easily cartooned, right? But he's also a very talented political performer. He's very good on the stump. He can excite a crowd. He's been pretty consistent. And who knows if Democrats would be committing suicide if they nominate him in Maine? And, you know, Susan Collins will, you know, put a million

like Nazi tattoo ads up and whatever and she eeks by again because that's what she does. But I don't know. I mean, I appreciate the freshness of both the candidate and his oysters. You also covered Bernie and West Virginia. Do you have any takeaways from that? See what was happening in West Virginia? You know, West Virginia, very Trumpy state, right? I mean, I think perhaps the Trumpiest or either that or Wyoming. It's extremely depressing. I had

Manchin on a couple of months ago. Yeah. Some of the listeners didn't like that episode. They were wrong. I thought it was great. Yeah. The refreshing thing to be about West Virginia is it's like, okay, maybe the, I'm interested to hear what you think what the Bernie impression was because my frustration with it is, the state has only been governed by Republicans for

like forever now. And it's a disaster. Jobs aren't good, outcomes aren't good, schools aren't good, health, health isn't good. You would think that that would be the type of place that people might be like, yeah, maybe we'll try something new, but no. That was the interesting thing about the Bernie rally there. I mean, first of all, Bill Clinton carried West Virginia twice. I mean, Michael Dukakis carried West Virginia. Like, he won 10 states. One of them was West Virginia. And, you know, it's like, oh, look, the map has shipped. It's famously important for Kennedy. I mean, now it's, we're in the deep past, but, yeah. I mean, it is core working class-based, you know, the

traditional working class base of the Democratic Party is pure West Virginia. You can see exactly why. I mean, Bernie, you know, he blew out this, the Capitol Theater in downtown Wheeling, probably about three, four thousand people. It was very organic. And Bernie didn't say anything he hasn't said in the last 30 years. And he came out to like power to the people by, you know, John Lennon and the plastic ono band. I mean, just a real hokey stuff. But you look around and unlike a lot of Democratic crowds, this is a working class crowd. I mean, this is a gritty, this is not, does not present as a college-educated, affluent crowd as you would get. NPR tote bags?

How many do you see NPR tote bags? And the only crowds you see in the Democratic Party like that are, you know, frankly, like things like Bernie rallies. I mean, you know, Sherrod Brown doesn't do a lot of rallies. He doesn't do a lot of like town hall meetings. I mean, the sort of working class essence of that is lost. And Bernie, for some reason, still does speak to that element. And, you know, obviously this crowd, I mean, it's pretty close to Pennsylvania.

I mean, I talked to a lot of people who came over from Pittsburgh and some from Ohio. I mean, it's not, you know, there's all kind of a tri-state area-ish kind of thing. But I don't know. You go to most democratic events right now and you might as well be, I mean, it just feels very comfortable moneyed education. I mean, it's sort of like, you know, might as well be held at like Georgetown University or UVA or something. The Whole Foods buffet or something. I mean, somewhat, yeah. If you're going to write a story about the Democrats and why they're struggling,

you do have to go to a diner that is in the contract. And you did. You attended a diner. I guess I did go to a diner. Damn, I didn't realize it was a diner. Yep, you went to a diner. I'm sorry to a diner. Oh, I'm sorry.

Yeah, I think it wasn't a cafe. I think it actually. I have in all caps on my notes here. Final stop, a diner. Damn. Well, it was actually in Toledo. And I remember I interviewed Hillary in 2016, but before the Hillary rally, also in Toledo, I went to an actual diner. And a wait person said to me that she really liked Trump because he seemed to be speaking the truth.

And I knew right then, not because it was Toledo, not because she liked Trump, not because of anything about her or Trump. It was in a diner. So it carried that extra kind of credibility. So I could just state anyway, you didn't need me to hear. So did you get me of that insight this time? speak with Sherrod. No. Or just Sherrod.

Like, you know, I don't know. Sherrod Brown is a, he's a nuts and bolts Democrat. He is not flashy. He is not going to give a big old speech. He's a guy who's gotten elected in Ohio a bunch of times. And he keeps it very nitty gritty on health care, on Medicare, on, you know, on student loans. I mean, he's very, he does not go big on like democracy. He doesn't go big on.

you know, Trump this, Trump, that. You know, he seems to have a formula that is not particularly media savvy or media-friendly. I mean, it might be very media-savvy. But it's not, I mean, it's not like he's going to go out and, like, subject himself to all these, you know, a lot of interviews and big sort of rallies or anything. Look, it's worked in the past. And he also, I mean, he lost, I guess, in 2024, by like three, four points, whereas Kamala lost Ohio about like 11, 12 points. So, I mean, he obviously overperforms, you know, certainly the national ticket. And I imagine, I mean, Chuck Schumer, if you were here, would say that that is as good a recruit as you could hope for in Ohio.

And, yeah, it's a pretty close race. I mean, Houston, who he's running against probably up by a few points in the polls I've seen. But, you know, I mean, Sherrod Brown, I mean, is as tried and true as an Ohio Democrat who can get elected as there is out there. I want to circle back to the autopsy porn you were talking about. Not literally porn, by the way. It's like, I meant that kind of sarcastically. Oh, really? There are no photos of like Ken Martin or anything.

Thank God. We're Sherrod Brown. Just for the families who are watching this after Bible reading, you know, before bedtime. I just want to make sure that's clear. I appreciate that. It would be particularly scary if it was literal autopsy porn. The one that you showed it out was by Scott Furson. I hadn't seen this one.

Not out yet. Oh, okay. Well, there you go. You're giving us a little. It's coming out in April. It's kind of coming out as a book. So you said that was the most compelling one of the various autopsies you read. Why?

Yeah. Well, the guy talked to, I mean, I never heard of him. He's an operative up in, he's in Massachusetts. He had a team of researchers and interviewers. They talked to, I think, well over a thousand Democrats, independent swing voters, mostly around Ohio. I don't know if they ventured into any diners or anything. anything. But you know, you would hope that, you know, they hit a few diners. You would, you would hope so. But basically, it was just sort of a larger sample size and sort of a deeper level of questioning

that underscores pretty much these same sentiments that you read at the beginning of this, which is, you know, all the things that people said about Democrats that are that are as bad as the caricature would suggest. So, yes, they underscore the point as his upcoming book would indicate that Democrats seem to have lost, you know, at least the parts of America around DeCan, Ohio, where he focused a lot of his research. This is, quote, Biod, in there. I think Democrats' message to the people in Canton, Ohio, is you should move. And that seems a little glib or whatever, but the Democrats do a lot of talk around centering different marginalized groups.

And so you would think they'd understand the value, right, of, like, focusing on the concerns of a specific group, group people in those groups like that, you know? It just demonstrates you care about them. Right. I guess the answer, if I was trying to be very generous, is that like the Democrats are more focused than the Republicans on giving that person in Canton government health care. Like, they'll make sure they can get government health care.

The Republicans, well, which is not nothing, right? People want to live and survive. But like, that's not that optimistic of a message for the person living in Canton who doesn't think that the Democrats are really talking to them at all. True. I mean, but, you know, is Donald Trump's message that, you know, I assume he carried a lot of people in that area, right? A lot of areas around.

That's a good question. I mean, is that with... The immigrants are ruining your lives. Yeah, I mean, so is that going to resonate? I mean, maybe. Maybe that was more effective. Maybe that's what got him elected. Yeah, the immigrants are ruining your lives and, you know, I'll bring America back and we're

respected. But again, I want to go back to, look, we all see through this, okay? I see through this. But we're above it all, Tim. You have to remember that. We're above at all. We're so wise. Yeah, so wise.

We're smarter everybody. That's why the candidates, I support it all. lost. Not all. Okay. We ended some pretty good work in state elections. Top level. Not great. The thing is, though, back to this element of centering. Trump centered him. He didn't use the word centering, but he went to rallies there. Folks that looked like they were from Canton and felt like they were their neighbors were behind him on the stage. He paid lip service to the fact that they were pissed about how other elites had fucked him up. Absolutely.

Maybe that message that, hey, these other guys screws you. I hate them. And I care about you. That's not perfect because he's not demonstrating how he's going to help them. He's actually making their lives worse right now. But that does seem to be a preferable message to, I don't care about you at all. I mean, especially if that's the message people are taking from Democrats.

I mean, and look, a lot of it's just sort of, you know, Democrats are run by people far better off than us, far better educated than us. I mean, Donald Trump, you know, has this richy rich, you know, he's a literally, I guess, a billionaire and all that. Especially now. Especially now. Especially on crypto paper. Yeah, among other things. But, I mean, I do think populism, everyone thinks populism.

There's this very antiquated view of populism being like pitchforks and farmers and, you know, union guys in Ohio and so. I mean, populism is celebrity, basically, in America in this day and age. And, you know, Trump sort of proved that very much in 2015, 2016. You know, you can't discount that. By the way, the other piece of this. And so Scott Furrison, the guy who did this can't know, Iowa, how Democrats lost America thing. He was the one that gave me that joke, trippy quote about, you know, by the time Democrats get to these folks, they're convinced that Democrats are space aliens who, whatever the, you know, who invented AI to take your jobs, who are transloving, whatever the character. is. And it's true. I mean, the media deserts and the vacuums that are filled by Fox and, you know,

whatever infrastructure is on the right. Facebook shares of crazy stuff, memes. The whole thing. Yeah. I mean, that's powerful. I mean, it's obviously a discussion for another day. But it's, I mean, it's a huge factor. I want to talk about the DNC itself. I want to preface this by saying somebody that has worked at the RNC, nobody understands more than me that in the year 2026 this was true in the year 2012 but certainly in the year 26 these are almost useless institutions right and they're extremely hollowed out like this is not the 1970s like party committees do not have the power they used to have in many ways the party committees actually when they try to do something like there is a reaction effect that that

results in them actually hurting the person they're trying to help. You see this in endorsements now. Like voters in both sides, I don't want to support the candidate endorsed by the official party. So if they do endorse them, they're actually hurting the candidate they're trying to help. So I've lived all that. So I don't, I think that sometimes people, you know, obsessing over Ken Martin is like not really that valuable because Ken Martin, unfortunately, doesn't have that much influence. But I think it's, it's instructive to at least see what they're trying to do. And you spent some, time with him. You talked about who he is resting dread face, which I, which I enjoyed. And how he talked about how his job was the apocal equivalent of being a fire hydrant.

Being pissed on, but yeah. Yeah. Dogs pissing fire. Yeah, we got it. Yeah. You did the same thing with Wrights back in 2012. I guess I did, didn't I? No, that was 2016. 2016. I was like, I wouldn't have approved that in 2012, actually. So it couldn't have been 2012. You wouldn't have approved that. Yeah. Thank God you were. Thank God you were gone by then, Tim. Yeah, yeah. Party chairs are a great copy. That's one of the lessons of my my career pat. No, I mean, Ken Martin is this, this like, like Reince was. I mean, a party apparatic. I mean, Ken Martin is a long time DFL chair in Minnesota, has done well for Democrats

or DFL people in Minnesota, now trying to run the entire party at a time when Democrats sort of came into this cycle, pretty crotchety to begin with. And here's this kind of party functionary from way back, doesn't have a lot of goodwill attached to him. And he has a very kind of work. worried affect, a very kind of overwhelmed, I wouldn't say hapless. But, you know, he's like, the guy's like, I mean, any party chair is in over his or her head. There's just no question about it. He just happens to look and play the role pretty well. I don't know.

Ken Melman and Terry McCullough handled are pretty good. They did. I mean, that was a kind of a different, well, they're different animals. But, I mean, there was a time when there was a more sort of public, you know, elected officials actually had these jobs like Chris Dodd and Rom Emanuel. And yeah, so Ken's doing his best. one of the things for kin there is some upset in the office because the staffers had to go back into

the office and there's one thing I noticed your article is there's a statement put out by the DNC employee union to the New York Times complaining about the amount of work they had to put in and that gives me an opportunity to sound like a former Republican again which I like to take from time to time why does the DNC have an

employee union this is not a steel working job like they are not at any physical risk it's an optional job. It's a highly coveted job. If you want to go, you're signing up to work more than a 40-hour work week. That's like the point of going to work for a party committee. It's not like the kind of job where you get unlimited PTO. Yeah, I mean, I think the reason this union exists is so they can, you know, try to advocate on behalf of the workers if they want to work from home. And then if that goes south, leak everything to the New York Times and create an even worse look for the party.

Your job if you're working for the DNC is to help Democrats win. Yeah. So I don't understand why the spokesperson for the union would be doing things to make the party look worse. It seems like that person should be fired. Maybe that's against union rules. Yeah, you would think, though, I mean, from a self-interested perspective, though, created an incredibly easy groove for me to just call up every high-level elected official in the Democratic Party to have me trash this whole fiasco around the DNC.

I mean, it's like shooting the fish in the barrel. It's a terrible look. I mean, like, who was it? I guess it was either a list of slack. No, it was Abigail Spanberger who just like said, look, we're running for office. All we want to do is like find people to do our work, you know, for free volunteers who believe in us. And here we have like the people who are actually paid to do this complaining about having to, you know, get out of the house and do it. Anyway, yeah, made for a illustrative, I think, bit here.

My last complaint that was channeled about your piece is that. No Democrats will answer the time machine question. I've asked a lot of them the time machine question on this podcast. What is the time machine question, Jim? It's kind of important, which is if you could go back in a time machine, what would you do differently? And this is kind of important because, you know, if we're going to learn about what to do differently going forward to prevent fascists from taking over the government, you might want to reflect back on the things that you did that allowed them to take over. And I'm for that.

I made plenty of mistakes in life. you know, nobody can ask me, go back to start the Jeb Bush campaign. What would you do differently? And I'd be like, you know, nothing, really. We ran an honorable campaign. And I just, it's like, what? At least have a theory of the case. I ask every guy that comes in or a woman who wants to lead the party this question.

Pete was the only one that gave an interesting answer, but it was more about COVID stuff, which was interesting about how you think they should have done COVID differently. But it didn't speak to any of the political questions. Why won't they do it? Are they scared of Joe Biden's ghost or of Clinton? or Vice President Harris? Like, what is it? An object lesson here is that the Democrats themselves,

the DNC, had their own autopsy report that they spent months on, a lot of money on, interviewed hundreds of people. And they didn't release it. And presumably, and my suspicion was, they were afraid of what it said. I mean, if the president of your party is 80 years old, you know, maybe he should, you know,

say he's a one-term president or something. I mean, there's that. That's alarming specificity. And I won't talk about whom I'm referring. to. But yeah, I mean, it does go to the larger point that we were talking about earlier and that a lot of people quoted in the peace were that, which is Democrats are terrified of hurting each other's feelings. I mean, again, I mean, the feelings of other politicians is not very high on the list of concerns of most voters. But look, I mean, Democrats are a constituency-based coalition,

whereas Republicans have become a cult of personality. Now, that might flip Democrats, you know, find someone who was worthy of transcending a lot of the sort of factional divides by his or her personality. But that person doesn't exist right now. Maybe they will in time. Okay. I told people we're going to come around to it. The one area where I think that the critiques are overstated is just that the Democrats aren't fighting hard enough. They weren't fighting hard enough last year. But the Democrats been fighting pretty fucking hard lately. And the Democrats crushed the Republicans in the redistricting thing. Crush them. And it's just kind of amazed me how quickly people, go past that. And I do think sometimes it's good for people in my boat, for media commentators,

you know, they get more out of boys if they talk about the Democrats being feckless and how they should fight harder, harder. And so. Yeah, cheap magazine stories. And so it creates this doom loop of everybody being like, of the voters. You're not fighting hard enough. And then the media is saying, don't fight harder. And so I just do want to say, like, they fought pretty damn hard on the redistricting thing. They won the shutdown fight. They're doing better than they were doing last year. And that's not nothing. It's not nothing. And look, I mean, I think, this is where Gavin Newsom, I think, has to be mentioned here. I mean, he was, I mean, he has been, I mean, if in so much as, you know, you're going to be giving out, like, awards of, like, the first sort of, you know, 14 months of this. I mean, he did

seem to get the Democrats on a kind of fighting footing, you know, partly around, you know, L.A. was the first city that, that ICE really went into and they did, you know, National Guard stuff. But ultimately, you know, he took on the redistricting thing. He executed it. They won, you know, by vast margins. You know, and that between that and his social media stuff really did seem to capture an imagination of a lot of voters. I think it obviously helped Newsom politically. You know, he's a separate conversation about, you know, whether he would be a good candidate or not. But I do think that he did speak to a hunger and a yearning that a lot of Democrats had. And he gave voice to it. He gave, you know, tactics to it. it and, you know, maybe the rest of the party caught up. But no, I would agree. I think they're in a much more fighting posture now than they were six months ago. Last topic, Jonathan Alter, a guy that we both know, reported yesterday. He says he's learned Trump will kill Netflix's bid for Warner and help Paramount win, giving him control of Fox, CBS, CNN, and TikTok. I'm sure, and Jonathan Alter is well-sourced. I'm sure he has that on good authority. I also think that you can never

know for sure what Donald Trump is going to do until the moment he does it because he's a fickle person. But the writing does seem like to be on the wall that this is where things are going. And it's pretty alarming. It's extremely alarming. I mean, I don't, you know, I don't know who Walter Sores. I mean, where did he write this anyway? I guess the whatever, I guess news week. Washington Monthly. Oh, Washington Monthly. That's right. Okay. So he did it. I guess he came from there many, many years ago. But no, it's certainly plausible. I mean, I haven't seen it picked up anywhere like at birth sort of confirmed anywhere, but it certainly makes all the sense in the world. It's very consistent with everything he's done. And yeah, it's alarming. And it's alarming. It's as

alarming as you can imagine. And I don't know, put it into like the alarming bin. And I mean, it's, it's, it's the essence of how an authoritarian, poor authority, whatever you want to call it. I mean, this is how it runs now. This is what, you know, there is to compete against. I mean, polls say that, you know, voters don't like this. But look, I mean, it's not going to not going to. I mean, it's just, it's very consistent with everything we've seen to this point. The propaganda machines are become powerful then too. So then that creates this different doom loop.

So let's avoid that doom loop. Well, just the silence, though. I mean, I cannot keep, I mean, look, this is a hobby horse of so many of us. But this doesn't exist without the full compliance of every elected Republican with a few exceptions in Washington. and it just every day I still can't believe it. Mark Leibovich, he's at the Atlantic. It's always a banger when he files. So make sure to put the little, I don't know,

do you guys have like a little alarm bell on the website so people can get a push alert when you file? I think as soon as I get off the phone here or the Zoom here, whatever the hell we're on, I'm going to recommend this because I think this is what my, this is the thing that my career has really lacked over many, many, way too many years now. And I think, but some kind of signature

alarm bell might be the thing that sort of puts like the extra cherry on the Sunday. Well, the good news is if people miss it, you'll be here on the Bullwark podcast and everybody's listening. So I appreciate you, Mark Leavich. I'm in Minneapolis tonight. We're all in Minneapolis tonight. So tomorrow's show will be our live show from this evening. And then I'll be back with you all on Friday. So thanks to Mark. And we'll see y'all soon. But look, I'm taking the charge going harder. Get your two shots now. I'm facing the charge. The Bullock is produced by surprise, they might get you by surprise by Jason Brown. But if you feel for the shit, then you might survive.

Guess I see you when you wake up on that upside. Yeah. The Bullwark podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.