What A Day - Politics In The Paint

Episode Date: August 14, 2026

The Women’s National Basketball Association has been making the headlines lately. In fact, according to a Media Matters report, since the end of June, Fox News has devoted at least 206 segments to the WNBA. But why are the likes of Sean Hannity and Bret Baier suddenly paying such close attention to women’s basketball? To get to the bottom of how the most LGBTQ-friendly sports league became a favorite subject of the right-wing media, we spoke with Leah Asmelash, a culture writer for CNN.And in headlines, the USS George Washington aircraft carrier is headed to the Middle East to relieve the USS Abraham Lincoln, Luigi Mangione pleads guilty, and Cards Against Humanity wants you to join its “Official Elon Musk is a Sad Little Bitch with No Friends Monument Design Committee.”Show Notes: Check out Leah's piece – tinyurl.com/3m6v5sxksophie-cunningham-caitlin-clark-trans-bans-cec Call Congress – 202-224-3121 Subscribe to the What A Day Newsletter – https://tinyurl.com/y4y2e9jy What A Day – YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/@whatadaypodcast Follow us on Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/crookedmedia/ For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail]

Sports have historically been that, right? Like, sports have been the place where we can set our differences aside and come together in cheer for or against a common enemy. But I think maybe what's happening here is some of these new fans coming in might not necessarily be fans of the fever. They might just be fans of Caitlin Clark or Sophie Cunningham. Right. And that, I think, sort of just creates a different goal. I'm Erin Ryan in for Jane Koston, and this is What a Day, the show that, like Iowa Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, would like to offer compliments to the sheep barn at the Iowa State Fair. See, we can reach across the aisle.

On today's show, we talk about the WNBA as a battleground in the culture wars with CNN culture writer Leah Asmelash. Before we get chippy in the paint, here's what we're following today, Friday, August 14th. Well, no, that ship is moving. No, they're not. That ship is moving right now. or very shortly, and it's being replaced with another very similar ship. When the deployment has not on too long? Are you working on? No, no, no. Not nearly long enough.

Well, that was encouraging. The USS George Washington aircraft carrier is headed to the Middle East to relieve the USS Abraham Lincoln. The Lincoln has been supporting the U.S. war against Iran. Its deployment has included a record-setting, uninterrupted time at sea of more than 260 days. Sailors on the Lincoln have voiced concerns about deteriorating conditions in recent days. conditions in recent days, and at least one has jumped overboard. Defense Secretary Pete Hegesseth predictably claimed that the conditions have been, quote, completely misrepresented. Hostilities between the U.S. and Iran have calmed in recent weeks, but the Navy has reimposed a blockade on Iranian ports

in the Strait of Hormuz. The Trump administration has offered no clarity on how it intends to wind down the war. Documents reveal that Department of Homeland Security officials conducted far-reaching spying operations on labor unions, community groups, and even churches that helped organize protests against the federal government's immigration enforcement blitz in Minnesota earlier this year. Per the New York Times, the newly released documents detailing Operation Puppet Master were shared as part of court proceedings concerning 15 anti-ice protesters who were arrested for, quote, providing material support to violent opportunists and agitators, end quote. They show that in its zeal to pursue so-called antiques,

The federal government encroached into the private lives of hundreds of ordinary law-abiding citizens exercising their constitutional rights to free speech. More than 400 people have been arrested in connection with Minnesota anti-ice protests so far. At 645 on a December morning, Luigi Mangione stalked and murdered Brian Thompson in cold blood on a public sidewalk in Midtown Manhattan. Just a few moments ago, Mangione pled guilty to his heinous act. But wait, there's more. U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Jamie McDonald, spoke to reporters after Luigi Mangione admitted that he killed United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson in New York City in December 2024.

Mangioni told a judge, quote, I shot Mr. Thompson in Manhattan, adding, quote, I knew what I was doing was illegal. Mangioni pleaded guilty to federal stocking charges, but he still faces a murder charge in New York State Court, to which he pleaded not guilty. Federal prosecutors plan to seek a life prison term at Mangione's sentencing set for December 18th. Do you despise Elon Musk? Good news. Cards Against Humanity, the company behind the famously vulgar card game wants you to join their quote, official Elon Musk is a sad little bitch with no friends monument design committee. Sounds right up my alley. Yes, you heard that right.

The card game company is planning to build a monument mocking Musk on a small piece of land in Southern Texas, which it bought in 2017 to block border wall construction right next to Musk's Starbase Village. Cards Against Humanity is asking the public to chip in $10 if they want to join this design committee. So how did they settle on the sad little bitch diss? The company's spokesperson told the what-a-day newsletter, quote, we considered the word dumb, but decided it was debatable and therefore weak. He's surely smart in some ways. We briefly considered an asshole and man-child, but agreed they were too obvious. Miserable lacked the punch of sad. Sosopath and narcissist felt too clinical.

Motherfucker felt too broad. We take insults very seriously at cards against humanity. No notes. And that's the news. Let's talk about the Women's National Basketball Association. A Media Matters report released this week revealed that since June 25th, Fox News has devoted 206 segments to the WNBA. That's 13 and a half hour.

longer than the Lord of the Rings trilogy, the extended editions. So why are the likes of Sean Hannity and Brett Bayer suddenly paying such close attention to women's basketball? Can they even name five WNBA teams? To get to the bottom of how the most LGBTQ-friendly sports league became a favorite subject of the right-wing media, I spoke with Leah Asmulash, a culture writer for CNN, whose recent piece, how the right-wing decided to care about women's basketball in Indiana, gets to the heart of the issue. Leah, welcome to What a Day. Thank you for having me.

The WNBA has gained millions of fans in the last few years, but one unexpected place the league is showing up a lot recently is right-wing media. And I'm not psychic, but something tells me it's not because they love women's basketball over on Newsmax. You write that the right wing has taken to the Indiana fever specifically, but because it gives them a place to air grievances about gender and race. No pun intended, but can you give us a brief place? play-by-play on which players on the fever are at center court in these discussions and why?

So the main person right now is Sophie Cunningham. She might be the new figure for some folks. She's been in the league for a while, and she recently joined the fever as a sort of like person off the bench, like six-player option is sort of how we would describe that. So she's not necessarily a star on the team or one of their main players, or at least not, you know, for actual. fever fans. But she sort of recently got herself into the center of this discussion because she made a comment in a ESPN profile about how she doesn't think trans women or trans girls should play in women's or girls sports. And this is something that sort of immediately ignited this larger sort of culture war-ish discussion among the sort of right-weigh.

contingent that maybe did not pay attention to the WMBA before that. All right. Well, you talk about how Fox News has covered the fouls against Caitlin Clark more than actual sports networks have. What is the right-wing media seeing in Caitlin Clark? And why has she become such a powerful figure in this culture war? Yeah, that's a great question. I mean, I think what's happening with Caitlin Clark has been happening ever since she

joined the league. like ever since 2024, there's been discussions with her about how she's not treated fairly or about how, like, players are more physical with her, etc. And then I think part of the problems come when she gets fouled. And then the person fouling is then sort of flooded with a bunch of racist abuse. So this happened this year where one player on the Phoenix Mercury sort of fouled. Caitlin Clark and she talked about receiving death threats afterward. But this also happened in 2024 where another player also fouled Caitlin Clark and was sort of

received just a lot of vitriol for that. And that doesn't really happen to other players. There's something happening where the WMBA is a physical league. That's part of why we love not just the W, but just sports. but specifically when it happens to Caitlin Clark, there is this sort of a different standard maybe that people are sort of holding her opponents to, if that makes sense. And what is Clark's response, Ben? I mean, she's in kind of a difficult position here, isn't she?

Yeah, she, for the most part, has sort of sidestepped any specific comment about it. she has said very specifically that she doesn't think that hate or harassment or any of that is the way forward. And she goes out of her way to condemn that. She also did that in 2024. So that's been a consistent point with her. But there are some people that think that because she doesn't make any sort of specific political statements, she opens herself up to the right wing sort of being able to attach their political statements to her, if that makes sense. So I think that is sort of what's happening there, but she doesn't specifically say anything about politics.

She doesn't say anything one way or the other way. She will stand up for her teammates. She will, like we saw most recently, she has stood up for her coach who got booed at a recent game because some fans didn't think she defended Sophie Cunningham super well. And she will sort of knock those things out or she'll sort of nip those in the bud, so to speak. But, yeah, it doesn't give the right wing a lot of things to talk about otherwise. Yeah, you know, I was always curious about the whole Caitlin Clark thing because, I mean, the Dallas wings, Paige Beckers has a lot in common with Caitlin Clark on the surface. She was a standout college player. She was the number one draft pick.

She's got a great jump shot. And she's a pretty white girl. So why hasn't the right wing media glommed on to Beckers the way they have to Clark? I think Paige Becker's, unlike Caitlin Clark, has just been a lot more outspoken, has been very, very clear about her viewpoints, has been vocal about civil rights, both for on both against racism and against, you know, any sort of homophobia and things like that. And she's also in a very sort of public relationship with her teammates. So there, there's sort of these other things that maybe don't make her as appealing. as a subject, maybe as Caitlin Clark is. I mean, even if someone did try to sort of put a viewpoint onto her that she did not agree with, unlike Clark, she's a lot more able to not allow that to happen. She's a lot more vocal about what she does stand for and what she doesn't.

It sounds like Clark is doing kind of the Michael Jordan thing of Republicans by sneakers, too. Yes. Yeah. So who else outside of the sports? world has chimed in on this discourse? Oh, yes, a lot of people. So one instance that sort of stuck up to me was the Newsmax host, whose name was Greg Kelly during a segment on his show, which does not usually talk about sports. He talked about how Caitlin Clark was being, you know, aggressively foul like we were saying and how the WMBA really needs to stand up and do something.

And while he was doing this, he replayed a clip of the player on the Phoenix Mercury, Alyssa Thomas, who had the flagrant fowl against Clark. And he seemed to say, or he did say, if the league won't do anything, I think the cops have to show up and start making arrests, which is an interesting statement. That is so silly. That is so silly. It's so silly. It's sports.

It's sports. It's sports. And, you know, the WMBA, like last year they had a whole promo about how their physical league, how there, you know, there was videos of, you know, some of the players getting in each other's faces. There were hard fouls. It was definitely something that the league is interested in, or at the time, the league was interested in promoting about what the WMBA was and what the WMBA product is. And now we see. see that sort of being used against the league. We'll get back to my conversation with Leah Asmalash in a moment. If you are also known for your physicality, stick around. Make sure to subscribe, leave a five-star review on Spotify and Apple Podcasts, watch us on YouTube and share with your friends. More to come after some ads. What a day is brought to you by Quince?

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Well, the WNBA has a history of being LGBTQ friendly, even being, as you note in your piece, the first professional league to have a pride night. So how have other coaches, players, and officials responded to the right wing, glomming on to the WNBA. The most high-profile case has definitely been the case of Cheryl Reeve, who is the coach of the Minnesota Lynx, and she's an amazing coach, has sort of done it all. Anybody would sort of say that. She's definitely one of the most high-profile coaches in the league. And the day that the Lynx were set to play, the fever, she wore a shirt, like a t-shirt underneath a blazer that just said trans kids belong. And so that was definitely one of the most

clear and direct stances that a coach has sort of taken in the W and she had a whole conversation with Cunningham about that before the game even started and both parties sort of left that with nothing negative to say about the other

you know so she's definitely been very much made it very clear about where she stands and then I think some other coaches have been maybe a little bit more don't want to offend but there haven't been any coaches that have said something that would be considered pro right wing

or pro any of these other things. Now, with all this attention, how much of the culture war coverage is impacting the WNBA? Like, is it impacting the players at all, do you think? Most recently something that happened is the head coach of the Indiana fever, Stephanie White, was booed during a game because she, I guess, didn't defend Sophie Cunningham. very well and in like in a post-game press conference fans were except that she didn't defend Sophie Cunningham and there was sort of this moment after that game when coach white was booed where the high-profile players on that team including Caitlin Clark were all like that's unacceptable like

this is our coach we have nothing but respect for her there's no need to to boo her so it does sort of seem Like, I mean, there's only a handful of games left in the season and then it's playoffs, right? So it sort of seems like this would be the time to really lock in on basketball. And the fever have done that. But there is a lot of noise and I think it's clear that it is sort of making its way. Like, they know about it. You know, like they hear the noise. They hear all of this debate around them.

It doesn't seem like it's affecting them. They're still winning. But you can tell that it's not something. that they are necessarily thrilled about, or at least, you know, on the vocally, they have not been thrilled about it. Yeah. I'm kind of of two minds about the WNBA. Like, I like seeing it get a ton of attention, but there's also a part of me that's like, okay, becoming a hugely popular sports league and breaking through means embracing a new set of fans who kind of hate the original fans. Should the WNBA even want newsmax viewers as fans at all? I don't know if I can really

say. There is, of course, the, like we mentioned earlier, the Michael Jordan School of Thought, Republicans buy sneakers too. And I think the WMBA has said specifically that, you know, they want to welcome everybody. And I think ideally that could be, like, sports have historically been that, right? Like, sports have been the place where we can set our differences aside and come together in cheer for or against a common enemy. But I think maybe, maybe. Maybe what's happening here is some of these new fans coming in might not necessarily be fans of the fever. They might just be fans of Caitlin Clark or Sophie Cunningham. And that, I think, sort of just creates a different goal.

Well, putting the culture wars aside, how is the season going so far? Who do you have your eyes on and who are the standout teams? Yeah. Well, I mean, honestly, the fever have been doing amazing. I mean, they, I think coming into this season, people didn't, weren't really sure what to expect. But Kelsey Mitchell, one of their other guards, has had an amazing, amazing season. They're scoring so many. They're doing things that I haven't seen in a long time, 37 points against the Lynx in that game that we talked about where the links is one of the best teams in the league.

Yeah, they just clinched. I think they're the only team that clinched so far. Yes. Yeah, yeah. So that's, I mean, that's why I'm. and, you know, they're my team. Yes. No, exactly. And so, and they're a great team. And I mean, yeah, speaking of, I mean, the links are doing amazing. I mean, there was some, they kind of made some major changes in the off season and people were a little unsure about how that would go for them. But the rookie, Olivia Miles has been, yeah. Amazing. Amazing. Do you think MVP? Do you think Miles for MVP? I don't know. I worry that she might, because she's a rookie, people will. I think she's a case, but I kind of think we might see. Aja Wilson get it again. That would be my thought. Who has also been like doing amazing as always?

I think people expect it from Aja, so it's a little less talked about. But also having an amazing, an amazing season. And who's your team? Just out of curiosity. Well, I'm based in Atlanta. So I will say I'm always happy to see the dream do well. And of course with Angel Reese, they've been such a fun team to watch. And they have also, I mean, I think they're definitely going to be in the playoffs. And I think they could definitely make life difficult for the links who I think are probably the favorites right now or the Valkyries. So we'll see. All right, Leah, thank you so much for joining me. I love having someone to talk about the WNBA with. No, thank you for having me. That was my conversation with Leah Asmalash, culture writer at CNN. Before we go, this November, we have a chance to stop

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