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And Chuck Edwards in the North Carolina seat made things easier for Republicans because unlike Max Miller, he is dropping out and he will not be running. That will bank of that seat much easier to hold. There were a lot of primaries over this week that I want to get into in Michigan. Socialist Abdul El-Sayed defeated establishment Democrat Haley Stevens by a single point margin, 48.5 to 47.5. Mallory McMorrow was a Democrat running. She dropped out to endorse Stevens, but remained on the ballot and took 4%. That is why Stevens lost, and Abdul El-Sayed won was because Mallory McMorrow did not drop out. despite having horrendous polling numbers until the very last moment. And then she dropped out a little earlier. Stevens would have definitely become Democratic nominee. So she was a spoiler and it definitely affected the overall outcome of the election. This election was one of the biggest polling errors of the year. The average poll said Abdul El-Sayed would win by 13 points, including Mitchell Research and Emerson College, two of the most respected pollsters that were in the field for that race. Why do they get it wrong? I think that's a big question. A lot of people want to know. First, Michigan is a very hard state to poll because it is a state without registration by party. People just register to vote. They don't register as Republican or Democrat. Many of the polls have the independent vote up to 40%. It was nowhere near 40%. So where they were sampling and who they were sampling among likely voters was just completely off. The second thing that was happening was in the case of Emerson, they believed Abdul El-Sayed would win the white vote by a two to one margin and also win voters who don't have a college degree. Mitchell Research, though. probably the most famous and well respected in Michigan, solely Michigan pollster, said that Stevens only led by black voters among by five points and was losing white voters by 14 points. Neither one of those narratives was true. In the end, Stevens dominated in areas without voter college, where voters do not have college degrees, do regardless of race. killed it in the black majority area. Stevens dominated the city of Detroit winning more than 70% of the vote in precincts. The same percentage Abdul El-Sayed received in Muslim majority towns like Dearborn. Overall, Stevens won Detroit by 28 points. Abdul El-Sayed won the three major Muslim townships by 47, 57, and 67 points each respectively. Stevens won every majority black town in the state. The only area, though, of high population of college educated voters that she carried was places like West Bloomingfield, which have exceptionally high Jewish populations that should not come as a shock to anybody. There's a problem with polling when it comes to...

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white progressives. White progressives, regardless of if they have a college degree or if they don't have a college degree, most do have a college degree, they love to answer polls. They answer them at incredibly high rates and they are skewing the results of this poll. That's why these pollsters were saying, you know, Haley was going to. lose the white working class vote. She was going to lose the white vote overall by sometimes 30 points in some of these polls. This is the same problem Anne Seltzer had in 2024 when her famous poll in Iowa said Kamala Harris would win. And in her cross steps, Harris was winning senior citizen white women who were mostly evangelical. Like that's crazy. It was never going to happen. Like you should have looked at those polls and said, this seems very strange. Obviously. There should have been a question in the mind of these pollsters say, hey, is Jim Bob, and I don't mean that disrespectably, I'm just using a generic, you know, working class white name. Is Jim Bob from Central Michigan voting for Abdul El-Sayed, who's campaigning with a podcast for this as we deserve 9-11? Does that seem normal? Is that usual? Should we be doing these polls in a different way to verify that these are reflective of these counties? They clearly did not do it because there's probably white progressives in, you know, exorbs or suburbs closely to, you know, matrices like Grand Rapids or Detroit that were throwing and skewing these polls overall. I mean, Abdul did win a few. counties up in the northern peninsula. He did win a few rural counties, but is mostly dominated in just some major urban areas with high college degrees. College was the big divide in this election. There's just no question about it. Stevens won white working class town. She won black working class town. She won every black town, but black working class towns especially. Abdul El-Sayed. Very funny. Abdul El-Sayed carried Congressman Schlotten's district. Congressman Schlotton represents Western Michigan, a very high-educated, highly wealthy part near Grand Rapids. He won that by like... 20 points, even though Schlotten endorsed Stevens. Meanwhile, Stevens carried Rashida Tlaib's district by big numbers, even though Rashida Tlaib was endorsing and campaigning for Abdul El-Sayed. They, even though they are politicians that were representing areas, you know. Shalib's district is overwhelmingly working class. Charlton's district's overwhelmingly college educated. They were not representing their voters because their voters, those without a college degree were moving for Stevens and those with college degree were moving for Abdul El-Sayed and those without were moving for Stevens. College is the big divide in this election and ultimately had McMorrow dropped out before her name was on the ballot, we would be having a different conversation. Stevens would have one. That's just.

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There's just no question in my mind about that. What does this mean for November? What does it mean for the ultimately for the midterms? It depends on how many independents and Republicans crossed over in this election to vote for Stevens, but will not vote for Abdul El-Sayed. Like there's definitely a constituency of voters, Democrat, Republican, and Independent who voted for Stevens that will not vote for Abdul El-Sayed. He is too radical for them. Mike Rogers is a Republican nominee. He is led or tied in the last four polls. But the question fundamentally is this. Who is more toxic to Stevens voters? Abdul El-Sayed or Donald Trump? It's not a matter of Mike Rogers. It's a matter of Donald Trump. Because what is going to come down to, I mean, the black voters that voted for Stevens, they are going to go with Abdul Salih. There's no question really in my mind. They vote for the Democrat, no matter who the Democrat is. But among the white voters, which is a whole large chunk in a state like Michigan. especially the Jewish voters in places like Oakland County and McComb County and in the suburbs of Grand Rapids, they will decide this election. And it's a question of, do they hate Trump more than they fear Abdul El-Sayed? The man who once again was campaigning with a podcaster that said America deserve 9-11. That kind of. That's a really big stain to associate yourself with somebody like that. Abdul El-Sayed is now the most prominent DSA-aligned candidate, although he's not, quote, unquote, a member of DSA. They're all, by the way, all these candidates now are saying, I'm not actually a paid member of DSA. Okay. DSA was organizing and campaigning extremely aggressively for him. He believes in all their opinions, you know, more or less. And he is now the most prominent DSA-aligned candidate. running for national office. Now, especially that Graham Platner is out of the picture. But he was not the only DSA-Aligned candidate to win in Tuesday's primary election. Will Lawrence, who says that he was a DSA member up until last month. It's very likely. He won his Michigan primary in the 7th Congressional District, which is a swing district. Yosef Rabi defeated a 12-year incumbent named Christopher Taylor for the mayor of Ann Arbor, Michigan, which is a... pretty big city, very liberal city in Michigan. And state representative, Donovan McKinney, defeated two-term incumbent Shri Thanedar. He is the 71-year-old who kind of dresses like he's a teenager and he looks like he's wearing a wig and he really doesn't speak English very well. That's the prominent Democrat. That's who he defeated in his race. Not, it wasn't all sunshine and rainbow zone nationwide for Democrats. Cori Bush, the famous congresswoman from St. Louis, former congress from St. Louis, she was making a comeback. She's about as sharp as a pinball covered in Lou. She lost her race by big numbers in the St. Louis area. Another interesting race in Michigan that not many people are covering is that a Trump endorsed candidate lost badly.

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to a guy who dropped out, probably the biggest defeat of any Trump endorsed candidate for Congress this cycle, or maybe even the last cycle, because he lost by double digits. A guy named Thomas J. Smith, who raised a little more than $1,000 and had to drop out of the race beat a trumped back candidate named Amir Hassan. How did this happen? Why did this happen? It happened for the same reason that back in 2010, for those who've been liked in politics for a long time like I have, there was once upon a time a man named Alvin Green who won a Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate against a very powerful and well-liked county executive named Vic Rawl. Alvin Green, for those who don't remember, was a guy who had no, didn't raise any money, was, and I'm not saying this disrespectfully, he probably had an IQ under 100. He was not. he's not what you would consider somebody able to make his, you know, rounds on this earth. He's passed away now, but his rounds in the same way you and I am. And his eyes went in two different directions, as if he didn't have enough things go against him. And yet, he won a U.S. Senate primary in 2010 to be the Democratic nominee. Why did this happen? Why did Alvin Green get this nomination against a powerful incumbent Democrat? Because Alvin Green probably had the blackest sounding name in the history of the world, and he was running an electorate that was overwhelmingly black voters. It's really that simple. Thomas J. Smith sounds like someone who would have married to Betsy Ross, and he was running against a guy whose name sounds like he was one of the 9-11 hijackers. And that's really what it comes down to, in my opinion. There was no campaign. There was no door knocking. There was no ground effort. There was no ads. There was no nothing. It was just on a name. And in a day and age when Republican voters are increasingly worried about Islam's influence in the U.S. and Muslim immigration into this country and in a state where voters have seen demographic transformations to such an extreme were towns back in the 1990s, 1980s were 80, 90% Caucasian non-Muslim white that are now 8090% Muslim. People get tribal when you see demographic changes to such a degree. There's no other way to cut it. Democrats, by the way, have always been tribal. Places like the South Carolina race, New York, California, Asian Democrats will vote for the Asian candidate and vice versa for Latinos and blacks and all the rest of it. And eventually, when you have mass immigration, working class whites are also tribal now. I'm not saying it's a good thing. I'm not saying a bad thing. I'm saying it's a thing. So take it or leave it however you want. Last important election I want to reference was a referendum in Missouri to abolish state income tax failed.

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by an overwhelming 83 to 17. I didn't see this coming. I thought they would have actually passed this amendment, but I wasn't really tracking it. The amendment would have traded a higher sales tax for income tax abolishment. And people were just like absolutely no. It failed in every county in the country and the state, right, in the state. It failed in every county. It failed in every congressional district, obviously. There was really nowhere that it did well at all. Voters did not trust politicians to. you know, tamper with their sales tax and that it would raise the cost of living. So it was very, very interesting. Okay, let's get to Wisconsin because that's the next really important primary that is coming up. It is happening next week where DSA backed Francesca Hong and county executive David Crowley are fighting in the Democratic primary. Francesca Hong, for those who you who don't know, she says a lot of insane things on a regular basis. She's kind of one of these people who has lived online for a very, very long time. One of her rants online that has gone viral recently, even though it happened a couple years ago, was saying that she wanted to cancel Thanksgiving. She appeared on CNN last week to talk about this and asked if she would still cancel Thanksgiving. She gave possibly one of the stupidest answers I've ever heard. Take a listen. You know, you've talked about your past positions that he keeps highlighting and, you know, obviously likely would continue to do so before November should you win. One thing that they brought up as well was a post from you in 2021 where you said Americans should cancel Thanksgiving, should have done this in 1621. The post has been deleted. Republicans have been highlighting it. Do you still believe that Thanksgiving should be canceled? I'm a chef and one of the first meals that I made that was for the community when I was 16 was a Thanksgiving meal. I always think my hospitality background in owning a restaurant for seven, eight years that bringing folks around the table to share conversation and build community is always a good thing. But Thanksgiving is also a time that's incredibly painful for many people in our communities. And so I think there, I wanted to make sure that people understood that there are multiple views, but views can evolve. And the position that I'm running for right now, and I think my background as a chef, will actually help me become a better governor that's able to bring more people to the table. My first job was working at Victoria's Secret selling bras to women. And I know how lonely and heartbreaking fat women could feel when they can't fit in, you know, in lingerie that they want to wear. So therefore we should cancel Valentine's Day. That's the reference that I basically would make for that answer. That's insane. That's so, so, so insane. Your pass as a chef gives you insight to be governor.

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No, she hates Thanksgiving because we celebrate the day that Western Europeans in America came to this continent and survived and built what will later become the most successful nation on Earth. And as a DSA-backed candidate, she has to hate Western civilization. That's what it comes down to. They hate Columbus Day. They hate Thanksgiving. Eventually, they'll say they're announced that they hate Fourth of July. They need to cancel that as well because we can celebrate anything where the overwhelming celebration involves white people building. you know, civilization. And that's really what it comes down to. Since that interview, she has come out and said that Thanksgiving is actually her favorite holiday. No one's really buying that. Hong is also in the past that she doesn't like Fourth of July, Valentine's Day, Christmas, and of course Thanksgiving. She's probably a lot of fun at parties. My guess. She's also called for abolishing the police, abolishing prisons. She's never given really straight answer whether she would agree to have murderers in prison or what to do with them. She once even described her half-white child as being her proximity to whiteness. I think that her, the night that that child was conceived as probably her proximity to whiteness that she should have been concerned about, but probably didn't, probably didn't worry her at the moment. Francesca, um, is a mental patient. There's just, that's just what she is. And that's, and that is qualifications enough to be a Democratic nominee for a major office in this country. But as crazy as a sound, she could still win. Why? It's a swing state and it's a tough year for Republicans. Trump's approval ratings are down and that is affecting Republicans across the ballot. Do not think anyone is too crazy to get elected, not in a year like this. So. With me on this podcast is my friend who is a professional Republican organizer in the state of Wisconsin. He's trying to help Tom Tiffany and other Republicans get elected. We're going to bring him on to talk about how he's doing that, what organizers on the Republicans that are doing, and what are Republicans' chances in Wisconsin. That's coming up next. This is Tony A.O. from The Real Report with Tony A.O. and Uncle Murder. You ever notice how everything keeps going up, rents going up, streaming services are going up? Even your favorite burrito spot suddenly thinks salsa should cost extra. But with Boost Mobile, you and your phone bill don't have to play the Willis Go Up Soon game because Boost Mobile has an unlimited talk, text, and data plan at a price that'll never go up. It's the same price you'll pay for life, meaning you're said to never worry about your bill increasing again for as long as you're on the plan. While the world keeps finding new ways, to nickel and dime you, Boost Mobile gives you unlimited wireless at one set price for life. Imagine something in your budget actually staying the same. You'll pay the same for unlimited wireless when you're posting mirror selfies in your 20s and when you're posting mirror selfies in retirement. Some things never change. Switch now for unlimited wireless at a price that will never go up, only at Boost Mobile. After 30 gigabytes, customers may experience slower speeds. Customers will pay $25 a month as long as they remain active on a boost. unlimited plan. This is Charity Lawson from Bachelor Happy Hour. Charity, I was thinking about this the other day. What's something that you'll always say yes to? That's easy. Seeing my friends, last minute girls trip, basically making memories you'll talk about for years. Same. And somehow every one of these memories comes with something to plan. That's so true. That's why Klarna stands out. It's about smarter tools that help you manage your money without taking away from the moments that matter.

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conservative organizers in the state, but when we get enough people, it's worth it. When you say purchasing, with purchasing history, what does that mean? So in states where we do not have registration by party, we have no way of knowing if you're a Republican or if you're a Democrat. So. When firms take voter data, it'll go based off of, say, your age, race, language, stuff like that. There's also ways for big firms to track what you purchase in a given day. So let's say you... This is really pushing it, but let's say you bought a bunch of American flags and you bought blah, blah, blah. That data is public when it's purchased, so we can infer from that a little bit, which way you'd probably be most likely to vote. But, you know, a lot of that's just guessing. Yeah. Well, I mean, if you have subscription, I guess, to MS now, you probably are not voting. Yeah. There's certain things where you can get data on it. It's a bit easier to say, hey, you know, we can say with 90% confidence, you're probably a Democrat or Republican. You know, it just depends on what data you can get on a specific voter. But it's more tricky out here because, like you said, we don't have registration by party. You do a lot of work going door to door. I did that early on in my career. I mean, I campaigned everywhere doing door-to-door knocking. It's probably one of the most interesting times to have direct voter contact because you truly get to see sometimes how insane some people are. Do you have any really funny stories that are going door-to-door if someone answered the door and just giving you a manic episode? You're not. In the state of Wisconsin, not so much. People are pretty, you know, nice and normal out here. I mean, you'll get the occasional naked old man because they typically don't have much shame coming to the door and whatever they're wearing at a given time. I'd say my work in Seattle was a bit more fun. A couple of, you know, iron pipes. I know some of my team back when we did work out there, you know, guns, stuff like that. But in the state of Wisconsin, nothing really that crazy. You know, I'll go out with my team and other teams and usually people are pretty good. There's nothing that funny. Yeah, I remember in Staten Island one time I was doing a campaign for Attorney General and someone answered the door and said, I don't do anything before I have my second cigar in the morning. And I was like, sir, you are relaxed and I appreciate that. Here's my question. So Tom Tiffany's running for governor. He's on this podcast before. I like Tom Tiffany, but is he too conservative for Wisconsin? And he'd be probably the most conservative governor in Wisconsin's history.

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Look, yeah, and it's interesting because in terms of governors, he would probably be more on the more conservative side. He's not Tommy Thompson, you know, our longest serving governor for four terms, very moderate Republican back in the 80s and 90s. Scott Walker was obviously part of the, you know, very conservative ideological Tea Party movement. I'd say Tiffany's in the vein of him. You know, you could say he's more conservative, but then you've got to look at. Is he more conservative than Ron Johnson, who just won re-election in 2022? And no, I think you could clearly say that Ron Johnson is to Tiffany's right. So really? Yeah, I think you'd say that, especially if you look at the way that Tom Tiffany's running his race, it is all bread and butter. I don't even think the campaign has mentioned a social issue once. The Dems are two divided right now to make hay of a lot of the issues in Wisconsin that Democrats typically try to. hammer in. His race has been, I'm a Wisconsinite. I'm drinking an old fashion at this dive bar, this dive bar. His campaign signs, they put out a line that just say, you betcha. So they're playing into that theme. They basically had five months of runway to run with this race with no Democratic opposition. They've defined Tom Tiffany early on as the Wisconsinite candidate. According to the latest Marquette Law School poll, Tom Tiffany has the highest approval rating out of any of the candidates running Democrat-Republican side. So they've been able to get in and define him pretty early as the... you know, Wisconsin candidate that I think a lot of the ideological concerns are sort of waived away by good name ID in that sense. How much when you're speaking of voters? How much does Trump's name come up? A lot. Yeah. A lot. And I do most of my organizing in the... for sort of Chicago land Wisconsin County. So Kenosha is seen Rock and Walworth. That is southeast Wisconsin for those. Southeast Wisconsin, yeah. Tom Tiffany's district is way up north. He is the representative for the seventh congressional district. In the state of Wisconsin, we call it the Northwoods. So I do most of my work in the furthest away part from him. So a lot of the association will come from, is he a Republican? Is he Trump endorsed Trump, Trump, Trump? I've noticed that in a lot of cases, you can convince a voter that, you know, statewide issues are not federal. If this race was a Senate race, I think it would be a bit tougher for us to cross over that finish line, but because it is a governor's race and Democrats are running for their third term in a row for this seat. It helps mitigate a lot of Trump's unpopularity in the state of Wisconsin right now. Where does Francesca Hong, the likely Democratic nominee, where does she get her support from? So she is the current representative for the 76th Assembly District in Wisconsin. There is.

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To my, we have 99 assembly districts. I do not think that there is a district that is more blue or leftist than that seat. Most of her support is coming one from the city of Madison and almost all of her organizing. The best of my knowledge is being done by the Democratic Socialists of America. So the DSA has a very large chapter in the city of Madison and they have a pretty comparable one in the city of Milwaukee too. Most of her organizing has been sort of outsourced to them. So they're running around Madison and Milwaukee and they send people into the more rural counties to go out and talk to them. I don't know how effective of a strategy that's going to be, but she's getting almost all of her fieldwork done by the Democratic Socialists. Well, where, okay, we've heard for years about Democrat organization and DSA, specifically progressive organization ability. During 2024, we heard a bit about turning point doing door knocking in some ground game, but really. When you compare what Republicans do with organizing, even between election cycles and what Democrats do, is there a comparison? I'd say it depends on the state. I know we've been pretty good here, especially in the past two years of sort of rebuilding that. 24-7 organizing potential. I'd say the Democrats are in this state, they're playing a little bit of catch up almost. DSA's come in pretty, you know, pretty strong this year to try to make up a lot of that ground. But. You know, we've always had a pretty good ground game in Wisconsin. Reince Prebus was obviously the former national chair. He had a lot to do with Trump winning initially back in 2016. And then a lot of our organizing efforts pushing Trump over the edge in 24. So. It's different interest groups, obviously, but I'd say right now we have the edge, especially in terms of absolute doors knocked and voter contacts made. The DSA is trying to make a push right now to get up to a million doors before the election. That's not going to happen. It's way too late in the game to make that a reality. So by the end of this race, conservatives will have better contact. in terms of organization indoors. Now, Francesca Hong has said things like she wants to defund the police. She hates Thanksgiving and wants to cancel Thanksgiving. We see a lot of things on Twitter about Francesca Hong. She's probably the most eccentric and arguably the craziest Democrat running nationwide this year.

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How much of what that we see online actually makes it to the doors when you talk about the doors? Had they ever heard of Francesca Hong? Do they know any of this stuff in your experiences? Are they aware of any of this stuff? I'll say, and you'd be sort of shocked on the ground, just how much Tom Tiffany having these five months of no competitive primary and no leeway has really benefited us. I think according to the latest Marquette law poll, Francesca Hong still only has a 40%. Name ID, despite being the most talked about Democratic candidate for the entire campaign, Tom Tiffany's already in the 70s, despite being a congressman from a very rural part of the state. Really, his work and ground of flooding the zone has sort of taken over the narrative, and that on the ground talking to actual doors and voters, because we target the whole universe. We're not just targeting conservatives, Democrat, we're targeting everyone. He is the only candidate really being talked about. There are people who know coming up now. I mean, we've had more national coverage on the Hong stuff. And now that Michigan's over with their Senate primary, I imagine we're about to get a absolute onslaught of national coverage for this race. People have heard it. They don't really know who she is yet. So I wouldn't really buy a lot of these polls that are showing. a tied race or Tiffany ahead by one, two, three, which is a lot of what the past couple ones have been. She's not that well known right now. She's sort of just generic Democrat. I think in the next month or so, her approval is going to absolutely tank. Last question for you, how much harder, I mean, Democrats have an advantage where most of their districts are urban and they're easily walkable, they're easy to get to, they're easy to make photo contact, and they're easy to organize it, which is essential. Republicans have a lot of rural counties, a lot of rural districts. It is virtually impossible to doorknock in those places. You spend more time driving between houses than you do talking to voters. How much of that urbanization versus being exurban and rural plays at a disadvantage Republican nationwide when it comes to organizing? It plays a lot. I mean, we will, we have to put in twice, sometimes three times the amount of work to reach the voter context they can hit in. 20 minutes, you know, these, especially Madison and Milwaukee, are very dense. You know, Madison itself is surrounded on two lakes, so almost all the people live in one little stretch of land. You can talk to, you know, 600,000 voters in Dane County pretty quick, whereas... Say you're going up north. Any of the rural counties up there, iron right on the UP, it's going to take a lot of time to talk to even a fraction as many voters. So we're always at a disadvantage, especially in more rural states like Wisconsin. We're always at a disadvantage of organizing our voters. We're always at a disadvantage of reaching people. It takes the time, the money. It always takes more to get them out.

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I'm glad that we've had about five, six months now of a very contested Democrat primary, where we decided this year, unlike in 2022, we weren't going to do that. We were going to try to clear the field and get Tiffany in there right away. So all the groups, all the organizations have been doing this outreach work since January, some even starting in December of last year. We've had a massive runway here where we've been able to organize and get a lot of people out there. Whereas they still have a week of a very contentious primary. If Francesca Hong wins, she's going to walk out bloodied and bruised. The current incumbent governor is out there today saying he thinks she has no shot of winning the general election. She's wasting her time with controversial statements on Twitter and going on CNN and trying to defend them. No matter what happens, I'm really hoping that we built up this advantage over these last five months, that even though we're at a disadvantage in direct voter contact and reaching people, we've had enough time to make up that ground. Where people go, I have a few thousand listeners in Wisconsin. So where people go if they want to get involved to try to help Tiffany flip the governor's mansion in Wisconsin? Yeah, you know, I'm always paying attention to Twitter. So if you want to go, you can go to my Twitter account, follow me, DM me, reply to any of my tweets. My Twitter. handle it's uh it's a logan at w i s c so logan wisk pretty much yeah very wisconsiny i know um so you can respond to it you can go on there follow me dm me on twitter um i'm looking at it 24 7 looking for people who want to get involved and i drive everywhere to go meet them where they're at so wherever you are just hit me up and we'll you know we'll get you in contact with someone if you want to make sure that we don't become a communist state All right. Logan, OS, thanks for coming on this podcast. I appreciate it. Thanks so much, Ryan. This is Tony A.O. from The Real Report with Tony A.O. and Uncle Murder. You ever notice how everything keeps going up, rents going up, streaming services are going up? Even your favorite burrito spot suddenly thinks salsa should cost extra. But with Boost Mobile, you and your phone bill don't have to play the Willis Go Up Soon game because Boost Mobile has an unlimited talk, text, and data plan at a price that'll never go up. It's the same price you'll pay for life, meaning you're said to never worry about your bill increasing again for as long as you're on the plan. While the world keeps finding new ways, to nickel and dime you, Boost Mobile gives you unlimited wireless at one set price for life. Imagine something in your budget actually staying the same. You'll pay the same for unlimited wireless when you're posting mirror selfies in your 20s and when you're posting mirror selfies in retirement. Some things never change. Switch now for unlimited wireless at a price that will never go up, only at Boost Mobile. After 30 gigabytes, customers may experience slower speeds. Customers will pay $25 a month as long as they remain active on a boost.

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So I don't want to give too much of an answer because it's overall a biased answer just because I speak to these people about this quite a bit. I will give you two pieces of data that I think are important in the defense of flock. And you could take that with a grain of salt because I know these executives, but I think they're being honest what they say. One. The media campaign against Falk, the social media campaign against Falk, in my opinion, is 100% paid for. So there are times that companies, not just politicians, but companies will pay conservative influencers to attack a product or support a product. And there are certain conservative influencers who are constantly the ones being paid. They will be, I don't want to say in his name because I don't want to be sued by anybody, but. They have hundreds of thousands of followers and they'll say generic GOP nonsense to substantiate and gain hundreds of thousands of followers. Like you retweeted, you're like, yeah, I believe this and I love America. No, illegal shouldn't vote or whatever. And then in between that, they'll be like, oh, flock does this or flock does that. Or they'll be pushing or peddling one thing or the other. I 100% believe. And I kind of have a little evidence behind this. So they know someone who was offered a contract and denied it to bash the, to attack flock. So part of what you're seeing is not organic. It is paid for. I believe it's probably paid for by flock's number one competitor who wants these contracts with the government. For those of you who don't know what flock is, by the way, flock is a camera system that tapes things 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They have government contracts. And then the information is doled out to the government. There is no central database to say if flock is making us safer. So that doesn't exist. I wish it did it would make this much easier for me. But a number of cities have reported what flock does in terms of. public safety. And San Francisco was an early adapter to Flock back in 2025. They had a big drop in crime right after that. There was a podcast interview with Adam 22, which is, I don't know who this guy is, but he's the, he's the podcast host, Adam 22. And he did a podcast where he, it's called the plunge, the plug talk show. Never heard of it. But I did see this one club. It was with a prolific criminal. In San Francisco, he did drive-by shootings and car robberies, carjackings, I guess you'd say. And he says because of flock, he could not do it like he used to do it. He could not commit those crimes because flock, once they catch you on camera, then drones are dispersed to follow you and it's impossible to kind of get away. Take that for what you are. It is a criminal saying this, though. But that is what I have. I believe the anxiety over flaw cameras, a lot of it's paid for. Some of it's real, a lot of it's paid for. And I also believe that what we have seen in some of the data, that that works. Listen, there's very easy to understand things that reduce crime. Streetlights reduce crime. Cameras reduce crime.

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So would flaw cameras reduce crime? Absolutely because it is, it's just digital software going instantly. And from what I understand that software is all deleted up every 30 days. So I don't believe that it's being mounted together for this giant database of, of, you know, watching everybody, you know, move every single other way. That's what I believe. But take that with a grand assault because I do know executives there. Next question comes from Forrest. Forrest says, hi, Ryan. I saw your busy post on Twitter about a Yuga poll that I'm curious all what your thoughts were on the overall, them overall. As a pollster, I only asked because I found. Their polls for seven or eight years now, they are nearly always polling seemingly more Democrats than Republicans. Although they seem to be more balanced. If you look at the ideological breakdown, their most recent polls at D plus five, but I vividly remember periods of time where they were doing D plus 10, D plus 12. Also, do you have any opinions on the now defunct website 538? I always thought that it was a site with awesome graphics and directed tools. I agree with that, by the way. And frankly, I was, I wasn't. And although, frankly, I wasn't surprised when that G. Eliot Morris Dweeb ran the company into the ground. Oh, I have stories by this. Okay. UGov is useful as a polling firm because they ask a million questions. So if you want any data on. public opinion on Kash Patel. Very few pollsters ask about Kash Patel. UGov will ask 140 questions, but they pay, I believe they pay participants to answer those questions. That's why they ask so many. So is it the most accurate pollster? No, it is not. However, it is a useful tool simply because they ask so many questions. And you can find data and information on a series of things that you otherwise have no information on. And some information is better than no information, especially when you can break downs and cross tabs. Don't worry about D plus 5, D plus 10. I think that what they're trying to do is estimate turnout for the year. And then they wait it as well. So don't get too hung up on that. They're fine for what they are. They are not fantastic. But it is mostly useful because you can get a question in there that no one else is going to ask because no one has the, you know. time and with to do those kinds of questions. So that's why they're really useful. As far as 538 goes, it was a great website when it existed. There was a lot of important information. I think that Nate Silver, for all the things he got wrong, got quite a few things right. I think he took the job very seriously.

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G. Elliott Morris, in my opinion, is one of the sum as predictors of campaigns and elections that exists in online today. I think that he's a moron. I, I, he's wrong so often. It's actually astounding. I wouldn't take anything that he says seriously. And it is no shocker that he is now at his, I think, third. um, place trying to, uh, I think it's his third website in a very short period time where he's doing, uh, political predictions. Maybe it's an independent site even, but no, he's terrible. He's so bad at it. It's not even funny. Nate Silver, I have some issues with some things that he did. He was really famous for getting things right during Obama, which now looking back, you're like, of course you did. Obama was a rock star in the country at the time. I, but yeah, I mean, Nate Silver does. I think he takes a job seriously. I think he works very hard. He's not always correct. I think the G. L.A. Morris is almost always wrong. So great, great reference point for G. L.A. Morris. He is one of the worst. Last question is from Julian from Canada. Julian writes, if Democrats and Republicans existed in another universe where everything was exactly the same as it is in ours, except Democrats held the same positions, rhetoric, ambitions, and progress on immigration that Republicans. do in this universe do you think democrats would win easily in other words how much other republican party's current electric strength do you think is driven specifically by the stance of immigration as opposed to everything else that is a fantastic question um I think in that universe, Donald Trump does not get elected to president. I will say that. You know, immigration and the uny party's position on amnesty, which is not dead, but certainly on life support since Trump came on the scene in 2016, that has been, that has been the dominant position of both parties. And it's been the absolute. you know, hatred of the electorate. And the electorate was like screaming in the wind. Now, let's say Hillary Clinton was screaming, build the wall. And that working class white voter base that felt like the country was changing too fast, like they weren't taking the law seriously, that illegals get everything and they have to work hard for it. I don't think there's a universe where if Hillary Clinton was green build the wall and nasty portations and Obama have been working to carry them out in a serious way and not creating the DACA amnesty. I don't think there's a way that Trump would have gotten elected. I think Democrats, now there's still big divisions. There'd be cultural divisions. There'd be abortion. There would be gun rights, all those things. But Democrats have dominated on issues like. healthcare, abortion, other things to the general electorate, Republicans are really carrying their support big time on crime and immigration and quality of life issues and the economy. And, um,

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I think specifically maybe in 2024 they would have won still because the economy was a big, big issue with inflation. But in 2016, I don't think that there's a world Trump would have won had Hillary been as a right wing on immigration as Trump does, because I think that would have taken. That would have kept millions of former Obama voters who voted for Trump back in the Democratic lot. And they would have cast a ballot for Hillary. And I don't think she would have won, she would have lost rather Michigan, Wisconsin or Pennsylvania. But yeah, immigration, they are so backwards on, but now that they're all DSA aligned, forget about it. I mean, it's not going to be immigration. It's going to be, you know, how do we deport whites back to Europe? That's going to be their, you know, their fundamental position. But great question. I love, I love that you thought of that. Thank you for listening to this podcast. If you like this show, please like and subscribe on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever get this podcast. Give me a five-star review if you can and check us out on YouTube. Talk to you guys on Monday. Have a great weekend. This is Tony A.O. from The Real Report with Tony A.O. and Uncle Murder. You haven't noticed how everything keeps going up, rent, streaming, even extra salsa at your favorite burrito spot. But with Boost Mobile, you don't have to play the Willis Go Up soon game. Boost Mobile offers an unlimited talk, text, and data planned at a price that will never go up. It's the same price you'll pay for life. Switch now for unlimited wireless at a price that will never go up only at Boost Mobile. After 30 gigabytes, customers may experience slower speeds. Customers will pay $25 a month as long as they remain active on the Boots Unlimited. plan. Picture this. You just got a romantic beachfront massage. The fun is flowing. The relaxation is real. And each drink tastes like a well-earned reward. This is when it hits you. That Myrtle moment. It's the second everything clicks. When you realize Myrtle Beach is more than a getaway, it's right where you belong. Don't just daydream about it. Find your own Myrtle moment at visitmerdlebeach.com. You know what quality feels like. You can see it in the way of fabric moves, recognize it in a flawless fit, and appreciate it in the details that make our styles unique. It's the standard Coldwater Creek has honored for over 40 years, derived from a rich Mountain West heritage, and designed for today in styles that are distinctively Coldwater Creek. For a wardrobe you can count on season after season, visit coldwater creek.com, shop new arrivals and save 15% on purchases $75 or more with code Iheart. How do you want to spend your day? At Brightview Senior Living communities, you decide and will take care of the rest. Pamper yourself at the salon and pursue your creative passions. Toast with your friends at Happy Hour and savor chef-prepared meals. Close out the day with a concert just down the hall from your apartment. Or simply relax. The choice is yours. Enjoy the comforts of home and the security of award-winning care. Discover the possibilities at brightview senior living.com.

It's a Numbers Game: The Fight for Wisconsin: Can Tom Tiffany Stop Francesca Hong? · Catchwind