Revenge of the Libs

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Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm John Favro. I'm Tommy Vitor. I'm Dan Pfeiffer. John Lovett could not be with us tonight. He is at the Andrew Cuomo party. No, he's just at his house. He's staying there. He's sleeping over. In that next apartment. Big night. Big night for Democrats. Big night for America. But it's definitely a big night for Democrats. So this feels better, doesn't it? Yeah. A little bit. Did you guys forget what it feels to have a good election night that feels good? Do you guys forget about that? Yes. And to have an election night where all the good news came right away. There was no waiting. There was no waiting for the college towns to come in or anything like that. It's just polls close. Call for the Democrats. That's how it should be. Love it. Yeah. One in Virginia. One in New Jersey. Prop 51 in California. One in New York City. Georgia Public Service Commission. Big win there. The main ballot measure that would have put voter suppression tactics in place and voter ID laws in place was losing really badly. And the one about a red flag law to take guns away from family members who I guess might use them. Don't forget the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. Pennsylvania Supreme Court stays 5-2, liberal majority there. I think. I'm probably forgetting a few, but it was big night. What is this feeling winning? This was like 2017. That's what it feels like in 2018. So let's start with just because we just watched the speech. Zohran Mamdani, 34 years old is the mayor of New York City. So far, it is, I believe, he crossed the 50% threshold right now with 90% reporting. It's Zohran Mamdani 50.4%. Andrew Cuomo, 41.6%. Gertesliwa, 7.1%. Zohran Mamdani won every borough except Staten Island. One by 20 points in Brooklyn, 11 in the Bronx, over and over and over again. Hit a million votes. First time a candidate has done that in New York since 1969. He becomes the first Muslim mayor of New York, the first Democratic Socialist, and the youngest mayor of New York since Tammany Hall days, I guess. Pretty goddamn impressive. Takes on Zohran Mamdani pulling it out. Dan? I mean, it's an incredible win. It's a campaign for the ages, right? You know, they put out this incredible video just the other day that was Zohran Mamdani standing on a street corner, I think, in Queens, right after the 2024 election, holding a sign saying, please come talk to me about the election. And he was trying to, people would pay no idea who he was, pay no attention to him. Flash forward one year later, the guy's mayor of New York. He is a celebrity. Everywhere he's go, he's mobbed about people excited by this. There is. like a sense of community in New York over this. People are just so fired up. It's like, it's truly, it really is one for the edges. Tommy? Yeah, just an extraordinary race. I mean, what a, look, I got to talk to him for the first time three or four days ago. And he's just like effortlessly charming. Um, he's relentlessly on message. He hammered cost. He hammered affordability. He was able to, uh, and we'll talk about it in the speech, take a two by four to Andrew Cuomo's head.

In a pretty delicate way, I thought, most of the time. Was it delicate? Maybe it was an eloquent way. He did it with a smile. He did it with humor. And he, like, Barack Obama was good at this, too. Like, landing a really hard punch in a way that doesn't feel mean or crass or cruel or what people hate about politics. He was focused on cost of living. He picked the right enemy, the kind of Bill Ackman billionaire class, and he ran with it. And my God, what a win. Let's hear a clip from the speech. Finish Andrew Cuomo only the best in private life. We can respond to oligarchy and authoritarianism with the strength it fears, not the appeasement it craves. After all, if anyone can show a nation betrayed by Donald Trump how to defeat him, it is the city that gave rise to him. any way to terrify a despot, it is by dismantling the very conditions that allowed him to accumulate power. This is not only how we stop Trump, it's how we stop the next one. So Donald Trump, since I know you're watching, I have four words for you. Turn the volume up.

I will say, clip cut off the most important part of the Andrew Cuomo line, which was, I wish Andrew Cuomo the best in private life. And let this be the last time I ever say his name. But let tonight be the final time I utter his name. You said Obama. You imagine Obama being like, I wish Hillary Clinton the best. And let tonight be the last time I ever utter her name. We all would have clapped. I should say, as we were walking in here, the CNN panel talking about the speech was pretty apoplectic. because they were expecting a more conciliatory, unifying sounding speech, which I frankly in this moment is a touch saccharine. I mean, he went super hard at Trump. I wondered if there might be some sort of... you know, ultimately failing strategy to kind of mollify Trump a bit and maybe see if he would not punish New York City. But no, I mean, Zohran Mamdani took the fight right to Trump. He basically called him a slumlord in another part of this speech. Zohran Mamdani was like unabashedly himself toward the speech. He talked about he opened by name checking Eugene Debs, who many listeners might not know is like a very, very famous socialist. He was proud of his identity. He's talking about New York being a nation of immigrants. He clearly hates. Andrew Cuomo. He was not willing to let it go to Knights. He also ended by saying a famous New Yorker once said you campaign in poetry and governing prose, which was Mario Andrew Cuomo. Yeah, going after his father's most famous speech. And then did The Shining City on the Hill, which is another Andrew Cuomo reference. My biggest anxiety for for Zohran Mamdani, for his team, for. all the young people who have poured themselves into this campaign and all their hopes and dreams is just the reality of how brutal and hard governing can be and how demoralizing it can feel when there are setbacks. And I wondered if Zohran Mamdani might do some kind of expectation setting tonight. He did not do that. He leaned into the high expectations. He said expectations will be high. We will meet them. So, I mean, look, like, good for him. He's owning the moment. He's calling a shot. He's calling a shot. Dan? Yeah, I think he clearly, the hatred that he and his campaign team have for Andrew Cuomo is palpable. And I understand that because I also hate Andrew Cuomo in the passion of a thousand sons. So I get it. We've been there on our campaigns for other parts. But yes, also with Andrew Cuomo. Yes. And also the Andrew Cuomo thing works in the sense that Andrew Cuomo represents everything that Zohran Mamdani was running against, like old broken corrupt politics. So, like it's, yes, there is like a personal hatred there, but it also works with this narrative. I'm not apoplectic like the CNN panel. I think the key for his success is going to not be in fights with Trump. It's going to be, I mean, not that Trump is not going to bring the fight to him, but it is to just like cost of living, cost of living, cost of living, affordability crisis. Like he's run this whole campaign. And I think he'll do the expectation setting in his inaugural speech on January 1st when he takes office. But like he is a powerful, powerful speaker. And the thing that I really took from it is.

Like, Trump has his vision, this 1970s vision of New York, right? Crime-ridden, the racial makeup at the time. And Zohran Mamdani is completely in tune with the New York of today, the way he was, like, naming Yemeni bodega owners. And it's just like it, like, he was name-checking everyone. But it is, that's the New York that he comes from, the New York he represents. It's this, like, amazing melting pot city of immigrants. I will say, though, the one part I did, like, I thought being tough on Trump was completely warranted because Donald Trump is at fucking war with American cities right now. And he's like, he spent the entire campaign threatening. He's still threatening to pull federal funding from New York. So he wants to hurt the people of New York because of who they voted for. He's got goons in Chicago and L.A. and everywhere. Like. He can be tough on Donald Trump. And I actually think showing a little strength is good. I mean, this is, again, Donald Trump is not a normal president from another party here. So I was actually okay with that. And, you know, you're pissed at Andrew Cuomo. You get a few digs in. It's fine. I wasn't, like, opposed to it or like. It didn't bother me. I was just a little surprised by it. Me too. You could imagine a meeting where you're like, look, let's not pick this fight right now. Let's wait. You're a young guy. He's going to come after you anyway. But he was like, no. He's going to punch me. He's going to punch him first. Well, and you know what Trump respects. Trump respects people who are fucking thorough punch. Yeah. I mean, that's the argument for it is he is sending a message to Trump that he'll fight him. Just I was struck by, there's a way to do it where it's mostly about protecting New York. And he really went out like, despot authoritarian, like the root causes of magaism. But also he's going to be a leader in this party. And maybe that's the, you know, the ground he's staking out. So we'll like sort of have to see where it goes. Yeah, I know what you're saying, Dan, because I thought he was going to go more in the direction where he did on when he talked about immigrants. And he said, you know, this is a city of immigrants. Now it's being led by one. And if you're going to come after us, you're going to have to go through all of us. Like I thought that that's sort of the, this is how we're going to take on Trump. It's like, it's like, it's not Zohran Mamdani versus Trump. It's like, you're coming after the city. You're not just coming after me, which I think is the right. Yeah, somewhere in ICE officials like, okay. Yeah, you can be a challenge. It's going to be. Dan, to your point about name checking the modern New York, do you see these is nice tweeted, if Zohran Mamdani is yet to mention your nationality, neighborhood or bus line in the speech, please stay in line. One just factoid on this race that I found the exopolis was fascinating, is that Zohran Mamdani won 9% of 2024 Trump voters. Amazing. Which is a huge number, yeah. Are we trusting any of the exit polls, Dan, for any of these? Because the top lines on both Virginia and Jersey, because people were doing the math where if you know the gender split, you can sort of figure out the top line are so wrong. Well, that's first wave, right? And the number is adjusted several times. Have they? I'm wondering if they have adjusted. They have adjusted. And I think, like, is it super precise? No. Like, they never are.

But it's like a piece of data. And maybe it's nine, maybe it's seven. But it's still like the idea that this, that there are a bunch of people. And this is an important thing for Democrats. There are a bunch of people in New York City who pulled the lever for Donald Trump one year ago, who then pulled it for the 34-year-old immigrant Democratic Socialist mayor. And I think it's, it says something about his appeal. And it says something about how sort of confusing voters can be. Before we leave New York, lessons from the Zohran Mamdani campaign and Zohran Mamdani's victory. Can they be applied to anywhere else in the country? Are we now a socialist country? And also, Republicans are trying very hard already to make Zohran Mamdani and Zohran Mamdani the face of the Democratic Party. They've already telegraphed that they're going to tie him to every Democratic candidate all across the country. Is this going to work? What do you think, Dan? I do not think it's going to work. You know, every election they pick a bogey man, right? It was Nancy Pelosi forever. And then in, you know, 2014, they put Nancy Pelosi in all the ads. Democrat Republicans did great. In 2018, they put Nancy Pelosi in all the ads and Republicans did poorly. Nancy Pelosi was less popular in 2018, this one, 2014. So just the idea that they're really going to. be able to use Zohran Mamdani to help, like, attack candidates in, you know, Georgia or this seems kind of far-fetched to me. Yeah. Yeah, me too. I agree. They always have a boogeyman. It's Nancy Pelosi. It's Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. It's Ilhan Omar. It's whomever. Hillary Clinton. If it's not one, they'll pick another. Yeah. How do you, any lessons? Any lessons from the, from the campaign? I think it's good to not run candidates in their 80s. That's one note I had. I wrote that one down. All three big races, young candidates. Yep. Cheryl, Abigail Spanberger, Zohran Mamdani. Yep. I just, like, jokes aside, like, you're already seeing the wars breaking out on Twitter. You've got Abundance Bros. Fighting anti-Oligarch cranks. You've got Neo-Lib Shills battling the DSA. Everyone just chill out. Everyone just chill out for a minute. Like I don't, I don't have a big, I don't know, I'd like to hear what you guys think. I've not had a big takeaway from this, this election night. Like some people say the party needs to go left. Some people say we need more moderates like Cheryl and Abigail Spanberger. I think all of them were boosted by the fact that Trump has totally failed to focus on the economy. In Virginia in particular, he fired a bunch of people who voted in the election. Running. When Trump is on the ballot is really, really hard. Democrats tend to get a decent boost running against Trump when he's not on the ballot, and that benefited everybody here. It really is good to pick young candidates who understand the digital age and who can communicate and connect or good messengers and good speakers, but also Zohran Mamdani picked the right message, which was affordability in battling the billionaire class as the problem, and he hammered it on corruption and the cost of living. And like that, that. Discipline, I do think, is a lesson that can be applied to, like, every election. Yeah, I mean, what is the lesson from an election where a Muslim socialist won in New York and an ex-CIA moderate mom trounced in Virginia and another, you know, woman with a military background, Navy pilot, trounce in New Jersey? The common denominator is...

Donald Trump hasn't done anything about affordability and has made it worse. Yep. So that is the one common denominator in all the races, no matter what part of the party you're from, remember what you believe, who you are, your identity. It has all been, it's been about Donald Trump and his failure to do anything about costs. Pod Save America is brought you by ZipRecruiter. What if you could consistently find whatever it is you're looking for right away? We're talking everything from parking spots to holiday gifts to jackets or jeans that fit perfectly. Imagine how much time you'd save. While you may never instantly find these things, if you're hiring, you can find qualified candidates right away time and time again with ZipRecruiter. Some people say that the hardest thing to find is yourself, John. Mmm, and happiness. Wherever you go, there you are. And today you can try it for free, not happiness, but ziprecruiter.com slash crooked. ZipRecruiter's powerful matching technology works fast to find top talent. With ZipRecruiter's advanced resume database, you can unlock top candidates contact info instantly. No wonder ZipRecruiter is the number one rated hiring site based on G2. We love ZipRecruiter. We've used it here at Crooked. We've got a lot of resumes, and you have to sort through them. It's a real pain in the ass. ZipRecruiter helps you do it. It's great technology. Makes your life easier. Want to know right away how many qualified candidates are in your area? Look no further than ZipRecruiter. Four out of five employers who post on ZipRecruiter, get a quality candidate within the first day. And right now you can try it for free at ZipRecruiter.com slash crooked. Again, that's ziprecruiter.com slash crooked. ZipRecruiter is the smartest way to hire. Pod Save America is brought to you by Hymns. Confidence shouldn't be complicated. Through Hymns, you can skip the guesswork and get access to care that actually fits your lifestyle, straightforward, stress-free, and designed around you. Through HIMS, you can access personalized prescription treatment options for ED, like hard mints and sex RX. Plus what? Climax Control, if prescribed. Hymns offers access to ED treatment options ranging from trusted generics that cost 95% less than brand names to hard mince, if prescribed. You shouldn't have to go out of your way to feel like yourself. Hymns brings expert care straight to you with 100% online access to personalized treatment plans that put your goals. First, feeling like yourself confidence, these are, I feel, euphemisms for having an erection bond. And there are plenty of people who probably don't feel like themselves and have no confidence but are able to get erections. But there are people that need help to do it. And I don't think we should be bashful about that. That's okay to talk them out. I think it's fine. The point is, this isn't one-size-fits-all care that forgets you in the waiting room. It's your health and goals put first with real medical providers making sure you get what you need to get results. And those results are erections. Think of hymns as your digital front door that gets you back to that back door with 100% online access to trusted treatments for ED and more all in one place. It's not a one-size-fits-all approach, John. There it is. Because it isn't. To get simple, online access to personalized affordable care for EDI, weight loss, and more visit Hymns.com slash crooked. That's Hymns.com slash crooked for your free online visit. Hems.com slash crooked. Actual price will depend on product and subscription plan. Featured-products, which the FDA does not approve or verify for safety effectiveness or quality. Prescriptions required. See website for details, restrictions, and important safety information. All right, Virginia, Abigail Spanberger, will be the first.

Female governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia. She won so far I got 57. She's at 57%. God, that's an ass kick. 57.42.7 over Winsome Earle-Sears. Jay Jones wins the attorney general race by a smaller margin, but the margin is 52%. And his opponent was 47.5. Democrat Gazala Hashmi is the new lieutenant governor. She won 55, 45. 45. Every single, just about every county, I think, but four. In Virginia, shifted blue, some by double digits since 2024. You have counties like Chesterfield County, Glenn Youngkin won by five. Abigail Spanberger is winning by 17. That is like an unheard of swing. Virginia Beach. Another sort of Bellwether County. Glenn Youngkin won by eight. Abigail Spanberger by 10. Just huge, huge shifts. So I was... I was not worried about Virginia. I thought she was going to win by at least Kamala Harris's margin, maybe a few points more. This was way bigger than that. What did you guys think of Virginia, Tommy? Yeah, I mean, this was a remarkable drubbing by Abigail Spanberger. And also, Democrats are on track to win 64 Virginia House of Delegate seats out of 100 total. That's a pickup of, I think, 13. 13? Which is just massive. That is massive. And it suggests that it wasn't just top of the ticket. There was anger at the Republican Party all the way down. Like you, I think Abigail Spanberger is a pretty good candidate. She was running against a terrible opponent. Republicans all but gave up on this race. Although I do think the RGA burned like $4 million for no reason at the very end on ads, which is thank you, I guess, for lighting that money on fire. But, you know, with all these races, there was chatter in the summer sort of doldrum months. that maybe things weren't going well, that maybe something secret was showing up in the polls and Republicans were closing. And so, you know, that creeps into your, to your brain. But no, it was a drubbing. Dan? Yeah, like she obviously, I was pretty sure she was going to win the whole time. I mean, the. The party opposite the president has won every Virginia governor's race since 1975 other than 2013 when the Republicans nominated Ken Cucinelli, the worst candidate humanly possible. But this was a massive win. And I think this is largely about Donald Trump and specifically about Donald Trump's attack on the federal government, like using the exit polls again. 60% of Virginians said that they were adversely affected by the federal, by the cuts to federal spending or federal jobs. Wow. And Abigail Spanberger won those voters by 37%. Thank you, Donald Trump. A fifth of the, a fifth of Virginia voters say. that someone in their household either work for the federal, was a federal government employee or a federal government contractor. Abigail Spanberger won those voters by more than 20 points. It was just an absolute, like if the shutdown was going to be a problem for Democrats, it was going to be in Virginia. This would be places. This is ground zero for the shutdown. And the fact that the Republicans did so well, so far outran margins, crushed with moderates.

Right. And then just a massive shift in the suburbs from Glenn Youngkin's victory in 21 to Abigail Spanberger's victory now. Like in the exit point, they do it by regions. Right. So in suburb people who live in the suburbs, Glenn Youngkin won by seven points. Abigail Spanberger is going to win by about 15 points. Like huge, huge wins. And this is once a place where Donald Trump is 15 points underwater. in this state. And he's more unpopular in Virginia than he is in New Jersey. And that clearly played a role here. And the fact that Abigail Spanberger did so well that she pulled Jay Jones across the finish line, who everyone thought was going to lose was basically left for dead by the Democratic Party because of the texting scandal. And he ends up winning pretty handily. I know. What texting scandal? I don't know what you're talking about. I'm just kidding. He doesn't do that in our party. We don't do that in our party. Yeah, right. I feel like this is a bigger win than 17. Like, this is the biggest Democratic win in Virginia of our lifetimes, I think. Yeah, it is. It's the biggest margin by far. I think 17 was 10 points maybe. Yeah. This was this was this was wild and to have the whole to bring in the assembly to the biggest it's actually it's not it's the biggest democratic win. And we lost really really bad in 2009 by like 20 points I think or 17 points. Oh yeah. Great deeds. And so again now the lesson to take from here across the country is run. moderate former CIA. It's the only option. That's the same. That's it. That is another lesson. It has to be binary. It's got to be one or the other. It's not about running the right candidate for the district you're in. That's ridiculous. Mikie Sherrill in New Jersey over Jack Ciattarelli, 56 to 43. Now this is maybe the margin here, I think, at least for me, of the big races. was the biggest surprise of the night. 100%. Because, you know, a lot of the polls had this down to one point lead, two point lead, three point lead. There were some other, there was some variation. There were some that were like seven or eight, but no one had at this point. No, I look today, the RCP average, the Real Clear Politics average was 3.3 at the end. And to your point, like there were a couple polls late. They were like Cheryl plus one, Cheryl plus two plus three plus one. Like it would, it. It seemed like it was tightening up. And this is the one. Your day has passed Atlas Intel. Yeah, they officially lost three plus rating today. Fuck you. Oh, that's a polling firm for all you non-sickos out there. I'm really excited to never have to learn how to say chitterrelli properly. You just did. You did it correctly. Well, I know, but I heard John say it. Oh, you did? Well, this is because I said it wrong a couple times. Oh, you did? Not tonight, but in the past. So this is an interesting one, right? Like, Phil Murphy, you've got an incumbent who's already served two terms. So it's sort of hard for another Democrat to win after Democrats already served two terms. Jack Ciattarelli is someone who's run before. So he has like near universal name recognition in the state. He was seen as a like winsome, Winsome Earle-Sears.

Not seen as a great candidate, but Jack Ciattarelli, not a bad candidate for Republicans. Was not like a super Trumpy Republican in the primary pretended he was a super Trumpy Republican and then basically forgot that Trump existed in the general. I think you had to like, so you look on his website and he had all the list of people who endorse them at the very bottom in like small letters that says Donald Trump, but that's like the only time he ever mentioned. Unfortunately for Jack Ciattarelli, he. He said Trump supported him on video, and then it was put in ads for months. Oh, yeah. Well, that's, there you go. And he also, he also, he also proposed a 10% sales tax at one point, which is a bad move when cost of living. Oh, that's a tough one. What do you, what do you think, Dan? What happened? Why was the polling so often this one? I don't know why the polling was so off. I don't know that, uh, Yeah, the polling was off in 21, too, in New Jersey because that would end up being much closer than we thought. So maybe we don't have to pull New Jersey. I don't even think they did exit polls in 21 because we were so sure the race was going to be. So it was such an easy win for Murphy. So it was hard to even do to like, it's to do an apples to apples comparison of how things might have changed. It's a, it's a truly like this is even more of a stunning win than. then Abigail Spanberger's win because of the point you made, which is every election is a change election. And it's so hard for a third Democratic term to replace a two-term Democratic governor and then to win by almost as much as that governor won the first time. I think Murphy won by 17 points in 17. But to win by such a huge margin, usually it's a begrudging thing even in a Democratic state. I think the other takeaway is. If New Jersey shifted very far to the right from 2020, 20, from 2020, 24, a 10 points swing in Trump's direction. He, Trump made huge gains in the counties outside of New York City, like Bergen and Passaic and Hudson. And as of the vote count I just looked at, like Cheryl is crushing in those counties. Now, and I think that, like, this doesn't tell us that Trump, that New Jersey hasn't moved some to the right, but if this is a warning sign that it may be a fleeting moment for Trump to have to have the strength there. It may look more like Obama in Indiana in 2008 than Obama and Virginia in 2008 in the sense that it's like a fleeting moment as opposed to a state on its path to purple status. Ron Branson was tweeting. He was looking through the exits and some of the... And literally have that highlighted on this. That's so funny that you're going to do that. He said, no group received more attention as evidence of realignment in 24 than working class minorities, but Abigail Spanberger won 84% of non-whites without a college degree, and Cheryl won 71% of them. And that number is probably going to be adjusted up. In each case, that's better than Kamala Harris in 2024. It's a different election. I was going to say, Ron had a few of them, so who knows. also pointed out that in New Jersey, the Republican, Cheryl didn't get back to the Democratic share with Hispanic voters that we reached in 17 or the 2020 presidential race. But Jack Ciattarelli did not come close to Trump's 2024 Hispanic number of 43%. He only got 34%, which suggests that Trump, like having permanently changed the baseline for Hispanic voters.

that assumption is probably not proven out yet. Yeah, and I think don't want to step on any of Dan Sullivan meta takes at the end. But in all of these races, it does seem like the voters that the voting groups that shifted the most towards Trump in 24, young voters. some black men, Latino voters. And then in some of the polling we've seen in the last couple months, those have been the voters who are now disapproving of Trump. And I think this election has shown that, like, they actually did flip back to Democrats in a lot of these, in a lot of these races. Or they flip to the couch, which is the more likely thing here. Or they flip to the couch. Which is just a like, this is we actually. Yes, exactly. Too late for that? Never, never too late. It's just this is such a smaller electorate with more highly engaged voters. So it's not necessarily that a bunch of these people, there will be some who voted Trump in 24 who voted for Cheryl or Abigail Spanberger in 25. But the most more likely scenario is people who came out for Trump in 24 state home. Now, that is a sign of political weakness for Trump because he has not able to turn these people into regular Republican voters. And he's not going to be on the ballot. He'll never be on the ballot again. Will they stay on the, will they come off the couch for JD Vance, Tommy. Phrasing. Yes. Come off the couch? I don't know. Or late. It's 9.15. My kids had me up before four. That's okay. We have a 7 a.m. flight tomorrow. Great. Anything else in New Jersey? No? Great state. Close to New York. Easy to commute to the city. Good, good. That's the kind of analysis people come for.

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Pennsylvania, we retained three state Supreme Court justices. So we got the 5-2 majority. We mentioned that. It's a big deal. Should we talk about the biggest? Honestly, probably the most impressive electoral performance of the whole night are these two candidates that won that flipped Republican seats in the Georgia Public Service Commission because they were state. This is a statewide election. Statewide race. And not only did they just win knocked off these Republicans, the margin here is. 61 to 38 in one of them and 62 to 38 in the other. I mean, wow. And don't take our word for it. We're going to drop in right here, Steve Bannon talking about this race on the War Room podcast tonight. The midterms start tonight. One of the biggest warning signs that we've got. that we need to get focused is these two commissioners in Georgia, the Marjorie Taylor Greene mentioned. First time in 30 years that Democrats have won a statewide election. I don't think they've ever had commissioners have been Democrats in a couple of decades. That is a warning that this thing is going to cut deeper. So, like, Steve Bannon, like, legitimately, I think, was shaken up by this Georgia result. And, like, for those wondering, like, what are you guys talking about? This is a state agency that regulates utilities and make sure that, like, electricity, natural gas and telecommunications are provided safely and at reasonable rates. But it became a proxy for this broader political battle we're all waging this evening. And you know why people who are listening to us may be more aware of this race than some other folks because one organization that was. laser focused on this race, Vote Save America. Damn right. Great work to that team. And they would tell us, hey, could you in the pod talk about the Georgia Public Service Commission and we'd be like, what? And they were right. Glad we focused on that. You've got to be feeling good if you're Jon Ossoff trying to defend a seat in Georgia. Again, obviously, very different electorate midterm to off here. But I don't know. What do you think, Dan? I think it's very positive, right? Like, this is, it's just, if there was lingering positive effects for Donald Trump after 2024, then you would, they would have shown up in somebody should perform. And the exact opposite happened, right? This is a, it's a full rebuke. And the fact that it's even showing up in Georgia, like Virginia, that's a Democratic state, New Jersey has a Democratic state, California against you Democratic state, Maine Democratic state, Georgia. Purple as can be. Trump won it last time. And the fact that Democrats were able to win there, that Steve Bannon's right to be worried. When Asaf was in here, he said that he thinks his race is going to be like a half a billion dollar election, the Georgia Senate race. Also, way taller than I thought. Very tall. Very tall. God damn good looking. Handsome. Really handsome. Handsome and tall? That seems unfair. Handsome and tall. If he were blonde, he would look like DHS or ICE recruiting poster. He's got that kind of like 50s throwback handsomeness. You know what I mean? These guys get it. You're glad he's not blonde, right? You're like, don't step into my territory. That's right. Yeah. Away from my culture. My culture is not your costume. My culture is ISIS costume. Says Thomas Frederick Vitor. Should we come back here to California? Prop 50. Gavin. Wins. Crushes.

Great work. We got 65% of the votes in. It is 64 to 35 right now. That's awesome. That's a lot of votes to count already. I'm surprised. Usually we don't count votes that fast. No, we count them really. They come in early, we count them early. That's right. And then we have to wait. It's the harvesting. Then you harvesting starts tomorrow morning. When you rig, then it makes it easy to count. Anyway, big win for the Democratic Party in being able to neutralize the gerrymandering that Texas did. So they took five. Now we'll take, we'll take five. They're still trying to take more. So won't. completely neutralize the gerrymandering that they're trying to do. But it is very good news for Democrats taking the House in the midterms of 2026, at least gives us more of a fighting chance. And also, big win for Gavin Newsom. Yeah. Who, who, this was a risk. He took a bet. I think this is a really big deal. I mean, obviously, once he put forward the idea and said it was going to be on the... there was going to be a ballot initiative. It seemed very likely, given that this is the state of California, given the makeup of off-year voters in a special election like that are primarily like... The Libbya Slibs. Yeah, the positive America election. Like, odds are we were going to win it. But he had the guts in the foresight to conceive of this idea, push it forward, and get this thing done. And like, imagine if we were sitting here tonight, like... knowing we were going at the 2026 midterms at a deficit of five seats because of Texas. Like this is a huge deal. I believe he spoke about the idea for the first time right here. Right here at this table. Yeah. And then we, I think we scooped his own podcast by accident because we put out the clip early. Told us he's like, well, we can either try to do something with the legislature. He's like, but also I think we might just be able to put it on the ballot. Wow, what an idea. Cool. Do it. Here it is. Here we are. Things happen. Do you vote for Prop 50 din? Were you four against? Did I? Yeah, me too. Me too. Me too. Okay, let's do meta-takes. Any other races that we should talk about? We talked about those two main, the main ballot measures. So there's a red flag gun control, we call it? Sure. It's a red flag gun measure, gun safety measure has passed, and then Tommy you noted that a voter ID measure failed. John, wasn't there a big race in your wife's hometown? Oh, yeah, Aftab. Mayor Aftab Perval had a challenge from JD Vance's half brother. Kicked his ass. The love seat. 50 points. Crushed him. Crushed him. Absolutely crushed him. Good job. Good job, Aftab. Great mayor, great person. Glad Cincinnati has him for another term. I think that's it. Any meta takes? Should we do meditakes? Dan? What do you got, Dan? Unschool your meta take. I'll give you my minutes. Give it to us first before you put it in the message box. It's, well, what time are you posting this? Now. Oh, yeah. It's live. Hold on. I need a second. Got to hit send. I think the biggest one is that this is a massive rebuke of Trump.

Right. He, like, he is massive. He was underwater in all these states. The, in both Virginia and New Jersey, two thirds of voters said were dissatisfied with the direction of the country. The economy was the number one issue for most voters. In both states, the Democrats won those voters by 20 points. The Democrats went with moderates. They went with independents. They held their margins with young people in the corporate parts of Democratic coalition. Donald Trump is unpopular. His political operation made things. Couldn't get out of their own way made things harder for Republicans, Virginia, New Jersey. It's just like it's very clear in the results. Like I think Abigail Spanberger would have won shutdown, no shutdown, no doge, no doge. But what he did the federal workforce and federal government sunk that race made the political situation so much worse. And then he's got his fucking grim reaper, Russ Vought, like just canceling infrastructure projects for New Jersey in the months and weeks leading up to the election. And so it's a huge rebuke for him. Like it is, there a whole slew of polls came out. Over the weekend, all of them had Trump at his lowest approval rating in a very long time. People are pissed about the economy. They're pissed at him. Democrats are still fired up, even if they don't like the brand or our leaders, they're still showing up to vote for Democrats. Most of the polling shows that people who voted for Abigail Spanberger and Cheryl did it to vote for them, not to oppose Trump or someone else. And so even when our, so meta take number one, very bad for Trump, meditate number two, that at least in this off-year election environment, the base of our party, our true most loyal voters, remain incredibly fired up and ready to go vote for Democrats, even if they are dissatisfied with large parts of the party leadership. Fired up and ready to go. Ready to go vote. I like that. That's pretty good. Dan Counterpoint, a political analyst I follow on Truth Social posted, Trump wasn't on the ballot and shutdown were the two reasons that Republicans lost elections tonight, comma, according to pollsters. That was from Donald Trump. Was that Alan Lickman? Yeah, that's one of the keys. I have another new pundit. He just, he was tied up for a bit and now he's out and about again. Mr. George Santos. Yes, that's he saying. Fuck you, Curtis Sliwa. I hate you, your dumb wife, that stupid beret of yours, and all your fucking cats. That's a tweet we just got from George Santos. That's good. One more question. Federal government has now been shut down for 36 days. That is the longest shutdown in American history. Donald Trump seemed to, well, it didn't seem to. He did. In his truth social post was basically like, it was the shutdown that hurt us.

Do we think now's a good time for Democrats to cave? I mean, Dan, could you imagine? What's going on there? I have not paid... I see people are looking for an off-ramp, and then I saw a lot of other Senate Democrats go on the record to CNN and be like, this would be fucking crazy to do this now. So I don't know what's real, what sources, and what's not? Well, I read punch bowl, so you don't have to. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And so what... The folks of Punchball are telling me is there's upwards of a dozen Senate Democrats who are talking to Republicans or interested in some sort of off-ramp, which would include kind of what John Thune's been proposing, which is open the government in exchange for a vote on the Obamacare subsidies. Republicans had a caucus meeting today. The Republican senators also want to vote on the Obamacare subsidies. I think not saying they're going to vote for it, but they at least want to be able to put up a Republican bill, so they're not just voting against a Democratic bill. So there's some interest there. People seem to be very quickly moving to the exits on this. I keep asking this question, but like, what's going on with the House? You can't have a fucking vote in the Senate on this and then just not have any kind of deal happen in the House. Otherwise, it's a big leap. It's nothing. It's a flaw in the plan. There's also a lot in there, which is really the motivating factor here is the appropriators really want to appropriate. And their part of this deal would be to get the appropriations process working again. And they'd have three, they'd pass three minibuses. I don't even want to get into what that is. But appropriators are excited about it. But like, I get the substantive reasons that everyone wants to end the shutdown. We want people to get SNAP benefits. We want TSA to work. We don't want any more planes to crash. That's how the- Sean Duffy said he was going to shut down a lot of our airspace next week if the government doesn't reopen. Don't love that. So that's all not ideal. But if you wake up tomorrow and your your Hakeem Jeffries or your Chuck Schumer and your meeting with your leadership or you're having a caucus meeting, like what in the data? suggest that what you've been doing for the last month has been the wrong approach. There's a lot of ways to choreograph this so that Republicans can still say, you know, we didn't let them hold it. hold us hostage on something while the government was shut down, right? Like, there's a way to do it. So if you don't get the vote you want, then the government shuts down again because you only pass a funding bill that goes that far. So, like, that's fine if they want to choreograph it. But, like, the House has to be involved here. And we have to, like, know that Trump's going to sign a bill that includes ACA subsidies as well. So, like... If we're not having meetings where it's a deal between Trump and Chuck Schumer and John Thune and Johnson and Hakeem Jeffries, then like, what the fuck are we doing?

Well, John, Trump is having breakfast with the Senate Republicans tomorrow, and he's going to tell them to invoke the nuclear option, eliminate the filibuster, and then not just open the government, but then pass a whole series of voter suppression methods. He also truth about that tonight is what he wants them to do. That's another. It's like bad mail-in voting, do all these other things. This is why they don't want to, this is one of the reasons they don't want to. follow his advice and eliminate the filibusters, they don't have the votes to do all that crazy shit. Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski are not going to do that. They're not going to probably get, I guess they can get, I don't know. They can get the votes for those people to even get rid of the, they probably don't have the votes to get rid of the filibuster. That they don't. And they don't want to get rid of the filibuster because then they have to do all Trump's crazy shit. Right now he calls him and says, do this insane thing. And they're like, well, we can't. The Democrats won't let us. But once they hit after 50. But now he's learned. He's like, wait a minute. Wait, this is what's stopping me from doing all the crazy shit? Only five years in. Yeah, he's figured it out. He did have some new spin on his election night. defeat, he tweeted out or chart truth doubt, just out. The 60 Minutes interview of Donald Trump on CBS Sunday night was the highest rated 60 minutes in years. That is some cope. That is some cope that is right alongside when every election the Republicans lose, someone tweets a photo of a map of a state or the country. And it's like, if not for all these cities, Democrats would never win. It's like, yes, if not for all the human beings, the citizens who live in those cities who vote for Democrats, we would never win. You are correct. Counties don't vote. Here's a Democratic senator who's not backing down. Chris Murphy just put out a statement about the shutdown. Democrats win when we show the American people what we stand for and how we're willing to fight for it, as we have been for the last month. Tonight's election results are an unmistakable rejection of Donald Trump's corruption and Republican's billionaire agenda, but the result should also give Democrats confidence that the American people have our back as we engage in the fight to protect people's health care and save our democracy. Good for Chris Murphy. Get a Murph dog. Meanwhile, fucking Chuck Schumer can't even tell us who he voted for in New York. Let's talk about that for a second. It's just so, it's bad politics. Yeah. It's, it's, if you didn't vote for him and, like, you know that everyone's going to be pissed to you, just fucking grow up here and say you didn't vote for him. This is Chuck Schumer. Say it one way or the other. This has been Chuck. Cowardly. This is why I think Chuck Schumer's greatest flaw as a leader. He's is afraid to tell people what they don't want to hear. And like, what is his thinking here that if he, that the Republicans would be like, man, we were going to run all these ads comparing? Jon Ossoff to Zohran Mamdani, but Chuck Schumer never voted for him, so I guess that's off the table. Yes, we can't do it. Yeah, would be unfair. Rats, he foiled our plans. Well, in his, the Chuck Schumer approach is only just a little bit worse than Hakeem Jeffries, who just took on water from the left for like a month or two months. Yeah, he took the Band-Aid off painfully slowly, but he did take it off.

You took it off, and I give him credit for that, but it's like just raw politics. Like what, what did you, how did that benefit you? But you got the left mad at you and all the attacks you were worried about can still come. Yeah, I'm like, I'm almost more offended as like a like a practitioner of politics. Yeah, it's like, endorse him or don't? I would have been annoyed if you said, I'm, I'm not voting for him. Right. For sure. But like, this is, this was the worst of all options. Also, does Chuck Schumer think he's going to take the secret to his grave? Like, he's going to face reporters and they're just going to, like, people are going to keep asking who you voted for. It was so annoying. Secret ballot, secret ballot. Yes. Oh. He's never going to come on Potsave America. It's the only thing we're going to ask him. He's not invited. Who would you vote for, Chuck? Tell us, come on. Was it Curtis Sliwa? He shows up at the studio and there's just in his chair as a new piece of crookin merch called, that says closeted comosexual waiting for him. Remember when people were rocking quomosexual shirts? Like, oh, yeah. A lot of people's 20-20 tweets did not age well, I would say that. Well, let us never say his name again. That's actually, fuck yes, that's it. In the words of the next mayor of New York City. Let us defile the words of his father.

Great night. Great night, everyone. We're still alive. We're still kicking. Democracy is not dead yet. So everyone should feel good about that. Thank you to everyone who volunteered in this election, who got out there and voted, who talked to your friends about it. It really mattered. And we'll see you guys in D.C. See you, a cricket con. What a time to all get together in person. I'm so excited. Better than the alternative. Having got crushed. See you guys soon. Bye, everyone. If you want to listen to Pod Save America ad-free and get access to exclusive podcasts, go to cricket.com slash friends to subscribe on Supercast, Substack, YouTube, or Apple Podcasts. Also, please consider leaving us a review that helps boost this episode and everything we do here at Cricket. Pod Save America is a Cricket Media production. Our producers are David Toledo, Emma Illick-Frank, and Saul Rubin. Our associate producer is Farah Safari. Austin Fisher is our senior producer. Reid Churlin is our executive editor. Adrian Hill is our head of news and politics. The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jim Jordan Cantor is our sound engineer with audio support from Kyle Seiglin and Charlotte Landis. Matt DeGroate is our head of production. Naomi Sengel is our executive assistant. Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Haley Jay Jones, Ben Heffcote, Mia Kelman, Carol Pelaviv, David Tolls, and Ryan Young. Our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.