Bidin' His Time
2024-07-20 01:23:38
Pod Save America is a no-bullshit conversation about politics hosted by former Obama aides Jon Favreau, Jon Lovett, Dan Pfeiffer, and Tommy Vietor. It cuts through the noise to break down the week’s news and helps people figure out what matters and how they can help. They’re regularly joined by journalists, activists, politicians, entertainers, and world leaders. You can watch on YouTube or listen to new episodes every Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. Ad-Free Pod Save America episodes available NOW through Friends of the Pod subscription. Head to crooked.com/friends to join today! For a transcript of an episode of Pod Save America, please email transcripts@crooked.com (edited)
What's up, Madison?
Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
I'm Erin Haines, and I can use my microphone.
I'm Jon Lovett.
I'm Ben Wickler.
The best party share in the country. Clap for that.
I'm Tommy Vitor.
I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
We have a great show for you tonight. Your fantastic senator who is going to win in November, Tammy Baldwin, is here.
And we're going to talk a little bit more about the Republican convention that just wrapped up with two people who braved magamania in Milwaukee. Erin is the editor-at-large of the 19th, and, of course, your Democratic party chair, as Tommy said, the best in the country, Ben Wickler.
All right.
Let's start with the RNC, which had everything. Election deniers, convicted felons, domestic abusers, cute dogs and dog killers, a running mate who once called his boss America's Hitler. But somehow, the Republican party is in the strongest position they've been in in a decade, despite being massively outspent. Three points ahead nationally, four points ahead in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and here in Wisconsin, ahead by even more in other swing states, and it's all because of this once-in-a-generation talent.
Thank you, Kid Rock, sometimes referred to as Bob. Was Danny good? I mean, you know, was he good? You know, he was on probably the only vacation he's had in about, maybe ever. So he got on a plane, he got here a little while ago, now he's going to get on the plane in a little while and he's going to go back home to his wife.
But they're great. They may call that entertainment. I know about entertainment, but when he used to lift a 350 pound man over his shoulders and then bench press him two rows into the audience, I say maybe entertainment, but he is one strong son of a gun. Followed by Eric. What was that all about?
And Green Bay's going to have a good team this year, right? They're going to have a good team. I watched the other day on a show called Deface the Nation. Has anyone seen it? If they would ever win this election, I hate to even say that, we will have our next Republican convention in Venezuela, because it will be safe.
The longest runways, most powerful, hardened, thickened runways. So we have to take the bow and we have to make it a little nicer and a little point at the top instead of a flat nose.
That was his convention speech in front of tens of millions of people. The easiest speech in politics. You just get a free audience teleprompter. That's what he did. All right.
The four of us gave our quick reactions last night. Erin and Ben, since both of you were there, I'd love to hear what you thought of both Trump's speech and the convention as a whole. Erin, let's start with you.
Yeah. I mean, I think, to echo the former president, what was that all about? By the time I got to the end of that speech, and shout out to everybody that stayed awake for that speech and is here with us tonight. Really appreciate you. I know that was not easy.
Yeah. I mean, that was probably the most subdued part of the whole week, though, to be honest. Because I was there for most of the convention, and it was a big party. Like the Grand Ole Party threw a big party this week. They are feeling good.
I mean, kicking it off on Monday, when you had literally Aileen Cannon saying, you know what? Dropping this case. They're going in with a lot of energy and the momentum just built every single day, as they're watching Joe Biden still on the ropes and their guy, you know, who apparently was divinely intervened into to, you know, to join them and accept the nomination for the Republican Party's presidential bid. So they're riding high. They were in high spirits, you could tell, all week.
And it just kind of culminated in, yeah, whatever we all watched last night.
Some weird shit. They felt pretty good. They seem pretty cocky.
Oh, yeah. I mean, cocky is probably the accurate word. I mean, they basically, last night might as well have been election night for them. I mean, that's where they are. They feel like God himself wants Trump to be president.
And as endorsed by Franklin Graham and Hulk Hogan. So, you know, I don't know.
That's all you need.
The Alpha and the Omega.
Ben, you were there, too. What did you think?
It was a fascinating convention, most of all, to me, because of what they did not talk about. There have been, I think, three really huge things that have happened since 2020.. The first is that President Biden and Vice President Harris have done a killer job. They've passed a ton of legislation. They've had the best economy in the world.
Yeah.
Weirdly, no one pointed that out at the Republican convention. I don't understand why. I mean, it's right there. The second thing was that after Trump lost in Wisconsin and the other states, he tried to overthrow the government of the United States. And a violent insurrection that killed multiple people and had his supporters trying to club police officers with American flagpoles and then parading the Confederate flag through the Capitol.
Trump has been campaigning on immediately pardoning the January 6th hostages, as he calls them. That was gone from the stage, as though it had never happened. And then the third is that the Supreme Court justices that Donald Trump appointed for that purpose ripped away a fundamental freedom from half of America. And they didn't mention that at the Republican convention. So it was kind of like the convention.
that seems fine, because no one mentions the giant gaping problem that everyone is actually thinking about. And the tell for me was that Trump, I mean, the biggest news that actually came out of the convention was Trump's choice of a vice presidential nominee, whose two qualifications were his support for 100% abortion ban and his stated willingness to shred our constitution in order to give Trump a dictatorship. And that long after the lights have faded and the gold balloons have been popped in the FISA forum, that is going to be an anchor that Trump has dropped through the bottom of his boat. He has chosen the person who confirms our most important and most effective argument in this election. They're the party of trying to rip away freedom and destroy our democracy, and they have to own that.
I think someone went through the transcript of all the speeches. I think abortion was not mentioned once in the entire convention. They tried to avoid the election denial, but Trump couldn't help himself in his speech because he was riffing, as we know. Here's how the New York Times sums up Trump's challenge going forward. His success will depend on whether, for the final 15 weeks of the campaign, he can contain his self-destructive tendencies and temper his preference for vengeance and unpopular hard-right policies.
Dan, will Trump's success depend on maintaining the sense of discipline that he's famous for?
I feel like the witness is being led here.
We have read all of these stories over the last few months, as Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita, Trump's campaign co-managers, have gone around extolling their virtues about how disciplined the Trump campaign is, how this is more professional than the previous Trump campaigns, which were run by basically the dregs of the Fox News green room. I think that is actually an accurate representation of how they've run this race. They've run a disciplined race. They've run a strategic race. They've been very smart about how they've thought about the messaging and the allocation of resources.
But there's one big problem with the Trump campaign. And that problem is Donald Trump. I mean, we saw that. They ran-.
They solved almost everything.
That may be the unsolvable problem, but their convention was the convention of a party that desperately wants to win. And, as Ben pointed out, they didn't talk about abortion, and they didn't talk about the big lie, which are the two things that make you a Republican in this day and age. If you do not believe, or at least propagate the idea, the false idea, that Donald Trump was illegitimately denied the election, then you are exiled from the party. Yet not a single person said that until the one guy who would suffer the most politically were that idea to be brought up, stood up on stage, and brought it up himself. Even think about this.
They pitched this idea. They were so proud of it. He would never mention Joe Biden's name. It's a new post-shooting Trump. And then he did it.
He could not not do- They asked him to do one thing, and he could not do it. And so the takeaway from that speech is, this guy is so goddamn beatable. We can absolutely do it.
So Levitt, we were talking last night about how Trump's speech might play with undecided voters. to the extent that undecided voters were watching that speech. It turns out. the Times and CNN talked to some, and the reviews were not great. A 21-year-old from Milwaukee said, and this person had been considering Trump, It was just insane to me.
And it made me feel really uncomfortable.
A retiree from Pennsylvania said, quote, He tried to be unifying at first, but then got on his high horse at the end. And a Michigan voter said, It felt like listening to a fourth-grader's essay who had to meet a word count and was just kind of using fillers.
That was my Uber driver.
That sounds familiar.
Voters are great.
What do you make of those reactions? And why do you think those folks are still undecided?
Yeah, first of all, I've been that fourth grader.
In some sense, I'll always be that fourth grader.
Larger font, bigger margin.
But the thing is, you could get margin blindness, and then you turn in the paper, and the teacher turns it back and be like, I see what you tried to do here, and you realize you squeezed it too much because you got accustomed to it.
Also, it's going to be a loose show. We've been doing recording every single night. Do you think Ben Wickler would have more credibility if he wasn't wearing flip-flops?
Best party chair in the country. How good would you be in a fucking closed-toed shoe? Think about all the door knocking we could do if you're dragging your feet along the ground with your toes in the world. I think we can always get better. That's what's great about this country.
It's an opportunity.
He's so on message, folks.
No, but look, I think, when we heard that this is going to be a change Trump, this is going to be a different Trump, I think it was a recognition that this campaign, which is smart, understands that barring some big transformation in who Donald Trump is and the public perception of him, people know who Donald Trump is. They don't like him. They don't want him to be president. They also are really unhappy with their choice between both Biden and Trump. And so the reason you have undecided people turning on this godforsaken speech, this 90 minutes of bloviating, unstructured rambling, talking about Dana White's flight logistics.
By the way, Dana White flew in. Now he's going to be here. And then he's going to fly home. That's just called going somewhere.
It is just a reminder that the question is not whether Donald Trump can lose. The question is, can we win, right? It's, can we do what we have to do to bring the people back to us?
Tommy, President Biden released a statement today on Trump's speech that said he, quote, avoided mentioning his Project 2025 agenda, but still flaunted the worst of MAGA extremism. During the convention, Trump's senior advisor, Chris LaCivita, told Jonathan Martin of Politico that Project 2025 is, quote, a pain in the ass to them. Points for honesty. I know. Is this the big vulnerability for Republicans over the next 15 weeks?
I think so. I mean, I think we should talk about what it is for a second, which is, it's the playbook for authoritarianism. It's a turnkey operation for an authoritarian state. This thing is 900 pages. It's backed by a $22 million budget.
So this is not a bunch of liberals puffing something up, manufacturing a controversy for a campaign. This is a real threat. And it covers policy, personnel. So they're vetting. They have a database of people vetted, not for qualifications, but for loyalty to Donald Trump.
They have training for the next generation of MAGA extremists. And there is a first 180-day script for Donald Trump to follow. And, by the way, I think he implemented like 60% of the Heritage Foundation's policies in his first term. So they want to do things like take full control of federal agencies. They want to push out qualified civil servants and replace them with the vetted MAGA extremists.
They want the FBI to directly report to the President of the United States. You don't have to be a constitutional scholar to see how that could go south. And, by the way, the FBI has never been run by a Democrat in its history. This is the most conservative organization in the government, yet it's still not conservative enough for Donald Trump. Should make you think for a second.
They're planning mass deportations. They want to ban medical abortion. They want to ban MIFA-Pristone. They want to roll back LGBT rights. They want to basically just take control of the entire government and MAGA-fy it.
So this is a massive, sweeping change to the federal government. It's a massive invasion in our privacy. It is not libertarian in any way. It's a huge overreach. So I do think this is something.
Project 2025, it wasn't an issue that I think the Biden campaign identified. They noticed that it was going super viral on TikTok when people were talking about it. So this is an issue that was identified by voters. This is something voters were organically concerned about. Because it touches every part of our life, from abortion to criminalizing porn.
Maybe those are related. I have no idea. But so I do think this is something we should be hammering every single day, from now until election day. And the value here is, it doesn't matter who's at the top of the ticket. Project 2025 is going to affect all of us as citizens equally, whether it's Kamala Harris, Joe Biden, or somebody else.
And we were canvassing today. And some of the folks we were talking to just brought up Project 2025 organically. First door we were at.
Yeah, first door we were at. We knocked on the door. We said, what issues do you think about this election? She said, saving democracy and stopping Project 2025.. It's like, we'll mark you down as a one.
It's happening.
It's happening. Want to hug you.
OK, when we come back, a game.
And we're back.
Have you heard the good news? He has risen. And he has some pretty crazy ideas about love. Namely, if you don't love him, he'll storm the Capitol.
Anyway, it's time for a game. we call, OK, Stop. And this will be our RNC Dear Leader edition.
Let's roll the clip.
At our club championship in March, I watched President Trump hit a perfect 210-yard four iron to within 10 feet of the hole.
Yep. He needed to sink that putt to win. Do you think he sank it? You better believe you sunk that putt.
OK, stop.
I love this guy. We're lucky he's not the nominee. This is a 300 electoral vote getting guy. This guy rules. Best host at the wedding, this guy.
I love him. I think that guy spoke at the North Korea Palo Burro meeting. Kim Jong-un, yeah, he got a 19 on 18 holes.
Pretty good. Pretty good.
No, 210-yard, four iron within 10 feet of the hole, I'm like, here, you need these, first of all. But also, golf? We're talking about golf? They love talking about golf. Joe Biden's biggest electoral weakness is golf, sure.
That was also one of two speakers who talked about golf. There was the manager of Trump, Jharrel.
Jharrel, yes. Oh, yes. And how? Trump is empowering women, empowered her. That is also the Donald Trump that we don't know, apparently, is a Trump that empowers women, just FYI.
A full speech about managing a resort.
I liked it. All right, let's see the rest.
Donald Trump, 21 club championships. Joe Biden, zero.
OK, stop. I love this. Repeatedly winning club champion at the country club you own. Would be like me winning Crooked Media Employee of the Month.
Which I have, month after month, because I am the best.
Don't clap for that.
Most Americans own a couple of golf courses and have been the club champion a couple of times. So it's just weird to have a president who doesn't own a bunch of golf courses. It's not relatable for people.
Definitely.
Let's keep rolling.
Proverbs 28 reads, the wicked flee, though no one pursues. But the righteous are as bold as a lion.
And that truly epitomizes Donald Trump. He is a lion.
On Saturday,
the devil came to Pennsylvania holding a rifle. But an American lion got back up on his feet and he roared.
OK, stop. What are we doing here? This is a job about sending Medicare checks and paving fucking roads, American lion. What are we talking about? Love it, as Tim Scott's number one supporter,
you're just doing a say here.
Yeah, did you work on that speech?
Oh, you've never been disappointed by someone you thought was great, like Tim Scott before?
Poor Tim Scott's still doing this. He doesn't really get considered for VP. He does this whole thing. He's still there, he's roaring at the convention.
He is roaring, yes.
He's roaring for Donald Trump.
He's so extra.
Brutal.
Yeah. He got engaged.
At least he'll have time to focus on planning the wedding. True. I'm sure he'll be very interested in picking up the invitations and the flowers and things and all the other fun parts of planning a wedding when you get engaged the Monday before you endorse.
Let's keep rolling.
We cannot know what the future holds, but we know damn sure who holds the future in his hands. Because God is not finished with him yet.
OK, stop.
Server just came up to God's table and said, are you finished with that? yet? God said, yeah, I'm still going to nibble.
I just.
Yeah, God was not finished with Sarah Huckabee Sanders, apparently either. I mean, look, don't know if there's a new Donald Trump, but there was definitely a new Sarah Huckabee Sanders on that stage. And also, I mean, hey, the future looks very huge when you see it in his two little hands on the stage. His tiny little hands.
The God isn't finished with him yet thing, it's like, OK. God isn't finished with Putin yet either, I guess, by the same standard, or people that spit their gum in urinals, even though there's a garbage can right there. Somebody's got to clean it up.
God is still working on me. I mean, hey, who among us?
Roll it.
Isn't just an American entrepreneur. He became a folk hero. Celebrities and sports stars wanted to be seen with him. Politicians sought his approval.
OK, stop.
Donald Trump is the most approval craving person in the entire universe. I know. This is somebody who, like, there's all this reporting about how he would give donations to politicians totally for access so he could be around them. He was constantly trying to buddy up to celebrities. He hosted a show where, like, failed celebrities, would come and try to supplicate.
This is his entire thing. And all the real celebrities hate him.
But what about Hannibal Lecter, though? How does Hannibal Lecter feel?
The late, great Hannibal Lecter. It's full, full of love.
Just check it.
I just wonder whether he wrote the script for this video.
No doubt.
You can tell. You can tell.
He hand selected the photos. The guy didn't look at the federal budget one time in four years, but he picked out the photo of Mike Tyson individually. for this. They had to digitally retouch to remove the Sharpie before they put it into the video. Yeah, it is a funny thing, because this is the story he tells in his own mind, right?
Like, this is the vision he had for what it meant for Donald Trump to be in New York, a folk hero, you know? Like, the kind of folk hero we all remember learning about growing up, the kinds that become famous for cheating on their wives, and it being in page six. Like Paul Bunyan, right?
Any final thoughts?
And that's OK, stop.
When we come back, Tommy sits down with Senator Tammy Baldwin.
I am thrilled to welcome to the show tonight from the great state of Wisconsin, your senator, Tammy Baldwin.
All right, good to see you, thank you.
It's great to see you.
Thanks for being here. It's great to be here. It's great to be out of Milwaukee.
Yes.
I was doing a few events around the period, just to draw some attention away.
Yeah, we were there too. It was weird. So we were talking with an elected official in Milwaukee earlier this week who was genuinely in awe, and maybe a little jealous, of your ability to win elections in Wisconsin, but also win by bigger margins than any other statewide official.
In 2012,, you beat Tommy Thompson, who was governor, who was HHS secretary, with 51.
4% of the vote. And then, in 2018, you were re-elected with 55.4% of the vote. Yeah, clap for that.
That's a huge margin, especially in a state where we are all used to, you know, one person, one vote, counting thousands of votes by the end, raised within margins. What's the secret sauce? How are you outpacing everybody else? And can you tell Joe Biden about it?
So secret sauce is travel everywhere. And don't just go to blue areas, go to red areas and purple areas. Go to rural areas, suburban areas. And listen. One of the most important things that somebody who's serving the public needs to do.
And frankly, I listen and I hear what people are challenged by, what they're struggling with, what they're hopeful for, and take that back, and it informs what I do. But there is no substitute for getting out there. I love the people of this state.
Hardworking, decent people. And to hear, whether it's Donald Trump or my opponent, Eric Hovde, speak insulting folks, it's very clear that he's more familiar with the boardroom or the yacht than he is with hardworking Wisconsinites.
I want to ask you about that, Goober, in a minute. But there have been some recent polls that show you running several points ahead of President Biden in this state. Just wondering why you think that is.
I think that it is about showing up. And exactly what I just said in answer to your last question.
I'm a known quantity. I have gotten out there and fight for our farmers, fight for our natural resources, fight to bring jobs back. And we make things in the state of Wisconsin. And my Buy America rules are bringing new jobs back to Wisconsin.
And it's the chance to really get to know my state and the people. And I think that accounts for it. But I also worry, I think in this particular year, I don't, I had ticket splitters in 2018..
I'm not sure there's gonna be as many this time around.
Why's that?
I don't know, try to, I have met a few Trump-Tammy voters in my time.
What are they like?
Well, I'll give you an example. I was visiting Nina Foundry. For those of you who travel, you always look down at the manhole covers. It's like, yeah, that was made in Wisconsin, yay. And I was visiting right before my last election.
And I met with, they were showing me how they make things. And the guy who brings the molten metal and pours it into the, operates the machinery to pour it into the molds, he started the conversation by like, why do you keep picking on my guy, Trump? What? Why do you keep picking on my guy, Trump? Well, maybe he deserves it.
The guy didn't even crack a smile. He shows me what he does. And after I moved on, a staffer went to engage him and said, okay, you're a big Trump supporter. What do you think of Tammy Baldwin? And he stopped and he said, look what I make.
I make manhole covers and things for our infrastructure. If it weren't for Buy America Rules, I wouldn't have a job. And Nina Foundry might not even be in Wisconsin. Of course, I'm voting for her. So that's, I also have a couple of folks.
who work hard as dairy farmers and know that I've gone to bat for them. And I remember one guy with a big Trump bumper sticker on his pickup truck, but he's definitely a strong supporter. I'd like him to put a Baldwin bumper sticker next to that. I'm not sure what signal that would send, but. But I don't, I think I do worry in this particular race that we have become hardened in our divides.
And so we're working to earn every vote. Trump last night said he was gonna buy every vote. My opponent looks like he's trying to do that. But I'm working really hard to earn every vote.
Speaking of divides, I mean, can you win statewide in Wisconsin if you are lactose intolerant?
You know, I wouldn't brag about it, but you could probably still try.
Just leave it out, all right, it's a good tip for love it if he moves here. Oh no, I love milk. Cheese curds, have you had cheese curds? We had, so we had two different kinds of cheese curds. We had kind of like.
Deep, fried and fresh.
One of them were like pancake-y almost. Syrup and powdered sugar on it. Really?
I didn't make them.
I like them fresh and squeaky.
Yeah, those were, we had some squeaky ones too. God, I'm gonna get run out of this place.
All right, now for the annoying questions. So, ever since the debate, the Democratic Party has had this roiling conversation about whether President Biden should step aside or let Vice President Harris or somebody else run against Donald Trump. As of Friday evening, when we're recording this, four US senators, four of your colleagues, have asked President Biden to step down, along with a couple dozen members of Congress. Do you think President Biden should step aside?
Look, as I travel, I have had countless conversations now of people coming up to me and saying that they're very worried about the top of the ticket. And these are legitimate concerns. And it's been my job, I feel, to convey it in no uncertain terms to the White House and the campaign. And I have been doing that. Ultimately, it is, yes.
Ultimately, it is the choice for Joe Biden to make. And I hope they are taking and weighing very seriously the input that we're providing. But in the end, whatever the decision, I am for the Democratic ticket from the very bottom to the very top.
Look, I am totally where you are. If Joe Biden is the nominee, I will do everything I can to support him. I'm so glad to hear that you're conveying these concerns, because they do feel widespread. I don't think this is an elite problem. And I'm just wondering if you feel like the White House is listening, because, yeah, this is, of course, Joe Biden's decision.
It's a very human, personal decision, right? I mean, this is his life's work and purpose. And saying, I no longer get to do that would be unbelievably painful. But ultimately, he's just a citizen. We're all citizens.
We all own this together. And I just worry a little bit whether the messages you're conveying from constituents are getting to the top.
Yeah, well, I know there's also been face-to-face discussions with a number of my colleagues and President Biden. But I have to trust that when I convey what I've been hearing, that it is going directly to him. That's what I was promised. And I hope that is the case.
So I live in Los Angeles. Your opponent, Eric Hovde, is basically my neighbor.
He's down the road in Laguna Beach, which is a hell of a lot closer than Madison, Wisconsin. So I saw that he also has a house in Washington, D.C. that I believe he gifted to his brother? Yes. As one does.
For 24 years, he ran a hedge fund in Washington, D.
C. And then came back and ran for Senate in 2012.. And now he owns a $3 billion bank.
Salt of the Earth.
And lives in Orange County, California.
$7 million house. This is a sincere question. Why is a bank owner from California running for Senate in Wisconsin?
That is a question for the voters, right?
Like, where did this guy come from?
And, as I was saying, I just feel, when I hear what he says, that he doesn't get us. That he doesn't understand the hardworking folks that I have the honor of representing. And he talks down to folks. He said that seniors in nursing homes shouldn't be able to vote. He disparages single moms.
He calls farmers lazy.
In Wisconsin?
In Wisconsin.
Okay, all right.
I mean, you can't look down to the people that you're seeking to represent. And I hope people really listen and understand. He seems much more conversant in the boardroom than he does visiting a family farm or a factory here in the state of Wisconsin.
Carpet bagging just seems so awkward, you know? You just gotta pretend, you know.
And it seems increasingly frequent these days. Yeah, it is a frequent thing. I mean, it's amazing to me.
Bizarre. I saw a recent interview with former governor Scott Walker.
I think it was at the RNC. He was asked by a local Green Bay TV station about HVD's residency issue. And in his answer, in the course of like a minute and 20 seconds, he got to a place where he suggested that criticism of HVD's residency was the kind of extreme rhetoric that led to the 2017 shooting of Congressman Steve Scalise and the assassination attempt on Donald Trump. And my question is, what the hell is Scott Walker talking about?
I wanna say, okay, stop.
I mean.
Oh my.
Oh my, there was this day a few weeks back, where he was due to stop by the Oconto County.
Republican Party for a meet and greet. He was a no-show. I mean, he's on the billing for this. Come meet Eric Humphrey. Same day, a neighbor of his in California snapped a picture of him on the beach, in Laguna Beach.
Come on, man. I mean, really. What are you doing?
I mean, really.
Unbelievable. Turning back to some Senate business, you called on your Senate colleague, Democratic colleague, Bob Menendez, to resign after he was found guilty. Yeah, applause for that.
He was found guilty on 16 charges, including bribery, extortion, acting as a foreign agent. He had literal gold bars in his house. You've also expressed willingness to expel Menendez. if he doesn't, if he won't leave. He said he's not gonna resign.
He says he's gonna appeal the case. What happens next? What's the process for expelling a U.S. Senator?
Well, I've never gone through that process before,
but it is, you know, bring an expulsion resolution to the floor,
and we'll vote on it.
I think that the rule of law matters, and when we look at the threat to the rule of law posed by Donald Trump and the plans that he has for the future, we have to be very clear that, regardless of whether this is a Democrat or a Republican, that he's been convicted. I called on him to resign after the charges because they were so serious, but I certainly hope he resigns and we don't have to expel him, but that's what we should do.
Agreed.
The Dobbs decision that stripped away abortion access for millions of women in this country upended politics nationally, but we were talking earlier before the show about how it was especially impactful in Wisconsin. I was hoping you could explain to the audience what the impact of Dobbs has been and whether, you know, this was the only thing we talked about going into the 2022 midterms. There's been a lot of noise out of D.C. that we discussed a minute ago, but are you hearing about the issue as much when you're at town hall meetings, on the doors, et cetera?
I am hearing about it a lot. First of all, just the Dobbs decision stripped away the rights and freedoms of half of America, and half of America now has fewer rights and freedoms than their mothers and their grandmothers had.
And in Wisconsin, you know, when that happened, the law reverted to state law. In our state, we have a criminal statute passed in 1849, one year after statehood, that was widely perceived as a criminal. abortion ban. Services stopped in this state the moment that decision came out. And I have heard harrowing stories of what happened to people during that time.
You know, to be told that we can't treat you, a woman who I met in Eau Claire, her water broke at 17 weeks. And she went in to her doctor,
and he said, I can't do anything. They basically have lawyers practicing medicine, like, no, no, no, you might be prosecuted if you do anything. So they sent her home, and they didn't provide her with care until she was at risk of sepsis and had a fever of 101.. That should not be in America. This is healthcare.
You can't say that half of the population has no access to comprehensive healthcare.
Now, since that time, a trial court judge has ruled that that 1849 statute is unconstitutional, and not intended to serve this, to restrict access. And so now we have three counties with Planned Parenthood clinics that have reopened. Dane County, Milwaukee, and Sheboygan. But we have 69 counties that don't have services, and we've got to change that. I'm proud to be the lead sponsor of the Women's Health Protection Act, which would codify Roe,
and it would take the necessary additional step of telling states like Wisconsin and Texas and Florida that you can't pass laws at the state level that make it impossible to access those rights. So we have to pass that.
Yeah, amen.
Final question for you. So we are constantly trying to figure out what issues do voters care about. We're looking at polls, you're looking at focus groups. You're literally on the road, doing town hall meetings, knocking on doors, talking to people. What do you hear about the most?
And do you have any advice for Joe Biden or Kamala Harris or anybody at the top of the ticket about how to refocus the conversation on the things that you're hearing about in Wisconsin and not whatever else is getting media attention?
Yeah. So the things. I hear about the high cost of things, but we have such a story to tell about lowering the cost of prescription drugs and asthma inhalers and insulin, and fighting so hard to make healthcare accessible to all. I hear a lot about the fact that we have, for the first time, or I shouldn't say the first time, but as a country, seen rights and freedoms that were fought for be taken away. I think all of us think of America as a place where we advance our state motto forward.
And to see that rights and freedoms being taken away is shocking. And we're not just talking about right to access abortion. We're talking about ways in which our accessing the ballot box is becoming more difficult. The right to unionize and organize, to collectively bargain is being blocked. And so all of these rights and freedoms are more constrained these days, and people want their rights and freedoms back.
And they're voting about that. They're very fearful that we could lose our democracy in this election. And so that's what I'm hearing. But that's also what the democratic agenda is all about. It's making it possible for people to work hard, play by the rules, and get ahead and lead a fulfilling, prosperous life.
Amen. Amen.
Last, last question.
How can people help you out? Where should they go if they're listening at home, they want to volunteer, they want to give?
Well, start with TammyBaldwin.
com. Easy to remember. And there's so many things people can do in terms of volunteering, in terms of amplifying our message. Yeah, go and follow me on social media. And when you see something that you think your friends might care about, spread the word.
Good advice.
And maybe occasionally look at what he's saying on his website. I don't do that very much. But just sort of, wow, this is what we're up against. Certainly, people can make donations. I'm running, you know, it's a multi-millionaire who's running against me.
He's put $13 million of his own wealth into the campaign. His brother formed a super PAC because he didn't want to be held back by the limits. And so he's put $2 million into the super PAC. Oh my gosh, so yeah. But calling, doors, all of those things.
Yard signs, you know, there's all this internal discussion.
lawn signs don't vote.
We fought about this all the time.
Visibility matters these days. And you know, there's people who haven't taken their Trump signs down yet. They just crossed out Pence.
We need to have a lot of visibility, especially in those parts of the state where people need to know their neighbors are sane voters, rational voters. Yeah, they need to see that.
Trump tried to cross out Pence for good, if you know what I'm saying. Senator Baldwin, thank you so much for being here. We're all rooting for you and we're all supporting you.
Thank you.
And we're back. All right, let's talk about the Joe Biden of it all. Yesterday, all the reporting made it seem like the president might decide to get out of the race. Today, the Biden campaign basically said, not so fast. The president said he'll be campaigning next week.
in a statement. General Malley Dillon, Biden's campaign chair, went on mourning Joe, as one does, to argue that they still have a path to win. The campaign sent out a similar memo. Meanwhile, another five House Democrats and two senators, Martin Heinrich of New Mexico and Sherrod Brown of Ohio, called on Biden to step aside. Even Chris Coons, the Delaware senator, who's one of the few people Biden is reportedly still talking to, said the president is, quote, weighing.
who is the best candidate to win in November. One member of Congress, one member of Congress who's still riding with Biden is AOC, who, I think made a really honest, thoughtful argument last night during an hour-long livestream, where she said this.
I just want people to at least come to their conclusions eyes wide open, regardless of what shakes out.
We're going to have to work harder.
than we've ever worked before.
Like, if you're falling out of a coconut tree, God bless you. If you're riding with the president, God bless. I'm not an open convention person. I think that is crazy. All you folks that are coconut-filled in the comments as you are identifying, buckle up.
How many people know the coconut meme?
All right.
Maybe you should explain it.
Oh, God, how do I even explain it?
What, the coconut?
Kamala Harris, do you want to explain it? How do you want to explain it? Okay, Kamala Harris, I think I can do this. Kamala Harris gave a speech at one point a couple years ago where she said, do you think you just fell out of a coconut tree? We exist in the context of everything that has come before, right?
Yes. You're like, how can I explain this verbatim?
I was thinking in the context, and so she was like, laughed after the coconut tree, and it's a very funny, it's also, she's correct, it's a good sociological analysis of the situation, but the coconut tree, so, like people who want Kamala Harris to be the nominee, have been putting coconut emojis all over Twitter and their bio, this is all over TikTok, it's gone viral, it's like, it's the thing.
They are unburdened by what has been.
They are unburdened by what has been.
Yeah.
Erin, I don't know if you caught all of AOC's argument there, but what do you make of this whole mess? We've been talking about it a lot.
Caught it all, are you kidding?
I just stayed up for 90 minutes to watch Trump. I could not stay up for another hour to watch AOC.
I mean. Fair, fair.
That's a lot, but no, but I did catch some of it, and look, I mean, I thought that she, what she really made a good point about that I thought was good was talking about how the conversation, focusing on the donors instead of the voters, right? And honestly, I think that that's probably where President Joe Biden is, right? Like. he's out there, well, you know, pre-COVID, obviously, but he's out there, he's in Detroit, he's in North Carolina, he's in front of the voters, and the voters seem to be with him, right? They're telling him, stay in the race, don't drop out.
He sees that, he's in the bubble, he's thinking, if the voters are with me, what is this conversation? I can do it, I can still win, the voters are still with me, I can still do it. I think that that's a legitimate part of this argument, that, as the party is still considering what to do, as he is still trying to make that decision, and it is still ultimately his decision, right? You know, it comes down to, for him, I think a lot of this calculation is what the voters say, because the voters proved people wrong in 2020, right? Maybe they prove people wrong again, I don't know.
Love it, what did you make of AOC's argument about the risks of an open convention?
I mean, we talked about this a couple of weeks ago on Pod Save America, and I was sort of, I'm not sure, I feel uncertain, I feel like anyone who has certainty is probably worth discounting, and she doesn't, right? She's, I think, being, what's so great about this is she's having the uncertainty that this moment requires. I have the same concerns about it. I think the idea, you know, we just went through a whole thing about how we did need to have a Zoom roll call in July, because some of these deadlines are not that urgent, at the same time, the idea that we're gonna have an open convention and wrap that up in time to get on all these ballots without legal challenges, I think that is also, like, kind of, I think, too much to hope for. The other piece of this, too, is the closer we get to the convention, and the less planning and discussion we have about the actual practical way in which we could do this, the less realistic it is that we could do anything like that in a matter of, we are now, we were saying, Patricia, we are one month away from the convention.
I also do think there's a little bit of,
psychology in the idea of, it's not Biden, it's not Kamala, it's someone else, because it gets, it gives you the confidence of saying, you don't have the liabilities of Biden, but you don't have the liabilities, there are no liabilities in your imagined perfect candidate, whoever it might be, so you get to skip over the reality that any person we put up is a person, with the flaws and challenges a person would bring, and so you get to, like, compare Joe Biden to kind of like a miasma of Whitmer and Shapiro and Mark Kelly and Raphael Warnock, and it looks pretty amazing, because it's all of them in one kind of Gundam.
But you also literally have a sitting. vice president. that is sitting right there. that has been mirroring this man for three and a half years, right? So we're talking about sitting vice president versus designated survivor, don't know who that is, I mean, that could be whoever, and again, with exactly a month to go, like, I just don't know, yeah, I really wonder, you know, if we are talking about somebody else, why are we talking about somebody else when this person has been training for the job and the other, and whoever else we're talking about would have to be in training?
It's like, it's the same broken brain shit that breaks up every relationship, because you're like, I got this great person, but I don't know.
I see the meme, I see the meme, Tommy, I see it.
Tommy, you okay? I'm good.
Yeah, it's right there.
I think the important part of what AOC said is we all have to approach this with a lot of humility. This is unprecedented. We don't know what's gonna happen. We don't know what the right answer is. Sticking with Biden could be the right answer.
Switching to Kamala could be the right answer. Someone else could be the right answer. It is totally unknown, and there's a huge amount of risk, and so it's just this idea that there is exact one right answer that guarantees victory is a fallacy.
Yeah, I do think it's worth playing out to the open convention point. What happens if, say, this week, Biden decides to step aside?
He ideally announces this with Kamala Harris by his side. Either he endorses her, or he says something very nice about her, whatever it may be. She is the sitting vice president. If I was advising Kamala Harris, I would think it would be best for her if she said, yeah, of course, we have a month till the convention. I would like to compete with anyone who wants to compete with me.
We're the Democratic Party. This is democracy. Let's do this, and then, shortly after that, there's only a couple weeks. She starts getting a bunch of endorsements. The whole party starts.
People will go pretty fast, and then, at that point, who's gonna really challenge her with four weeks to go? She's the sitting vice president. She probably just got the endorsement of Joe Biden. Now she's picking up steam, but the benefit of at least saying I'm open to challengers is now she actually wins this, and she feels the sense of real legitimacy from going through a process, and everyone else looks at it and is like, you know what? There was an open process.
No one wanted to challenge her. A bunch of the party just coalesced around her, which I think would absolutely happen, because she'd be the overwhelming front runner, and then we wrap this thing up, and we go to the convention and work our asses off.
It's just, there is this, like,
there is this conspiracy theory. There are two conspiracy theories going around. One is that some group of party poobahs would just pass over Kamala Harris, and the other one is that the party that's those same party poobahs will rig up for Kamala Harris. Here's the thing. The moment Joe Biden says he is not running for the nomination of the Democratic Party, all of the delegates are unpledged.
They can vote for anyone they want.
They are unburdened by what was.
They are unburdened, yes. They might have fallen out of a coconut tree, and so Kamala Harris is gonna have to earn their votes. If someone else wants to run, that could be someone of great stature, like one of the governors we've been talking about, or a senator we're talking about, or it could just be literally. anyone can seek the votes of that convention, and so there has to be, by DNC rules, an open process. Whether someone will challenge her or not is an open question, and I can see a lot of arguments why people wouldn't do that, but it is an open process for the majority of those delegates.
But I mean, look, I hear what you're saying, but we also have to admit that this country is burdened by what has been, right? We have never elected a woman to be President of the United States, so sure, she may be the most qualified, and if she's the most qualified, then she comes out on top at the end of an open process, but like, wow, we're hearing, again, we're leapfrogging over the sitting Vice President to choose somebody else. I think we've seen kind of what happens when the person that is the most qualified, if they are a woman, that doesn't always work out, right? That doesn't always work out, we gotta be honest about that, so I don't know. You would like to think that it should be about maybe the person's leadership, maybe the person's resume, maybe the person's track record, but if we're talking about that person being a woman, I think it is a different calculation, and you have to acknowledge that.
Yeah, I also do think, I think, yes, I think we're talking about two scenarios. In both of them, she says, I am seeking the nomination, I hope to earn the support of the delegates. In one scenario, no one serious challenges her, and this is sort of a moot point, and she begins the campaign against Trump immediately.
And, by the way, in that scenario, the reason no one challenges her is because they think her political position is so strong that I could not win, and that benefits her. That's my argument.
Yes, and the other is that there is a serious challenge, and then I actually do think this is an argument we're gonna have, and I think she starts out ahead in that argument, and I think, now, whether or not you want that, my view is, is it worth having that fight? Do we wanna just hit the ground running right away with Kamala running hard against Trump and no one else, or do we wanna have that fight where she comes out ahead and proves that she's the leader of this party by keeping what she kills? I don't know. Wow. And nobody remembers the movie Triple X?
That's crazy. Oh, not, Triple X. He's in it.
I don't know. Delete it.
I don't know what you're talking about.
I just think the odds that, if there is a process, she is by far the overwhelming favorite. She's the best known. The polls show that she is the choice of the Democratic primary voters, who don't have a voice here. And also, just from the delegates, winning an open convention, something we have not had to do for many, many years, is about math. And she also happens to be not just vice president, but the vice president from California, the largest Democratic delegation.
And so she, I struggled, I would be shocked if someone of great consequence decided to run against her in this process. And I would be even more shocked if she did not beat that person who chose to run against her in that process.
Yeah, and P.
S.
, this is a non-starter for black women. I mean, I was just at Essence, and these black women were like, what are we talking about?
This is not a conference, this is not real.
Black women, most loyal, base of the Democratic Party, we know this, right? They're gonna vote. But what you need is, what the Democratic Party needs is black women who are going to not only vote, but take their church members, their household, their sorority, whoever else they can take to the polls. How, I mean, and voter enthusiasm, energy is a thing. It is a thing, this cycle.
And if you don't have black women on board, because you threw the black woman overboard, like, you got a problem.
Yeah.
God only knows what the right answer is. The only thing I want to say is, I watched that whole live earlier today, and I just, it was so nice. I actually don't agree with her conclusion. I didn't agree with a lot of the analysis. But hearing a member of Congress lay it all out, honestly, like, warts and all, and be like, here's the process, here's what I'm hearing, here's why this whole process is fucked up and bad.
It's like, thank you. Thank you for respecting the intelligence of the people watching this, your constituents, the Democratic Party, and just, like, talking it out. That's such a better path than hiding or giving background quotes to Axios or, like, whatever others are doing.
And I do, yeah. And I do want to make two quick points. It is Chronicles of Riddick, starring Vin Diesel.
That's a good movie.
We're back on track, people.
That's a good movie.
I'm glad we circled back to that.
That's the sequel, right?
Fact check.
It is the sequel. Pitch Black is the original. But also, yeah, anyway, that's the point I wanted to make. That was the most important point that I wanted to make about that.
Yeah, I know, I know.
So we are getting ahead of ourselves.
Tommy, the reporting today is that no decision has been made, that Biden is still weighing this decision.
And headed back to the campaign trail.
And yes, although it was interesting, the statement said, we'll be back on the campaign trail next week. We'll be talking about, it was very, I don't know, you can read into it. But the campaign is making it seem like full speed ahead. They had Jen out on Morning. Joe.
He's going to the campaign trail. What do you think is going on there with the, like, no decision, but the campaign looks like it's moving full speed ahead?
Jen O'Malley Dillon, the campaign manager on Morning Joe. Yeah, I mean, look, they have no choice but to proceed ahead, right? Because if you show any daylight, if there's any weakness, that leads to more members of Congress saying like, oh, I see where this train is going. Let's get in front of it, call it a parade. It leads to the donors cutting off funds.
It leads to another terrible news cycle. So they're just stuck. And I think the reality is very few people have any real information. It's like Joe Biden, Jill Biden, a couple of close family members, one or two staffers that are kind of cloistered off.
Israeli intelligence.
Israeli intelligence. Maybe the Russians, maybe the Chinese. The French have some good collection.
So they're gonna figure it out. And I guess, like moments like this is when I have so much empathy for the Biden team. He is, his campaign in his White House is really good. Like they have some of the smartest, most effective, great people in the Democratic Party. Like we know them, they are our friends.
They were pissed at us. We feel bad about that. But like they are in an impossible position. They are trying to figure out a path forward when no one knows what that path is. So they're gonna be professionals.
They're gonna do their jobs. They're gonna keep doing what it takes to win. And then Joe Biden's gonna make a decision.
Which brings me to, Dan, I saved the easy question for you. It is getting pretty late. This has now been going on for three weeks. More Democrats are expected to come out next week calling on Biden to step aside. If Biden stays, digs in, congressional Democrats stay dug in.
Like what happens? We're in a standoff here where you got four weeks to the convention.
Ultimately, this is Joe Biden's decision, which he claims to have made. And he keeps saying he's made it and no one keeps listening to him.
Are you sure?
Are you sure?
I mean, we keep looking for something that is not there. Like there has never yet been real, solid reporting that he himself is open to changing his mind. There's reporting that people around him have recognized the inevitability of the decision. There's been reporting that members of his family have at least considered, if he were to make a decision, how he might announce that decision. But nothing that Joe Biden himself has done.
And no, we've gotten detailed readouts from a lot of phone calls that have been happening with President Biden over the last week. And the reason we're getting those detailed readouts is because in those phone calls, Joe Biden has at no point has evinced any doubt about it. But it is his decision. So he can do this if he wants to do it, and no one can stop him. I do, however, believe we have now crossed the Rubicon where it is not possible to run an effective campaign under these circumstances.
The donors have left. They have shifted their money to the House and the Senate because they believe that Joe Biden is unlikely to win and they want to do everything they possibly can to set up a bulwark against complete magic control of our government. And that would be in the House or the Senate. And just imagine how this campaign works. if he continues as we are here, right?
He's gonna go to Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and put the vulnerable senators and Senate candidates in those states in the position, every single day, during every trip, of deciding how they're gonna respond to the President. That puts him in an impossible position. How do you run when most of the Democrats, including the leaders, have indicated, publicly or quasi-publicly, that they don't want you to run? Like, he can do it. And maybe there's a way that I cannot conjure in my brain that that campaign can be successful, but it feels to me like a very, very dangerous death spiral that lends itself to a landslide Trump victory that brings the House and the Senate with him.
And so it is his choice. And if they have a plan for how to navigate these waters and to do it in a way that Joe Biden can execute, they really have to lay that out. Because as we sit here today, I just can't see. And every day that we are not running a race against Donald Trump, it's a day we will never, ever get back. And if Kamala Harris is going to be our nominee, we want her out there yesterday, not 10 days from now.
And so.
It's been a psychologically grueling week.
We've got to bring Ben back out.
Oh, let's bring Ben back out.
Ben, you take my spot. I'm going to come over here. I remember how it all works. Hi,
Ben.
Hi, John.
You at the beach earlier or something?
Unbelievable.
It's been grueling watching the Republican National Convention, and there's something I always turn to for self-soothing. It's called dairy.
Luckily, we're in Wisconsin. Unfortunately, we're in Wisconsin for the RNC, so tonight we must bridge the divide between our greatest love, Wisconsin, and its dairy. And something we dislike, the Republican Party. And we're going to do it all in a game we're calling Cheese, Cheese, Cheese.
Cheese, cheese, cheese.
Don't prove I'm wrong.
Terrific. Can I just note that in Wisconsin, we are proud that when the temperature goes above 40, we put on our flip-flops.
Yes.
That's what we do in Wisconsin.
A little esprit de.
. You thought, okay.
Coastal elite.
You. live your truth. Live your truth.
It's true. I am a member of the coastal elite. But I eat like a Wisconsinite with nothing to lose.
All right. So here's how it works. I'm going to divide you into teams. The teams will be Aaron and John versus Ben, Tommy, and Dan. I'm going to ask you Wisconsin trivia.
Some of it will be about dairy. Some of it will be about Republicans.
All right.
I feel good about this. They get Ben? What the fuck?
It's a ringer. It's a ringer.
Don't panic, guys. We're going to be okay.
I feel good about this.
Ben, you're going to help both teams.
No, that's okay.
No. Aaron and I are going to do it. We're going to win on our own.
All right.
All right.
Seems like you're not happy with any option. Sounds like a Democrat to me.
All right. Let's start with Ben, Tommy, and Dan. Between 1895 and 1967, Wisconsin outlawed which product, forcing residents to smuggle it in from across state lines? A, cough syrup, B, margarine, C, root beer, or D, lube?
We'll take margarine. That is correct.
Wow. Wow.
The state banned the manufacture and sale of yellow margarine to protect dairy farmers, and that ban remained in place for 72 years. Aaron and John, what 1965 incident precipitated the end of the margarine ban? A, a staunchly anti-margarine state senator agreed to take a blind taste test of margarine and butter and failed it, B, a deep-pocketed margarine magnate funded a full renovation of the state capitol, C, a butter warehouse exploded, or D, Rock Hudson appeared in a sexy magazine ad, his naked torso slathered in margarine.
Holy shit.
Is this like, maybe B? A or B.
Found a friend. A?
What was A?
A was a staunchly anti-margarine state senator agreed to a blind taste test. That's the right one.
Hey.
A.
Subtle. Thank you.
Subtle tip.
We appreciate you. Was that your kin? Shout out to them.
Who was that?
You want us to have fun up here or you want to just be smart?
Wow.
A. You got it.
We got this. GOP state senator Gordon Rosely failed a blind taste test. It later came out that his wife had been secretly serving him margarine instead of butter for years.
Damn.
Wow. Sometimes it be your own people.
Call us coming from inside the house.
Exactly.
Margarine.
Yuck.
All right. What percentage, this is for Ben, Dan, and Tommy. What percentage of Wisconsin milk is made into cheese?
50%? 75%? 25%? Or 90%?
Dumb shit.
We're going big. We're going for 90%.
Wow.
Correct.
Wow.
Wow. This game is called Cheese, Cheese, Cheese. Let's be real, people.
2.
8.
I just want to point out that when you asked that question, a hush fell over the crowd.
It really did.
You ask the question, people go, ooh.
It's because people were worried, like, what if there's not enough cheese? But it turns out there's enough cheese. 2.8 billion pounds of cheese a year. Wow.
Yay, cheese.
All right, Aaron and John. How many varieties of cheese does Wisconsin produce? Is it A, 50, B, 100, C, 300, or D, 600?? How much cheese?
C.
Incorrect. It is D, 600.. Wow.
That's so.
More than double the cheeses that the next cheesiest state, California, produces.
Yeah. That's right. We don't talk about that. Those fags don't know shit about cheese.
Sorry.
Wow. I guess I have to stick around. I have not tried all the cheeses.
That's a lot of cheese. Wow.
I have work to do. John knows about cheese.
What did you say?
Wow.
What does that. You said, I know about cheese. What does she know about you? You said, thank you.
I feel. I feel seen.
Ben, Tommy, and Dan, true or false, Wisconsin has a total of 10 festivals dedicated entirely to cheese.
At least.
At least.
It might be false because it's too few. That's right.
Wow.
That's right.
You know what that is, my friends?
Game theory. I like the. By the way, the best that we could do is at least 13,, which is a little bit like, hey, Wisconsin, how many cheese festivals do you have? 13 that I know of.
All right. Moving on to Republican trivia. Deal with it. It's the world. We exist in the context.
Aaron and John, on Tuesday, Rudy Giuliani did what on camera at the RNC?
Oh, he fell.
He tripped. He did. He tripped into a row of chairs. We have the clip.
I think. I don't think we should show this. This is not cheese related.
Was he looking? Wow.
It's a bummer. I regret this. I regret this. I regret this. I honestly.
Was that like cheese fever? What did that have to do with cheese? I shifted from. I shifted from schadenfreude to just pure sadness on Rudy when he got overheard, and Mar-a-Lago saying that his life is a living nightmare.
Cheese and karma.
All right. Ben, Tommy, and John. And Dan. I know your name. During a live interview from the RNC floor with CNN, who said about Matt Gaetz, he's got an ethics complaint for paying a 17-year-old?
Kevin McCarthy.
You got it. Let's skip the clip. We've all seen it. All right. We can show it.
Nah, it's over. All right.
Play it.
Play it. Play it.
Are you speaking tonight? And the other part you have is one person who raised the issue, he's got an ethics complaint about paying, sleeping with a 17-year-old, so that's the way they would go. So that's the biggest challenge we have.
That guy is bitter.
Though Kevin McCarthy and Matt Gaetz, I like that. they have a hatred towards each other. that isn't political. It's they truly hate each other on a deeply personal level.
And they're just.
People respond to authenticity, you know?
Yeah. They do. They do.
Maybe it wasn't all about unity. after all. I forgot about that.
Yeah, right. There.
John and Aaron, this year, an English bulldog stole the hearts and minds of the RNC owned by West Virginia Governor Jim Justice. What is the name of that dog?
I'll give you. Is it A, Mr. Chomp, B, Daniel Texas, C, Sneakers, or D, Baby Dog?
Baby Dog. It is.
It's Baby Dog.
Daniel Texas. I know that a lot of you want to meet my little buddy, so if Baby Dog could come on out here,
she makes us smile.
Oh, my God. Baby Dog.
She loves everybody. So funny.
Honestly, best part of the RNC.
It really was. Baby Dog was a highlight of the week.
That guy saying you could meet my little buddy could end a lot different, you know what I, Yeah.
Look at these. I love, just. I like when dogs look like their owners.
It's so sweet. I mean it in the best way. Look at these two.
Huh?
I hope Baby Dog got some cheese.
The governor should be in a motorcycle and the dog should be in a fucking sidecar. All right.
Wow.
And you know what that sound means.
I don't. I'm terrified.
Jesus.
What?
It's time for a lightning round. We are calling truth or dairy.
There it is. Yes.
Bring out the dairy.
What is happening?
Thank you, sir.
How long has that milk been out?
Bring out the lactaid.
All right. Truth. I don't need to. I don't need to. I don't need to hear any questions.
Okay.
Here's what's going to happen. I'm actually going to take some lactaid.
I hate this.
I'm going to ask you each truth or dare questions. You can either choose to answer it truthfully or make me consume dairy.
That's right. Tonight. I am the designated milk martyr. Wow. I alone will bear the brunt of your skipped dares, because I am brave like a lion.
And because I figured you wouldn't want to drink all this dairy, at least not as much as I wanted to. All right. And we're going to work our way up from skim all the way to, I think it goes from skim to yogurt.
Is that cottage cheese? Yeah.
Oh, I'm ready for this game.
Okay. Let's start with John. John? Yes. Who actually did an incredible job with their RNC speech?
An incredible job?
Yeah. Who do you think did an amazing speech?
You can also say dairy.
You know what?
I think Kai Trump did a pretty good job.
Kai Trump did do a really good job.
She was great. All right.
I'll just drink some skim.
Was that drinking dairy just because you wanted some milk?
I approve of that. Well, I'm just, I'm having skim to get started. All right, Aaron, you're up next. What is something you like about JD Vance? Oh?
Usha. I was gonna say Usha Vance's introduction speech was very endearing.
Humanized him really did, Ben. What's something you like about JD Vance? I have a thing, but I want to watch you drink more dairy. Yeah.
All right, let's do some whole milk.
I'm pouring it into a cup because I don't want to waste. I skipped oach. I skipped oach.
Hard to watch. beautiful, that's beautiful to see. Ben, Do you remember when I drank a quart of chocolate milk while you made a case for the Wisconsin Democrats? Oh, yeah, I'll never forget it. Tommy, you're up About.
what is about? what is what? is some harsh feedback you want to say to baby dog? Wow, let's get another photo of baby dog up there.
You need to rip this dog to fucking shreds.
My watching this, my biggest fear was this sweet, adorable, loving, Absolutely portly dog was gonna jump off the chair and break its little tiny legs. You need longer legs, baby dog.
Baby dogs not healthy. Can we be honest about it?
Yeah, no, not at all.
That count yeah, drink some shit, okay.
What is this? Oh, my god, milk. Oh, my god.
I.
Have to look away for this. I hate this. Is that buttermilk? Oh,
Dude, tell me when it's over y'all.
Dan. hmm, you have to kiss one RNC speaker on the lips.
Who are you? who's it gonna be I?
I mean, it's a tough choice. Can I just say dare you enough? Yeah, I'll drink some, or if you had to pick it, Have to be baby dog, right? Yeah, baby.
Is that the buttermilk? that's actually really tough.
It's kind of interesting, it's like sour, oh.
That is terrible. doing it. Oh my god.
Not, not really a sipping beverage.
John, back to you.
Which of Trump's kids would you choose to spend a full day with at a cheese festival? and you can't pick Tiffany And you can't what? no, Tiffany. Oh, and you know what? I'm taking Baron off the table.
Ah.
Dairy no dairy.
Okay, don't do it. I agree, I agree.
That.
Was a big bite. This is so rough. Wow. We're proud of you, John.
Thank you for your service on him to puke. Oh, my gosh. Oh.
man. Erin, what are your genuine thoughts on the don't step on me and MAGA ball gowns that popped up a Milwaukee this week? Will you admit? will you admit? Oh my god.
Will you admit, here and now, that they are to some extent? Serving?
Will you admit it, here and now, that, despite put your politics aside, Come on, especially the one on the left, the Gadsden flag?
listen.
If nothing else, they were getting these fits off this week. They were. I mean, look, this is a statement. It's a statement. It's a statement That was made this week, they don't get to wear this, you know, back home to Target, but here, here.
Milwaukee was their runway. Yeah. Yes. It was. I have to.
I have to give it to him. Milwaukee was a runway and they were serving. it was their beautiful.
hardened, thickened runway.
It was.
All right, I feel gross.
I guess that's our game. Wow. What a finish. What a finish. What was that?
What was that about?
That's our show for tonight. I want to interrupt for one. Yes, do it. All right, wait, I'll wait. wait, you can pitch for as long as it takes me to drink.
Oh, there's a lot of dairy left on that on that table. We'll do two. This is a tradition that we have. We'll do two percent. Hold on.
You'll do the pitch while I do two percent. I'm not drinking this whole thing. I'll die.
All right, I'll drink a cup. All right, tell me when, John, you have as long as it takes for me to drink that with the butter, It's yeah, it's a little little bit of buttermilk for for texture. for texture. All right. I have a cup of 2%.
Make your pitch.
We've known doom and gloom.
We remember when Wisconsin looked like a red state, how many people here organized and fought to make sure we beat Scott Walker, that we elected Joe Biden, that we reelected governor Evers, that we reelected and won those Supreme Court races and.
Now we are gonna win this November if it's Joe Biden and Kamala Harris on the ballot who's voting for them this November.
Who's gonna do it? Who's gonna organize, who's gonna do the work? and we have an election on. I'm just going. we have an election on August 13th.
Constitutional amendments Republican power grabs. we're gonna stop them from ripping up our Constitution this August.
We're gonna do the same thing this November. people, politics is not a spectator sport. You can have opinions, But we are players in this game. every person here, everyone listening, has the power to turn off voters, and when we work, we win.
Yeah, we do.
Go to wisdom's org, make a donation to help the Wisconsin Democratic Party. Thank you, Ben wickler. Thank you, Aaron Haynes. Thank you, Tammy Baldwin. Thank you, Madison.
If you want to get ad-free episodes, exclusive content and more, consider joining our friends of the pod subscription community at crooked comm, Slash friends, and if you're already doom scrolling, Don't forget to follow us at pod save America on Instagram, Twitter and YouTube for access to full episodes, bonus content and more Plus. if you're as opinionated as we are, consider dropping us a review. pod Save America is a crooked media production. Our show is produced by Olivia Martinez and David Toledo. Our associate producers are Saul Rubin and Farrah safari.
Reed Sherlin is our executive producer. The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan Cantor is our sound engineer, with audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis, writing support by Hallie Kiefer. Madeline Herringer is our head of news and programming. Matt de Grote is our head of production.
Andy Taft is our executive assistant, Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Haley Jones, Mia Kelman, David tolls, Kiril Pelleveve and Molly Lobel.
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