Understanding Conflicting Poll Methodologies

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Jinx has premium all natural food, toppers, and treats to transform your dog's health and happiness no matter your dog's size or age Jinx's number one ingredient is high quality protein like Atlantic salmon, cage free chicken, grass fed beef, and lamb to support strong muscles and heart health. Jinx never has any fillers like corn, wheat, or soy. For me, I get her the mini biscuits, meal toppers, kibble, the kibble sauce, and ready meals. But for her, I think she loves the mini biscuits the most just because she loves the taste and not to mention The sound of the crutch. Jinx offers plenty of healthy and fun options for your dog Shop at national retailers like Walmart, Petmart, Chhewy or Amazon Experience vibrant senior Living with award winning services at Brightview Senior Living Communities At Brightview, our residents enjoy resort style amenities, daily programs, exciting social and cultural events, and delicious chef prepared meals But that's not all. Brightview residents also enjoy complimentary transportation, safety, security, and high quality care if needed Brightview, senior Livving commommunities. Learn more about the possibilities at Brightviewsseniorliving. comot Picture this. You just got a romantic beachfront massage. The funun is flowing The relaxation is real. And each drink tastes like a well earned reward. This is when it hits you. Myrtle moment It's the second, everything clicks When you realize Myrtle Beach, it's more than a getaway. It's right where you belong Don't just daydream about it Find your own Myrtle moment at visitmrtlebeach. com This episode of the Chuck Todcast is brought to you by chapter. Now almost everything you hear about Medicare is somebody quietly trying to steer you somewhere And you're skeptical of that. As you should be. I get it. I mean, there's a federal lawsuit going on right now over exactly this, companies that branded themselves as unbiased while allegedly pointing people toward whatever would pay them the most as some sort of broker. So if your default is to distrust everyone in this space, honestly, I get it. I'm a bit distrustful these days myself That's the whole reason I want to tell you about chap independent Medicare advisors whose entire model is that their advisors are not paid to push anyone plan They're just trying to help. Yes, there's compensation that goes with it, but it's across the board. is what they're trying to do. At the end of the day, they're advocating for you. They're not the insurance companies themselves. They're an actual person goes through your doctors, your prescriptions, your needs, and then compares them every single plan available to find the best one that will work for you and hopefully save you a couple dollars too And here's the part that sets chapter apart. They don't disappear once you've been enrolled. They will keep advocating for you. They're kind of like almost like a concierge service. You're just there. I need help. You're like customer service You know, the plan, you know, help me navigate this again. so you ever get hit with a wrongful medical bill, They'll help you fight it. They they want to stay an advocate for you even after you've done this. So look, I get it I think there's all sorts of You see a lot of people are throwing themselves in this healthcare space. What I like about these chapter folks, I've spent time with them. This is a very transparent organization. It is Medicare and all of its affiliated stuff can be very confusing. The whole point of this is to make this easier and less confusing Okay, so look Take the skepticism you already have in all of this. pointint it at your own plan for twenty minutes free, there's no pressure and then call chapter Today at nine eight zero seeven, three, four Three, nine, eight, five. Day two days now after of July America's two hundred fiftieth birthday. And I'm going to have a lot more to say about sort of what the weekend delivered to us as a nation and the unfortunate divisiveness that the whole weekend felt and all of that. But as you know, here at the Chuck Tagcast I'm just promising you politics for the rest of us. This is not going to be some left wing screet or right wing screet. it is just an attempt to sort of Hey, What about What does this all mean for the rest of us? Politics for the rest of us is I want as I'm calling it these days. And of course, A reminder that I cover politics as it is and then do my best to try to give you some ideas and how we can make it a little bit better. And let me give you the quick little rundown of today ike I said, I will have a lot, particularly on the president's financial disclosure. I think the most remarkable thing is what he's fessed up to. And I want to get into that in for a few minutes. My guest today is the managing editor for politics For the New York Times. It's Carolyn Ryan. I think understanding The decisions America's most important news organization makes on any given day. any given week how they go about it is extraordinarily important. I've known Carolyn a long time. And I think this is a good way to, you know, get a better understanding Oh. How the Times does its job? What does the firewall look like with the opinion page? What is their investment in polling that seems to be more robust this year than at any other time before? So U We get into a lot of it. What is it like to be a reporter there that's working on a book and what is the demands that the news organization has versus what the book publisher wants? The point is I try to anticipate every question you might have for somebody in the leadership and in the Mas at the New York Times and did my best to channel that. So I really think for those of you interested in how the media does its job This will be an excellent interview. It is Monday which means we're going to go back into the time into my Todcast time machine. And I'm going to take you back to an era when politicians Use geography to cement political power Um Frankly, it's not new But it is a reminder that how we tell our stories, how we tell our history can sometimes mask what the real intent of what happened actually was about. And so That is my one hint that I'm giving you, it is about the nineteenth century and it really rings true current situation that we're living in at the moment Um then I'm going to give you my hot takes on LeBron. I've got a lot of hot takes on LeBron. U and dash Darn it. I want to send out my a takes before LeBron signs with the team and makes all of us LeBron watchers feel silly or then some at that. I will talk about the one Nationational all star snub and then give you your complete. Remember, we're doing two episodes for the month of July rather than three. So I'll have a drop todayod, Monday here and we'll have another drop on Thursday. So with that U. Let me get started. You know, one of the hallmarks of Donald Trump and one of the One of the worst set predictions there have been over during the Donald Trump era is, you know, some form of up. He'll never recover from this one And yet Donald Trump recovers from this one. But the fact of the matter is even somebody with as many political lives as Donald Trump A man who seems to use Teflon as sunscreen He's bathed in so much of it and stuff just slips off of him so easily that we somehow, many people may have convinced themselves, nothing's ever going to take this die down and sort of But I would say is, I do think we know the ending. We just don't know when the ending is going to happen, right? We know this is going to be notot a spectacular ending dumb end thing. right? We know this is going to be the moment when you're just sort of trying to look away. You don't even want to remember the era. You don't want to look at the time period. You want to pretend it didn't happen. You just sort of you know, wish it away, you know, sort of the way some want to wish away than what actually happened in the nineteenth century in American history versus what we want to tell ourselves of what happened in the nineteenth century And I think that In some ways we there' a coping mechanm we like, geez, nothing's going to get Trump. But the fact is The Trump era is going to end and it's going to end in a whimper The Trump era is going to be u is is going to be is not going to be something that survive that that somehow gets better with age, right? History is going to treat it in one of the most damning ways. They'll explain it History will explain it and will understand it This is not You' right? There is there's no There are going to be very few pieces of probably positive impact that you're going to be able to apply to the Trump presidency. And in fact, I kind of think it is going to be just simply less memorable Like I think, you know, we always have this recency bias that somehow, you know, what's happening now will be so memorable. But as I Think about one of the most bizarre things we had done in our history before Donald Trump did it himself, which is elect a president a second time after that president was voted out of office like we did with Grover Clevel I'm sure when it happened, there were people at the time going, boy, this is going to be one for the history books and that this is going to be an incredibly historic presidency and one that's remembered quite well other than this one factoid about Grover Cleveland. What the hell else is he known for? basasically other than being that the the Democrat that the only Democrat that could win a majority between Lincoln Uh, and Hoover right? with apologies to mister Woodrow Wilson who got to the presidency in a split decision. So Um point is that I look at sort of how littleittle impact Grover, Cleveland had on history and how essentially it did it just sort of It was a classic fading away, right I know that that seems to be the least likely scenario because we can't help ourselves in the moment But hey, there was a time Dick Van Dyke was the most famous American on television type of thing, right? You know, the things things can come and go And it wouldn't shock me if a hundred years from now Trump is as memorable of a president as Grover, Cleveland or Polt Oh or Millard Silmore The likelihood that he is in the either now he could be memorable Allah Richard Nixon and Warren Harding are two most corrupt presidents that we've ever had U that is the likelihood of I think of his historical significance. So what is all this preamble about? Well done it myself, what I thought had been career killers for him haven't been But there's something about these last three weeks Donald Trumps behavior in and around everything having to do with America at two hundred fifty and the U just extraordinary financial disclosure form that he caopped to, right? He admitted to profiting off the presidency in a government form that in some ways is shocking in its brazenness And the question is Like his entire career is filled with these moments where it's just it's just over. And sometimes he certainly doesn't know when it's over But eventually the public lets them know when it's over U'm My generation gave this gave this phenomenon, the title Jump the Shark based on a happappy Days episode that actually didn't signify the end of happappy Days right away, but it's always been associated with this is when happay Days lost its way when they tried too hard to make fonts cool when he decided he was going to jump over a shark And so while I know that that phrase jump the shark has also jumped the shark, I actually think when you're talking about Donald Trump and you're doing And you're using references like Jump the Sark, it's actually very appropriate. He is somebody. who in some ways That era is such a defining era for him and it's the era he lives in. I think in his world it is still nineteen seventy six, somewhere between nineteen seventy six and nineteen ninetine. which was his peak period of relevance. And he has been trying to capture that glory Ever sincethones? My word, gototten quite a taste of it by hijacking a political party. So That's where I'm going with this this morning. At some point the act wears out it's welcome, right And it's been theory of Donald Trump's public life Not that there is one perfect scandal, not there is one magic headline. A, this is it. Not that the country wakes up morning one morning sees one new piece of evidence and says, o now we understand who this man is That isn't going to be how Trump collapses collapses when the product becomes too much in and of itself When the gimmick becomes so obvious that even the people who wanted to believe in it start to feel embarrassed for having believed in it And we saw this with the financial disclosure this last week the Wall Street Journal editorial page just eviscerating him over it as they should as any anybody who doesn't want to be accused of hypocrisy, right? If you've spent a minute criticizing the Bidens's for profiting Hunter Biden for profiting off his father, then you should beyond outrage and probably introducing articles of impeachment given that there actually is a constitutional provision here that in theory U Donald Trump has violated on this front. But when you had like the free press you know some, you know, who which would certainly is very Shall we say partarticular about how often it criticizes Trump, meaning they don't like to do it very often They want to be a bit right coodated they eviscerated him over this Wall Street Journal editorial page eviscerated him. And I think there is this There's a lot of people who have used their own political prestige to criticize the Bidens and the Clintons over the years for making money off of government And no one has done it like Donald Trump The man has perfected And so the idea that you do have a lot of people voted for Donald Trump feeling embarrassed. by his behavior is not a surprise to me because it's when the sales pitch keeps Going after the room has changed It's just sort of When the gold lettering is still on the wall, the lights are still flashing The Maatr D is still pretending that this place is exclusive of the carpet smmells old. The money is gone and everybody has seen this episode before. Every era of Trump's public life has ended with a whimper like this And so this is why It's likely to end, you know, end with a whimper. And I've made it clear. I think he's already in lain duck territory We're just all heaven Just there isn't Um, Majority acceptance of this just yet. and it's hard to say, oh geez, he's a lame duck when he can still have influence on Republican primaries, right? So he's not He's not a lame duck without Some powerower left. This is clear the question is Are we at the beginning of the end? or are we in the middle of the end? or are we starting to come to the end of the end But I definitely believe we're in the end The Atlantic City era ended this way for him. The casinos were supposed to be proof that he was some genius. a visionary, the master builder, the deal maker, the guy who could who was going to create an east Coast Vegas and if anything, it had more advantages than Las Vegas had And then the whole thing, thanks to Donald Trump, became debt bankruptcy, overreach ruins, right? Nobody has has had a bigger negative impact on a city on the east coast Donald Trump in Atlantic. The inherited business myth ended this way The story is that Donald Trump was some self made billionaire When the more honest version of that literally he inherited his place at third base got a fortune and if he had just invested that fortune would be wealthier today pre presidency because presidency has given him an access to wealth beyond his own imagination But he had not if he had just taken his dad's fortune and just literally bought he'd have more money than he did today and he had been a billionaire sooner But of course, he has spent the rest of his life trying to convince everyone. that wow. He was born on third base that somehow he hit his own grandsam onald Trp real estate mo. That act ended this way The branding deals, the licensing, the gold plated fantasy of wealth and taste, right? It works until people start noticing Brand is not proof of success The brand was the product, the image was an asset and the illusion was the actual business. His television era ended this way. right? The apprentice worked until it didn't It was a hit until the trick got old. It made him look like the businessman he had spent decades pretending to be It put him behind a desk, surrounded him with glass and steel and fear and edited him into some executive genius that he had always fantasized that he was And then when the format started to fade He turned it into celebrity oppress whichich really is probably the single most revealing cultural artifact of the Trump age Donald Trump sitting across from Gary Bsey. pretretending this was still a high stakes board and not a failing franchise trying to resuscitate itself through absurdity In some ways, Trump and Gary Busy together explain Trumpism Better than most political sciist came Celebrity without an excellence Drama without stakes, authority, without competence. if that's not Donald Trump, I don't know what it is. The aesthetics of power can feel of power but it's empty Everything that it iss actually supposed to make power legitimate The only strange thing is that the Gary Busey phase of his celebrity era happened before the presidency and not after Pitics has been the exception In politics, Trump has had nine lives Things that would ordinarily end a public figure did not end him. Things that would have destroyed any other politician made him stronger with the people most invested in his brand. So I'm going to start with a low humility on this prediction We've been here before. And yes, even before, I probably can be quoted as saying you can find a quote that saying, Wow, this time is different Insulting John McCain seemed like a bridge too far. A Republican candidate for president mocking a prisoner of war That was supposed to be impossible and certainly something that would have made somebody is Hollywood You can grab them by the, you know what? That should have been disqualified. How about his own confession The Fth Avenue w. Trump said he could stand in the middle of fifth avenue shoot somebody and not lose voters And the shocking thing is not just that he said it The shocking thing is that it became a pretty decent description of his political immunity for a good six years about in his first term the Helsinki Summit seemed like a bridge too far. standanding next to Vladimir Putin casting doubt on American intelligence siding with the Russian propagandist That seemed like the kind of thing that would break the fever didn't do it This episode of the Chuck Todcast is brought to you by Quintince. Look, one thing I love about summer is anything that just makes everything feel easy, right? That's what you we all think of as a summer day. The days are a little more relaxed You find yourself reaching for maybe the same comfortable go anywhere clothes again and again. It's why I keep coming back to Quints because they have all these comfortable clothes. 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At Jinx, all dogs deserve to eat well. Jinx has premium all natural food to transform your dog's health and happiness no matter your dog's size or age. Jinx never has any fillers like corn, wheat, or soy. For Mia, she loves the mini biscuits the most. Jinx offers plenty of healthy and fun options for your dog. Shop at national retailers like Walmart, Petmart, Chheewy, or Amazon This is Tony Yeo from the R Report with Tony Yeo and Uncle Murdder. You ever noticice how everything keeps going up, rent's going up, streaming services are going up. Even your favorite burrito spot suddenly think Salsa should cost extra. But with Boost Mobile, you and your phone bill don't have to play the Will' go up soon game because Boost Mobile has an unlimited talk, text and data plan at a price That'll never go up. It's the same price you'll pay for life, meaneaning you're set to never worry about your bill increasing again for as long as you're on the plane. 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That was the Ukraine call It led to impeachment He was Then there's january sixth where he literally instigated a riot against the country trying to stop certification of a free and fair election I'm sure if you told people in twenty fifteen that a president would try to overturn an election, that a mob would storm the Capitol Pident would be impeached for. and that he would then return to power and pardon nearly everyone charged in connection with the attack, most people would have thought America had been lost and that somehow We were part of a first Reich of some sort Be that's how ridiculous that scenario would have sounded even to the ears of a political electorate in twenty fifteen All of that happenens haven't even brought up him stealing classified documents as a civilian. and former president or the felony conviction that he received in the or. Then the pardons of the january sixth rioters. justust all of them across the board. Tar plane a foreign government Literally bribes an American president with a luxury seven hundred and forty seven and the bribe works Qatar has got a security agreement with the United States signed by Donald Trump after they gifted this plane. The quQuid, the pro and the quQuo is all right there staring us in the face And if somehow the official posture is why would anybody have a problem with this He just wants a plane And we're going to take care of Cotter. we got a military base there. So what's wrong with that We might have done this anyway There's the UAE crypto investment God. Every time you think it can't get worse. it gets worse. a Trump linked crypto venture, a stablecoin, billions in foreign backed investment en up giving his sons. o wait Biden was criticized by some of Trump's supporters for making money off of his pays. These guys are selling. American foreign policy to the highest bidder in the golf Remember the UAE bought with this bribe of Trump's kids They got access to important chips onald Trump Is the UAE an important ally of the United States strategically in the region? Sure it is Do it mean you're justified going into business with them while you're also in charge of taxpayer decisions about how we with said goverment And yet here we So I'm not going to sit here say very confidently. this is it Nobody should pretend the outrage itself is a strategy And we shouldn't pretend the country has some hidden emergency brake that automatically activates when a president crosses a moral line, right We have learned all too painfully that it does not I think all of us wish we had one, but there's not. But there is another lesson Imunity is not immortality And there's a difference between surviving a scandal keepeeping power, staying in office, and remaining compelling and remaining influential And that's really the argument. He has no ability to influence beyond his most devoted followers. And it's a shrinking and shrinking group of people. E. still drinking the Trump cooling because there is a difference between getting away with something and keeping the audience. And there's a difference between shocking people and boring And Trump' entire theory of political powers is depended on his ability to turn misconduct into some larger spectacum He could make scandal feel like domination. He could make disgrace look like proof. He was just fighting the system like you are You know, and they're coming after him simply because he's standing in the way He could make every indictment, investigation and outrage condemnation part of the show But what happens when the show gets old What happens when you start to look like Garary Busa yourself, which lately Donald Trump has What happens when scandal no longer feels like rebellion just looks like an invoice And what happens with the corruption is not even hidden anym Not even clever. He's not even he's not even trying to spin his greed Just a nine hundred and twenty seven page government filing reads like a catalogue of impeachable offenses That's where we are now. The last few weeks have been one of the most intense pressure tests of the Trump spell that we know much of the country is in That because one new fact is more shocking than january sixth Not because one new grift is more corrupting than everything that came before it Now the whole thing feels so undisguised He's not even trying to hide it anymore. He's not even trying to explain it away Raise it It's so strangely tired that that's why you can feel this act entering a late stage form financial disclosure basasically Because he has so warped the system. He's like, I'm going to disclose all the different ways that I am using my office to personally profit and no one's going to give a shit That's how little he thinks of you crypto money, the branded Bibles. I mean, it's so gross. this guy sells Bibles with his name on it Watches coins all to monetize whatever popularity he has within this presidency. Then of course, a guy who from a political party that wants to ban stock trading All the guy does is trade off of policy. in advance. I had already brought up the plane UAE crypto story. Then there's the America two hundred fifty celebration that he completely co opted and made it a Trump branded spectacle. literally driving people away Fewer people came to Washington, not the white supremacist, they felt welcome Ver regular Americans decided to come because he just made it less He basically made it that if you showed up to an event in Washington, you were endorsing him. He tried to make the at two fifty in endorsement hand And you know like plenty of people like I' nut I'm endorsing America The idea, of'm not celebrating your fatass. I gotta little bit it's just so insulting what he's done to us It's so insulting. He gets to insult us with small stupid playground and then the rest of us, if you fight back, you look like the smaller b I mean, the reflecting pool in itself has been so symbolically obvious. Just what a ridiculous presidency this is turning into. Again, maybe he survives all of this But when you're like monetizing, Patriotism like this Literally selling the presidency to the highest bidder, selling pardons, selling policy literally is doing these things. This is not made up shit. And yet it always is like, oh, Trump Trum Trump's critics are going over the top. No It's under the it's like literally under playay That's what made, Thankk God for this government for me actually filled it out By the way Do we think he's been one hundred percent hdest? Imagine the stuff he's not copping to So look, he has survived more than enough for skepticism to be an honest position The question is no longer whether Trump has done anything disqualifying. sale the lawn The question is whether the public is finally beginning to experience him not as J some sort of transgressive rebel N as entertaining and as strong, but as exhausting. and as an act that it's worn It's a fated act It's Morton Downey Junr. for those of you of a certain age, if you know, you know. That is the junct to shharp theory theory that the law finally catches up to him Not the theory that Republicans suddenly recover a conscience N the theory that his strongest supporters instantly abandoned him realizing They're the mark Owning the libs? No, we know who he owns Just look at that government form. He owns his own supporters. He monetizes the Bibles, the watches, the gold coins, all sorts of gaudy stuff. Ethereoryusmb Every Trump act eventually wears out its's welcome. He did so in Atlantic City and literally destroyed the city All right, just it should have been East Coast Vegas Everything that bigegas is today. is because Donald Trump wasn't allowed in to smuck it. Literally, the difference is one city wouldn't give him a casino license actually oper a casino One day Which city would you rather be Las Vegas or Atlantic City? And this is why I think the moment where the political act is going to start the same this financial disclosure. It's not a rumor leak or opposition research This wasn't like a whispering from an anonymous source, a leaked tax return, an official government ethics disclosure and what he admitted to impeachable offenses. We don't even know what's not on there. Now remember why we even have this document It's one of the few things still surviving the Watergate ethics reforms We decided in the late seventies that the public had a right to know whether people in power were using power to enrich themselves simimply letting us know What's your wealth? You want to be you want to make public taxpayer decisions and public taxpayer money You've got to let us know about your financial situation. That's why financial disclosure exists It's a relic of an era when reform was still possible when scandal Duced Ethhics laws when exposure would produce new garage And the country believes sunlight might actually disinfect Trump er is testing whether sunlight still has got any sort of impact any sort of ability to disinfect. becausecause the most shocking thing about the financial disclosure is not just the money the scale It's so much of it sitting right there on paper The disclosure runs nine hundred and twenty seven pages comparison Obam's financial disclosure with eight Biden' was eleven Vance, Jie Vance is current one with seventeen Trump's is nine hundred and twenty So before you even have to you go through it page by page, the scale tells you something This is not a president with a few boring mutual funds. is not a president whose finances are simplified to avoid conflicts or have somehow put himself in a blind trust This is not somebody trying to build a wall between public office and private game This is a financial universe And it is a universe built around brand. The filing shows hundreds of millions of dollars tied to that quote Qestionable crypto investment, mostly coming from UAE and the meme coins There's six hundred thirty five million dollars in royalties from a licensing deal tied to celebration coins Hundreds of millions tied to that World Liberty Financial token sale stablecoin related entities and other crypto linked proceeds. and I know some of you're going with the hell Yes This is a part of the investment community that not everybody thinks is even legitimate yet And whether it is legitimate is a regulatory decision by Trump's administration So what did he do He put his policy position up for sale because originally Trump was anti But then he realized there was money to be made. He sold his position to the highest bidder Now, depending on how you categorize these entities, you are talking about well over a billion dollars just in these crypto related bribes. And I'm sorry, I'm calling them bribes because again He literally believed one thing, he got all this money, and now he's doing another a sitting present, meme coins, token sales, stablecoin proceeds, all this stuff Then there's the other part, right? The licensing arrangements, the family brand, the office You know, it all creates this aura of power Now, of course, Trump says, well, the market went up, please, this is not the market went up This is a presidency being converted into a new business for him in order to solidify wealth that he used to pretend he had And now he actually has it Right? He was a fake billionaire and now Politics has let him become a real billion And then there's all the merchandise The disclosure shows money from selling Trump branded Bibles. The fact that hes there's no shame with that R? This guy thinks he can sell a Bible and they we wonder why more people are questioning organized religion and certainly questioning certain Christian pastors, excuse me. I don't even want to they're not serious religious people just grifters using religion There's the brand Trump bnded watches. The Trump sneakers, Trump fragrances, there's Trump guitars in there an entire retail universe of political devotion Oh. Yeah tied to revenue for him and his son And this part deserves the moral. focus as well as legal attention Because the saddest part of the Trump era has always been this, the people he owns are not the liberals The left. media He doesn't own the media, right? He doesn't own the elites. he claims to be humiliating He owns the people who send him money The people who buy the Bible with his name on it peopleeople who buy the cheap watch that's marked up The people who buy the meme coin that they know in their heart of hearts is worthless peopleeople who buy the collectible They're told if they purchase some little piece of Trump branded air It will become valuable because he is valuable Quite the con The people who think they are owning the libs are the people being monetized. they are the product. MGA is the product and its financial disclosure is the biggest middle finger to you guys I don't get it. I don't understand. Id I'd be pissed off to have been taken like this by somebody I trust it And he is literally stealing from you the MGa movement The people who think they are defending America are being directed to a merchandising table I'm sorry. I know you think you're part of a movement But he simply is treating you like a customer would be taken advantage of. Not even a customer that he that he that he that he ca about You think you're a part of history 's trying to sell you a souvenir. You think you're buying into the future He's just selling you a to You may think he's your champion He's monetizing your loyalty I know some people hey, well, he chose it. They chose it The adults make choices. Okay, but leadership still has sort of moral contxt You know, You should still have some morality to this You know Baltic still has moral We should still have a moral Clause in it There's still something rotten about a man who takes the faith and loyalty of his most devoted supporters It just simply converts them into a sales fun It's not just monetizing the presidency, he's monetizing devotion He's as bad as any one of those Jimmy Swaggerart era preachers He really, I think he's Trump is best understood through the seventies and eighties televangelists. Sters, right? Y swaggs, your folks like that Franklin Graham is kind of one of those people. Billy was Billy wanted Billy Billy Graham always wanted to avoid being seen as a total hx Well, this episode of the Chuck Todcast is brought to you by Fandel. It's the biggest stage in world soccer. Trust me, you got Americans caring about soccer. I'm sitting suddenly caring. 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Toast with your friends at Happy Hour and savor chef prepared meals. Close out the day with a concert just down the hall from your apartment. Or simply relax. The choice is yours. Enjoy the comforts of home and the security of award winning care. Discover the possibilities at brightviewseniorliving. com to spend What's what's amazing here and this is why I this is why I think this is this careful saying that this time is different, but this is why I think this time is different It's the lame spin. When Trump was asked about all of this, his answer was basically, well, the stock market is going up, everybody's profiting So that answer matters because one it is so weak J, it's oblivious to his to work with people in this country. You know, Trump so lives in the K shaped economy, he doesn't realize what's going on on the down slope of that K Right? Because he has money and because everybody he interacts with has money, he assumes everybody has money This truly is a guy who lives in a gilded cage and has no idea what the rest of the world You know, it is another thing to look at a filing full of crypto royalties token sale proceeds, stablecoin money, branded watches and Bibles, foreign income and say everybody's making money. No, everybody didn't make money this way. this It iss not even a good explanation I mean, he's literally like a magician pointing to his left hand after we all saw the card fall out of his sleeve You know That's why this feels different Trump is not more corrupt than he was before. He's say corruption has been obvious for decades But what feels different is that the concealment is common and the salesmanship is worse because in his own way, well, I keep he keeps, you know, how he's thinking, I keep getting away with it. So this is wor The old Trump would have made the Griff feel like a crusade, and the newew Trump seems to think the existence of the grrif is itself the argument He's robbing the bank in broad daylight and even filing a disclosure form to let you know what he robbed portfolio shows and then you look at his stock trading. my goodness, tens of thousands of stocks traded He's got stakes in company after company with government contracts, regulatory interests, national security connections, immigration connections, defense connections, AI and tech connections. And the problem is not that every trade proves a secret policy is attached to it, The problem is the system itself The problem is that this is a conflict of interest machine in the disclosure form just just screaming at neon signs Right? He's invested in something called the GEO group He bought and sold shares of the GEO group, a private prison and detention contracts Well, immigration enforcement and detention are central to his policy agenda The money and the policy occupy the same world That is the scandal. The money follows the power question, canan you prove the corruption? My God, it's out in plain sight To me, the better question is what would non corruption even look like inside this arrangement? If the president is financially tied to crypto and the government takes a friendly turns toward crypto, what is the public supposed to conclude The President's family business makes foreign deals with the countriess that negotiate with the United States for treaties and other national security commitments, what else is the public supposed to conclude? You do not need to find the secret envelope in the lock drawer to understand this arrangement He's telling you He's showing you His simple appearance is the scandal And in a healthy political system, the appearance would be enough to force retreat In this political system, the appearance has become a business model the Trump ethic. Why bother? Why bother with concealment, restraint, shame? Why bother with the norms that kept earlier presidents from doing the thing that might be technically possible, but obviously corrodes public trust Bother the pretending the presidency is not a licensing opportunity. My goodness, do you know how much money the Reagans could have made? or the Obamas Have they done this Why bother pretending the office is not a set of keys And the country is not just simply a customer base for a new CEO. That's where we are But every con does have an emotional expiration date Now with everyone, some people will never leave Some people will go down with the ship insisting that the water in the cabin is fake news as their draw roll in the gurgles, right? Oh, this is not true Political movements are not sustained just by the true believers. They require Poriphal believers, right? the ones that say, wow, I think he's kind of a I, you know, He's kind of an a ho, but he's my a ho the soft supporters People who don't read every filing but have a general feeling, well, he seems to be strong or entertaining. He's always a fighter and they're always coming after him The question is whether those people begin to feel Not outrage, but embarrassment And that's what you set Notice who wasn't with him in the fourth of July. I couldn't find many elected Republicans, Certainly not anybody that is in a swing election These people are not going to be inviting Trump Right? Nobody wanted to be standing with him when he was monetizing the fourth of July on America's two hundred fifieth birthday It's notable who didn't want to be with him outrage might be polarizing. embarrass That's corrosive embarrassment turns into distance And this is what happened to the previous Trump acts, right? Thein's not They didn't become morally worse than one day. they became bad bets. The TV show did not become fake one day, it just became stale. The brand did not collapse because everyone suddenly discovered that the cy was full of shit It collapsed because the performance stopped producing the feeling it promised Trump's political danger right now is not that people discover he's selfish. They knew that going in His danger is that the selfishness stops looking like a strength the con stops feeling like rebellion and starts feeling like a guy selling watches from the Oval Office And then of course, what he did did the two hundred fiftieth anniversary It was the easiest assignment in American politics. You are the president of the United States. The country's turning two hundred and fifty. You don't have to be brilliant You don't have to solve every division. You don't have to give the Gettysburg address. You just have to make the holiday itself bigger than you That's it. That was the entire assignment Make it about the country and not yourself. Make it about the founding and but also about the founders. Make it about people who expanded the promise of the founding Make it about the soldiers, the abolitionists, the suffragetes, the immigrants, the inventors Think about a country that has failed often and endured anyway It was a layer And Trump could not help himself He couldn't accept a bipartisan commission to run these things. He had to have his own structure his own tax task force that turned into another slush fund Of course, his alternative organization was just doing ideas that revolved around his tastes. hisis politics And he made everything about his own political brand A normal president would have looked at America's two hundred fiftieth birthday and understood the assignment. Disappear into the office, let the country be the star, let the flag be bigger than the man standing in front of it. Gerald Ford did it at the Bicentennial This president couldn't do it. He saw a stage And he believed the two hundred fiftieth birthday was his You know, what's funny is that Trump cared so little about his own people He did not heed warnings that people made about heat Washington's actual Iepeent Day Parade had to be canceled because of the heat Organized canceled that after the extreme heat warning. Temperatures are expected to push into dangerous territory all those things The city made the obvious public safety decision. Don't put people in the pavement for a parade and danger seat That's what civic institutions do. They look out for the general public Besides the celebration is not worth hurting people What was Trump's response wasn't let's be careful It was not, let's make this day about the people His response was, I'm going to talk longer It's going to be approximately one hundred and seven degrees. I'm going to go and I'm going to make it a really long speech just to show that I can do anything Again, he's not even hide it just to show that I could do anything Not to honor the country, unify the country celebrate the Declaration of Independence He just wants to use the event to show he can do anything he wants. In some ways it's a confession to Trump presidency in one sentence public safety concern becomes a masculinity fake masculinity tests A national birthday becomes his endurance stunt country's feeling it The country wanted permission to celebrate itself. It wanted a moment and Trump gave it more Trump. And so people walked away. That's why nobody showed up to this fair. That's why intendance was so poor You know, they've got to they should be thankful for all of these weather warnings because they can now hide the low attendance and the lack of interest behind that And that's the tragedy of this moment. You can't let anything just belong to the country Everything has to pass through him Even the reflecting pool, right Sometimes history is too on the nose. Trump woned the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting pool resurfaced an American flag blue. Not for a civic reason He just wanted it bloom. He looked at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting pool and saaw swimming pool And of course, he knew a guy No contr I mean, the whole thing, right? It's just an incredible metaphor. And then he's trying to blame other people, you know, sabotage makes up all sorts of fake news, right It's the perfect little Trump story. A national monument gets treated like a backdrop The public space gets turned into a branding exercise. The job itself costs more than it's promised, the result looks worse than it was promised, and then he shifts the blame to somebody else This is not just an anecdote about a pool It's been his entire philosophy By the way, the reflecting pool exists to reflect. It's supposed to reflect Lincoln the Washington Monument It's supposed to reflect the national story back at itself fllawed, solemn open to interpretation Trump looked at a reflecting pool and thought, hmm not blue enough likeike totally not even understanding. Why? it's positioned where it's positioned And then he turns it into a no bid cost overrun blame shifting fiasto He sees an institution and all he thinks is how can I brand it How I give it the Trump He never has an instinct to be a steward study. So is how does this look on television But hey, the reflecting pool story works. The naked emperor is not just naked. He's standing next to a blue reflecting pool in dangerous heat, promising a really long speech just to show he can do anything. while the country's birthday party becomes another episode of his show And then because subtlety is completely dead A bunch of white supremacists from the Patriot frront show up in Washington on july fourth I'm not saying Trump organized it. I'm not saying he invited them And I'm not implying there was any coordination You don't need to say any of it The point is simpler and more damaging moveovements here and they hear signals. and they hear permission and they knew Donald Trump. was fine if they showed us. So when a white nationalist group shows up on America's two hundred fiftieth birthday It's notether Trump sent them an invite. question is why did they feel so at home Trump's Washington. And this is where I have very little patience for the Republican Party's sudden lectures about extremism in the Democratic. There's this whole cottage industry of worried conservatives who want to tell Democrats that they aren't fighting their own insurgency hard enough. They want to lecture Democrats about the dangers of a party being pull too far to its Extreme position being captured by activists. losing touch with the mainstream of America Parties can be captured, they get captured all the time their vehicles, they're not inherently good or bad But I'm old enough to remember when the political party with the elephant is its symbol faced an insurgency of its own. And how did that go? Did they stand up Did they defend the Constitution? Did they say no to a demagogue? Did they protect the country from a cult of personality Did they put institutional responsibility above short term power They folded They negotiated, they excused, they normalized then they became. So careful of those lectures about what's happening on the left in the Democratic Party people who watch their own party become a vehicle for Donald Trump and now want to offer seminars on responsible gatekeeping. Just remember the Republican Party had a lot of chances to stop this The McCaine moment x Hollywood bone. H Sentimo The first impeachment January sixth. The second impeachment the criminal indictments The conviction The pardons There were plenty of Republicans who knew better about every one of these things Some said it privately. Some leaked their concerns anonymously, someome wrote books after they left the Senate. Some gave solemn speeches after it was too late to match But institutionally, they chose power. And that's why Trump' surviv is not just the story of Trump story about elite surrender A story of cowardice And a story about a party that decided the danger of losing its voters was worse than the danger of losing its soul And now that same party wants to warn everybody else about extremism Why might this time be different? And why are we, I think, in the end stages of the Trump era? There are three reasons. One Trump is older And old Trump had kind of a feral media instinct The older version of Trump Yes, he was cruel and reckless and all of those things, but he had a weird animal sense for the camera and what would work He knew how to manipulate the attention economy The instinct is still there, but he's a lot less sharp, right? The rallies ramble more, the explanations are weaker The spin is not as clean. the answer to financial disclosure, Everybody's profiting from it Vintage Trump would have turned the accusation into a slogan, right? Instead he just, you know The corruption now is less deniable because it's less hidden Literally it's he's admitting all of this right here. Look at how I've ripped off my own supporters by selling them Bibles and watches It's not a conspiracy theory if the form itself says it Third the country is simply t And that's the hardest thing to quantify because you can feel it. And the numbers start to support it. retty clear the country was not in the mood for a Trump branded spectacle for the fourth It wanted it wanted some reassurance and steadiness and Trump gave him more Trump. And I think it's a huge mistake. I think this is going to linger Some people are angry, he can use anger. And he can sometimes use revenge But when people are exhausted M Trump is never the solution. And the one thing And this is why I'm pretty convinced Donald Trump is not going to be remembered as a great. President. unless America gives up on history Unless we become a country that literally erases memory, manufactures mythology, and treats the archives historical archives enemies. He will not be celebrated as a great leader. He will simply be remembered as a warning. Not because historians are liberal because the record is the record. Two impeachments, january sixth, tri to overturn an election, monetize the public office, normalize political violence, constant war on truth There's no serious version of history in which that resume becomes a mount Rushmore resume And I think this is where Trump's fear really lies. He's not full of losing another election or legal accconounty. His biggest fear has always been exposure. He's got the worst foam of posure complex ever, right Exosure as in ridicule is what he fears It was always ridicule that motivated him supposedly to run for president in the first place. He didn't like that people were making fun of the guy. What a joke You can't ever be president. We only got to tell us, right The strong man is not strong in the way he said it. The winner is not winning the way he said it The emmperor has no clothes is not a legal argument So That's why I think we're here in this Jump the shhark moment He's in a humili we're in the humiliation portion The audience is finally seeing the trick and feeling stupid for clapp it I don't think this is going to end Painly It won't It's not going to end with a grand confession The strongest MAGA believers are not going to wake up and say I have reviewed the Office of Government Ethhics Disclosure form and reconsidered my life But it does end with slipperage. There's less energy, more distance, less laughter at just jokes More Republicans quietly calculating that he is a burden It's not a dramatic exit. It's people leaving before the Encore. We've seen this. People leave his rallies earlier It's why the Gary Busy image is where I'm going here. And it's the one thing I want to leave you with is Gary Busy. It ends when the desperation becomes visible. when the guest stars get weirder. when the format gets louder when the producers keep adding spectacle because the core thing no longer works That's why Trump is politically vulnerable in this moment He is suddenly doing things that are out of care It's not because he's doing things that are out of character He's actually being more trrumpy than ever. The problem is they look like reruns. It's the version we always knew was there is all we're seeing seeeeing the fun guy. The good salesman, the interesting marketer. It's just the grifter in all of its glory Now look, if you want to be skeptical Trust me, we've've earned that right We've all watched Trump survive things that should have ended any other political career ten times over. But at some point every spell breaks At some point the audience stops mistaking shamelessness for strength Trump has spent ten years testing this electric fence. touched it with McCain, notothing Axis Hollywood, notothing. Russia, Ukraine, january sixth. get you get the point Maybe this time the shock is not going to be a dramatic bolt Maybe it is a buzz or a humg But it's the sound of people finally saying Because explaining the failure, the Trump years are going to be quite easy. explaining why it took so long is going to be harder How did a country this wealthy, this educated This historically mature fall for this not once but twice How did a republic built around suspicion of kings become so fascinated by a man who wanted to be treated. How did millions of people who said they hated elites turn themselves Over to a golden penhouse salesman who sold them coins, watches, Bibles, and greevs And how did a political party that claimed to love the Constitution become a protection racket for a man who tried to overturn an election That's going to be the questions historians ask and the answers are not going to be. Exhaustion. The audience has seen the trick, The brand is overextended. The con is just too visible So the jump the shark moment is not when Trump becomes someone else It is when everyone can finally see that he has always been exactly this. A man who confuses attention with love Money with somehow merit and dominance with greatness country with himself. And I have a feeling Every day, more people are starting to see the difference So is this the beginning of the end? No, I think that's already happened. Are we in the middle of the end that's probably the fast look at this. But we are closer to the end. than we are at the beginning Let's sneakaking a break. I know I had a lot to say there, but Boy, this In some ways, a lot happened over five days And we've he helped paint a picture of a president who just doesn't even care what it looks like, that what he's doing is what now it looks like So we'll sneak in a break and we'll come back inside the New York Times with managing editor Carol Ran. Horseshoe Online Casino has a special offer for you, New Jersey. New users can get five hundred bonus spins in their first month on games like Huff and lots of puff and more. It's simple and rewarding to play your casino favorites. Download and play today. Must be twenty one plus and physically present in New Jersey. mininimum wagering within five days required to unlock bonuses. Full terms and wagering requirements at horseshoenlinecasino dot com slash promos. If you are someone you know is a gambling problem, call one eight hundred gambler This is Ke Miller from OK Storyime. So I have a furry friend named Mia to me. She's more than a pet, she's practically family Part of that love is what's best for them And for my dog, that includes the best diet. At Jinx, all dogs deserve to eat well. Jinx has premium all natural food to transform your dog's health and happiness, no matter your dog's size or age. Jinx never has any fillers like corn, wheat, or soy. For Mia, she loves the mini biscuits the most. Jinx offers plenty of healthy and fun options for your dog. Shop at national retailers like Walmart, Petmart, Chheewy, or Amazon This is Tony Yeo from The Re Report with Tonyo and Uncle Murdder. You ever notice how everything keeps going up, rent's going up, streaming services are going up? Even your favorite burrito spot suddenly thinks Ssa should cost extra. But with Boost Mobile, you and your phone bill don't have to play the Will's go up soon game because Boost Mobile has an unlimited talk, text and data plan at a price That'll never go up. It's the same price you'll pay for life, meaning you're set to never worry about your bill increasing again for as long as you're on the plane. While the world keeps finding new ways to nickel and dime you, Boostce Movul gives you unlimited wireless at one set price for life. Imagine something in your budget actually staying the same. You'll pay the same for unlimited wireless When you're posting mirror selfies in your twenties and when you're posting mirror selfies in retirement, S things never change. Switch now for unlimited wireless at a price that'll never go up only at Boost mobile. After thirty gigabytes, customers may experience slower speeds. customers will pay twenty five dollars a month as long as they remain active on a Boost unlimited plan How do you want to spend your D? At Brightview Senior Livving commommunities, you decide and will take care of the rest. Pamper yourself at the salon and pursue your creative passions. Toast with your friends at happappy Hour and savor chef prepared meals, close out the day with a concert just down the hall from your apartment, or simply relax. The choice is yours Enjoy the comforts of home and the security of award winning care. Discover the possibilities at brightviewseniorliving. com So join me now is Carolyn Ryan. Ive had parallel tracks at major big news organizations, covering politics, covering Washington. Carolyn is the managing editor for the New York Times overseeing the Washington Bureau of Politics Um And as you said, New York, I mean What does that mean, Carlyn? when you say you over say New York? Is it New York City Bureau stuff, political or is it more than that Well, there's first of all, thanks for having me on So there we have about sixty staffers on our metro department. So that's really, you know, that's crime transportation politics Quite frankly, the last six months, even more have been politics I mean Nework pololitics, I have to tell you, my very first job at the New York Times, I came from the Boston Globe was New York politics editor. So it was Bloomberg, It was Charlie Wangle, It was Spitzer, it was Hillary Clinton And it was the best job And because New York has this outsize kind of drama to it and personality. And once again, you have this movement that is emanating from New York and kind of an earthquake in terms of the New York primary And it's fascinating to me right now You know, Adam NcGurnney who got his start covering Albany You know? Yeah. would tell me all the time. He said, politics was so much more fun. And of course, he has war stories that go back when Tim Russard was a political operative and he goes Mario Com. You have no idea right, you know, type of thing. Anddam I have some great stories that I'll never share that came from Adam about Tim's days as a political operative. They're fantastic. But so look, you guys are I want to talk a little bit. we talk about independent media, right? The most successful independent news organization we have in the country is the New York Times right now. You guys are are on one hand it setting the bar high and well and the only thing I think that we're all concerned about is that you're alone And that, you know, because, you know, You know, one isn't enough, right? You need We need independent news organizations to feel empowered up and down up and down the food chain, if you will, of this Um What do you see as the state of independence journalism at the moment you know, I've always said the best time to get into journalism is actually when it's in a in a downturn. That's how I've been trying to tell young people, don't give up on us. This is actually the best time to jump up. This is how I got my break. But How do you see the state and what what what are What are some positives and what concern you Yeah. It's a great question. and I think like you, I kind of obsessed about the state of local media, especially. I came out of small papers in Massachusetts, came up to the Boston Gobe U And you grew up in Massachusetts? Yeah, I grew up on the south shore and started covering small town life there. My big break, I should tell you, Chuck Ted Kennedy was running for reelection in nineteen ninety four. Nobody wanted to cover him in the newsroom because he always cruised to reelection. I put my hand up And that was the year a man named Mitt Romney decided to run against him. So it became a natural suest. So U But here's the thing, you know, the Times is has a set of principles that guide us and whatever you think of the times or their opinion page The without feair favor is who we are And the notion of being independent of any party, of any ideology is something that the owners of this paper, of this news organization truly believe. But it's also those are the values that we really look to instill. in people who come to work here who might not have had the benefit of working at the Boston Globe or roll call or coming up in these ways And it's really learning You know, fact based, independent reporting and helping inform a public at a time when algorithms and social media tend to reward very different value systems, if you can even call it value systems One of the things that I always say the biggest thing I miss about being at a big news organization is the resources Um, you know, and it is it's something as much as You know, I can sit here and beat my chest about my independence. and there is a lot to it U There are things I cannot I would like to do a dive on this, but you know, I'm in the middle of also starting trying to, you know, run a business over here and do all this and I I don't have U the research department or I don't have this collaboration of a bureau where I can, you know, Or I can take two months off to do this. Um, this is what a really good independent news organization can do. And my concern right now is that I think the Wall Street Journal has resources and they use them. I think the post has resources. and I hope they're going going to continue to use them. We can I think more of their issues are on the opinion side than anywhere else these days And a little bit of the identity crisis that the Waston Post goes through every decade. Are we a local paper? A We're national paper? You know, you guys gave up being a local paper long ago I'm teasing So I would love for you to explain just the level of resources that you have as a reporter at the times that you really don't have anywhere else. Well, it was really kind of moving last week. Someone you and I both know Jonathan Swan. We had a book party because Maggie Habrerman and Jonathan Swan have this book about the Trump administration and he was reflecting on something that I think a lot of journalists think about these days, which is do you go to a substack or do kind of a newsletter go truly independent. But the things that come into play when you're doing independent reporting, especially hard reporting, investigative resources Frankly, legal resources now. That's This is People, I work on that harder than anything else and it's the hardest nut to crack Right. I know journalists who do a lot of Epstein reporting literally can't get insured because they do upstandate reporting. That's exactly right. I mean, the other resources that are sort of breathtaking at a place like the Times that really invests in journalism Um video investigations, being able to look at satellite imagery in the middle of a war and guide people into where attacks are being placed, having investigative teams, not just in New York, but overseas, having them in Washington, some of our best stuff, which I know you know, Eric Lipton and others about Trump and the ways that he has benefited and really his fortune has ballooned during this administration. That takes a lot of time It takes a lot of time to do really deep stuff as Sue Craig did on Trump's taxes in the beginning of all of this. It takes time even we can talk about this We had a breakthrough story on the Platina race talking to women who had dated him You know, you know as well as I do, like that's a long time talking to people. They might lead lot of lawyering too, a lot of legal. We have We're lucky to have the best, I think, legal team. And I have to say, Chuck, when Trump was running again and some of the threats were beginning They really got ready and some of the stuff that we're seeing now play out at the Pentagon and elsewhere, you know, they were really kind of looking at scenarios. And and when you talk about are we alone Uh You know, it's really important right now for news organizations like ours and others to come together in these moments and stand up for these basic values and kind of issues of access. And so some of that has been heartening when people do. Some of it's been a little disheartening when some of The Some of our traditional allies have not been there Interesting Um I hear you on that. And I've looked, there are other news organizations And this has been look, the I hate sounding like Um, some sort of radical on this I do now see that a publicly traded company owning a news organization, if it is not their primary business puts that new news organization in a vulnerable position. And I've watched other news organizations pull back in certain ways And it's very subtle Um whether it's, you know, having people tell reporters don't do shouted questions when you're in the pool Don't be the person that asks a certain question of the day, Don't create a confrontation And I understand the business side of it. Like, I'm not I'm crazy. and I think these there' been I look at these big media companies, you know, I'm what Disney ended up doing was a disaster for all of us. It hurt all of us. I think Iiger now knows this I think that's why Disney's fighting it fighting what's going on at the FCC now They made aistake. I appreciate that they learned from their mistake that not standing up and fighting that Stehanopouolis lawsuit damaged all of us abbsolutely had a big impact. I don't think that was the intent But they had shareholders, and I get it. And I I really Oh no, I mean, look, you guys are a publicly traded company But there is this sort of independent ownership structure It does seem as it and you don't have other businesses that are bigger revenue streams than the business that you have, correct I think that's a really good point. I mean, the Salzberger family, I think, is ride or die with the mission of. They will die on this hill. They are very committed to it. And that's a family that, you know, for generations has been there. The other thing, as you say, they are not looking to get government contracts. They're not looking to go to space. you know, they not to take anything away from people who are, but they are not what they care about And what is their identity? Their identity is journalism. Their identity is the New York Times in a way that is deeper, I think It's not a diversified business in that sense. and it's no question like where the values are. So I think that's right. And I think your observation is correct. I do have to say and you're a student of this as well, there are some good things happening around the country just in terms of nonprofit news organizations was ve grown up in newsrooms like ours and are, you know, going to places where good journalism is really needed. And I think readers reward that and they know what is straight up good journalism. and so Part of what we're trying to do, you know, you probably know this, but we have a Dean Backay, our former editor is doing a bunch of investigative projects around the country Yeah local news organizations, we do it I love that you're doing this. I mean, look, it's what Pro publica started doing this and and I'm so glad you guys are are doing this. I will tell you You know, what look, I think I've said it out loud. I don't care. I hope somebody steals the idea. You know, my goal is to figure out How do you network How do we create a cooperative? You know, in the history of media, the UPI was a cooperative. It wasn it wasn't like a nonprofit like AP. It was actually a for profit cooperative, and literally it was trading resources and it was a way for individual local news organizations to have some sort of national identity when they needed it or some sort of resource when they needed it, but everybody also individually owned their own IP. And individually, you know, I would love to see us be able to build a robust independent network. and I think you guys have this ability. frankly to essentially help grow a network. you don't have to own it In fact, I don't I think it's bad if it's the New York Times owns local news organization acts. It is more that the New York Times is supportive of this cooperative of shared resources, of making sure there's legal insurance for small local independent news organizations that can't afford that policy, but maybe as a collective can, right think that's what's needed in order to boost this. So I'm glad You know, the more We can raise the profile this of these independent locals, the better Yeah. I mean, I think that's right. and you know, there are small ways, there are big ways. I mean, even doing you probably saw this, but like some of our polling for the midterms Yeah have been huge partnerships with locals. Yeah. Yeah. the Portland Press Herald would not have access to that kind of and we're glad to do it. We did something in Pennsylvania the same way And you know, at the same time, we're also building hubs in some of these places like Texas where we need to get deeper into news, state politics, etcetera. because our readers are demanding it. So That's a big part of our investment You brought up Maggie and Jonathan Haber Swan It's that it you know, ye. I love that there port one too. That's great. moveo over Woodstein. We now have paper swwamp I'm There's the there's there's always and it's just in journalism circles. Hey did they hold their scoops for their book or this and Look, I don't even think it's a close call I am on the side of This is much more powerful coming out in one book than it would be because You know, I'm of two minds in most Trump books Yeah, tell me what There it is There are a ton of them And I always say every book's the same in one respect You won't believe what he tried to do, you won't believe what How he stopp how he was stopped or why, you know, there's always the there's this, you know, and it's always like so and so actually stopped him and you're like, so and so. I didn't think so and so would do that, right? There's there's a little bit of that. And then there's the And that there's frankly There are new anecdotes. doesn't it isn't necessarily a new understanding Does that make sense? Like and that is the most fascinating thing about this book is that if you covered the first term very closely Yeah Nothing in here is I don't want to say news is the wrong way. I't want to call it non news. It is news None of this is surprising. It's almost like Well, yeah, that's exactly what we saw that you saw, that's what he was hoping to do then and he couldn't quite do it. Now he did it, right? It is It is certainly you see the culmination of everything he tried to do in his first term And I think that what I give I am glad this is on the record on account, but Explain your policy What is that balance? How much did you have Maggie and Jonathan check in with you? How often did they say, hey, we have we have something here Did you rely on them to come to you when they thought, hey, we shouldn't hold this Or did youu regularly check in on them Right. peopleeople ask about this First of all, I just have to say I don't know if you've had a chance to read the book yet, because in the middle of it. It, it's wonderfully written to. It's a nice read. it's yeah And the level of detail, the description of these scenes is I feel like the thing that it makes me think about is Robert Carro just in terms of recreating like you are in the situation room. And by the best compliment they could get is that. The Trump White House tried to create a rumor that there's a secret recording and you're like, oh, so it was that accurate. Anyway. that was pretty nice. Maggie and Jonathan, as you know are singular reporters. I don't think there's anyone like them right now. And I feel like part of what you see with them coming forward, you know, in some of the excerpts we' run, but certainly in the book, is just the um, way inside this orbit I mean, for me, and this goes to your question about us talking we are talking to them constantly. Maggie is probably know Even when she's on book leave, she has more bylines than like most ordinary reports. She is just constantly She's a sccoot machine and that doesn't her brain does not turn off So if you look at even the time she was on Bookle, scoop after scoop. And so for me, the best example when people ask about this and you saw it was u The reporting that they did on the run up to the war, Netanyahu, inside the situation room and what was said To me, that was revelatory and eye opening. and they broke that in our paper You know months before the book, I think came out last week and that was back in March, I think. So they did that But how did that develop? Was that just more of you guys, you guys were constantly going, Hey, this this We gott to do this because we're about to go to war We ha't explained how we got. Yeah, I think it was six weeks after the war started and they got So it felt incredibly timely and urgent. And as you know, when you're writing a book, you're having all these conversations, but you also have to fact check like crazy, especially you're publish something, you know, in the New York Times There's just a whole process to confirmation of that stuff. So they were doing it in real time, breaking off pieces. and this was one where they really let us know. and that felt like it landed, you know, when the country was really grappling with How the hell did we get here? What were the decision points? Well, here's the reporting in real time. So you know, there's a level of depth that comes with book reporting and there's a level of candor that sometimes you can get. That' right U and u I feel like they are sort of u model journalists in the way that they balance both you know, breaking timely news, but also delivering a book as you say that like has a certain impact and it felt to me like There was a frame and an arc to that story And just a precision of the reporting that you just don't see anywhere else. I mean, even when the u people are inside the situation room talking about the Epstein files and like what to do about their boss and he's in there and U there's just to me it was very eye opening. And you know, frankly, there's nobody like them Horseshoe Online Casino has a special offer for you, New Jersey. New users can get five hundred bonus spins in their first month on games like Huff and lots of puff and more. It's simple and rewarding to play your casino favorites. Download and play today. Must be twenty one plus and physically present in New Jersey. minimum wagering within five days required to unlock bonuses. Full terms and wagering requirements at horseshoe onnlinecasino dot com slash promos If you are someone you know is a gambling problem, call one eight hundred gambler Ke Miller from OK Storytim So I have a furry friend named Mia to me. She's more than a pet, she's practically family Part of that love is what's best for them And for my dog, that includes the best diet. At Jinx, all dogs deserve to eat well. Jinx has premium all natural food to transform your dog's health and happiness no matter your dog's size or age. Jinx never has any fillers like corn, wheat, or soy. For Mia, she loves the minitti biscuits the most. Jinx offers plenty of healthy and fun options for your dog. Shop at national retailers like Walmart, Petmart, Chheewy, or Amazon This is Tony Yeo from The Re Report with Tonyo and Uncle Murdder. You ever noticice how everything keeps going up, rent's going up, streaming services are going up? Even your favorite burrito spot suddenly think Ssa should cost extra. 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No, and I guess what what I would say to anybody that's like saying that they they held for the book, and I would say is If the point is to make sure people are reading your work and consuming your work And if these are vital stories for understanding where the Republic stands literally at this moment book is the more impactful way to do that Yeah. Yeah. I mean, u It's an interesting question for us because You know, the The number of people who write books on our staff, You know, I got to the Times in zero seven and it's definitely more Doesn't the book deal come with the Times hiring? I'm half kidding right. But certainly plenty of Times reporters want to believe that, right? And so s I think you're about to bring up something that I am curious about, which is You've got a lot of reporters that want to write a book You know, you can't let them all go on Bookleave at the same time, you know? And and so that has to also be a balance, correct Yeah, that's that is a real balance and also u You know, there it's kind of fascinating to me just the kindinds of people go through a little process here if they want to write a book Some people are covering beat like Trump and they're like, I want to go deeper on this and here's how I want to do it. and here's how I'll manage my beat Some people are saying I cover this beat And actually I want to spend a year writing about Buddhist poetry and Please give me time to do that so that my brain won't hurt in the same way. so and we've had people write novels U we've had, you know, people go into, you know, you probably know u Sleichmann is in trouble, Taffy. Nner wrote this novel that became a streaming series. So now you have the inter of Hollywood and So it's not like It's not like it was when I was coming up in kind of small time journalism Right Um Let's talk about what you guys are doing in polling You know, it's funny, you've been at the times a long time and I'll just be honest before this partnership with Santa Time's reputation in polling was not good is not cling community U It's national bl was not great. It was that CBS partnership. It was always There were more outliers that always felt like coming out of the tie. It was the one of the I remember back in the old Holid days it would be like, what it is that Why does they Gest news organization put up with this. That just that would be our sort of. And look, you guys done to me a dramatic one hundred and eighty. It's a much more rigorous. polling unit you've created Nate Cohn really works hard on these things as more news organizations can't afford quality state polls, I mean, right now, it's you and ARP If I didn't have you ARP and occasionally, the Fox News polling unit, who I think is a very good polling unit They're the only ones doing quality state level polling. This is pretty expensive stuff And you can easily have a bean counter say to you, you're not getting your bang for your buck here Oh yeah. I mean, this is a big investment area. There are a few investment areas. I should probably mention. one is polling, one is data. And u we can get to video, which is another huge area of expansion. But it's really important for us because We have, I think Chuck You know, I'm just thinking about midterm cycles. I think we're spending double on polling right now. That's an investment that the publisher was willing to make. And it's partly because like other organizations, we set up a poll tracker. Let's see what's happening in Michigan. You know, you look at quality polling. Yeah, that's right. No you have it's usually a bunch of partisan polls that you kind of have to like, okay You know, how much do I weigh this, you know, you know, all that stuff? And you get really flukey stuff and you sense how hungry the electorate and the people who care about politics in that state are and they stop they start sharing their own internals and you feel kind of lost. Now the good thing for us is it feels like we can go out into these states. you saw we just did the six areas where the Democrats are hoping to make there are two states that I You didn't do that I I would like, where's that state? you know, Michigan and Nebraska Nebraska is interesting. Hint in, whereere's my Michigan numbers? I know you There's no way you're skipping Michigan. I'm waiting to see what you guys are doing with Michigan here. but anyway. U But in terms of polling, look, the part of it is obviously these races are of huge consequence in what happens in the midterms and in terms of the Trump agenda is huge. But honestly, it's also a way for us to take the temperature on these other issues that our reers are so interested in. I mean, you've seen this, but the The Shift on Israel is like something I haven't experienced in a very long time. The only thing that has moved this fast culturally is same sex marriage. Same sex marriage. Yeah.' sort of something that was a given and then sudenly wasn't Right type of thing, right where everybody was over here and then suddenly everybody went over here. It is I can't it's about That's always been the that always always the issue. I always say what's is anything moved fast? It's like that is something that moved fast. I mean, we were banning them inzero four banning same sex marriage in every swing state that like every single this is two thousand four. This was I always say. this was nineteen eighty four, you knowight And and literally by two thousand four U twelve, it's legal everywhere, you know.me But the Israel thing is especially interesting, as you can imagine being here in New York you know, where it was an issue on some of the college campuses, the protests. there's a significant Jewish dememographic in terms of the electorate and the history of who represents New York and kind of the support for Israel and just watching that get Wobbly and then the distance now is something that has been very eye opening. but I do think Caron, very recently, I was covering I was in New York, covering a pretty big gathering of sort of Jewish activists Yeah And they did their shout out to the local officials that showed up for it and there was one And I was like, there was one. Im And it was like one of those, I'm like, you know, literally in nineteen ninety seven It would have taken an hour to read every local elected official that showed up to this the Sen eents. And it was just, you could see this is This is shifted not just in the grassroots, but also in that sort of elite circles too in. Right, right U So some of the so some of that investment that we're making is to pick up on those things and to help reporters dig deeper You probably saw Shane Goldmarker had a pretty good story where he went deep on this whole question of and the working class and kind of whereere are the shifts happening now in terms of is Trump losing support among the voters that shifted toward him just as recently as twenty twenty four. U And you know, I gota mention as we're talking about polls and politics We got to tell these stories in ways that are accessible a new generation of news consumers. So a big area where we're investing in terms of politics, but in terms of news internationally and elsewhere is video. likeike you got to be able to put Nate Cohn on video and explain to you what's going on and why they should care And to do that in a way that's concise and authoritative. And so I think Monthly now, we're doing about seventy five hours of video, which is a huge increase. And so the newsroom has really embraced it. I think there was eually, you know, people were a little tentative or as you know You gott to be there. No, I I, you know, I tell myself, I have to tell remind myself of the break I caught So when we started a political website in partnership when I was back at National Journal We started it in partnership with the Washington Post and ABC News and Nsek. This is in nineteen ninety five, nineteen ninety six And the dirty little secret was noobbody at the Washington Post, ABC, or Newsweek wanted to write for the internet So it was twenty three year old me that got to write for the internet. And it was a whole bunch of us twenty somethings that got to write for the internet because none of them under the auspices of this political website of the Washington Post, ABC News and Newswek, and you know, it's a story I like to tell Like I have to tell myself, don't be a snob about technology. The biggest problem in journalism is and I do it, I'm like I roll my eyes at tech Right I fully confess, right? Oh geez. or really, I got to do an what do I what is what's the best way to do WhatsApp? What? you know? and like I, you know, I get the and I'm like, yeah and David Broder thought writing for the interternet was a waste of time in nineteen ninety five, right? Like, you know, so I, you know, I don't want to be that that guy. And I think every I think now more and more journalists realize that you got to Gott to be platform neutral. . And I say that and I have yet to on a Twitch stream. have you No no, but I'm waiting for you The most, I think that last year I think this is wrong, but maybe in the last sixteen months or so, one of the most watched videos was Maggie Haberman after Trump got initially convicted in his New York trial. And she was just walking you through what happened in the courtroom, what it meant. And you think what you have to do is like you got to take, you got to marry the expertise of reporters like that with the forms that feel accessible to whatever generation of readers. And so we're always trying new things. We're always looking for ways to reach new audiences And you're absolutely right. I mean, even like newsletters, bringing people into what we are doing and making them feel like The New York Times is a place that is helpful for their understanding of the world Let's talk about two sort of perception challenges and some of them are real challenges and some of them are just perceived and sort of manufactured And ninety percent of the criticism of the coverage of the times is usually through the prism of the oped page and the editorial page. It is not about the actual reporting or the journalists. It is about the perception, right? I mean, trust me, I sort of experienced this myself through the prism of NBC versus MSNBC, right which we had this naive notion, Oh, MSBC is just the op ed page of NBC N news, sry We tried that spin for a while. That didn't work out so well Um But h shouldh the opinion section be spot off completely and it should be still branded New York Times opinion Should it be merged? I will tell you where I struggle. and I say this as a reader I know there's a bright line between the editorial side and the opinion side. But if I consume the app, I love the app. I think you guys are the best app of all of them because there's still this feeling of scrolling through a newspaper. in that I can go section to section. I enjoy accidentally reading stuff. I miss that. That'sity I love it So that's the beauty of this But you guys spend a lot of time promoting the opinion section It's clearly a traffic driver And so that's always like becausecause to me, audience capture is a concern and any of us doing this in this news independent news world, which is where suddenly your audience is pushing you away from certain stories because they won't like it if you go down that road versus you know, if you go right, there's all this. So What are your safeguards And would you like to see more of a brighter line publicly between the opinion section because you guys merge it and sometimes I always say, you know, the photos of the opinion writers seem to be bigger than the photos of the journalists. And I'm always like, I'd rather to me, the journalists are the stars of the times, but I'm I I'm a wantan to be being Stain Rrench. they're sometimes better looking in their photos. I got to say a couple of things. One, I just want to say one thing on audience capture because I think about this a lot M There are a lot of things you can criticize New York Times for and people do. they have strong feelings about it. I do think We are not We are a place that is sending people to the Congo for Ebola. where people we cover classical music. we are not guided by audience capture. We're lucky to have this business structure where you know, where I'm not looking to as a reporter, say, I have to get my clicks or I have to get page views or something. That's not the value system I would say this about u The um The opinion content is is an important way for people to understand our analysis of the world and to come to familiar voices. many of you, many of whom you know, like a'mie dowed on a Saturday, people w However I do think that what you're dririving at is that we need to do a better job. If someone like you who's very sophisticated and lives in the news world you know, you have this observation, people who are far less sophisticated about what is the New York Times understand the difference. And it's something that we're really working on. We have Pat Healy, who, you know, is, you know, doing We've got to sort of guide the reader a little bit more. One thing we did, we made some changes to the design of the opinion content to try to distinguish it more from news You know, the place where I really noticed it Yeah After Biden's disastrous debate performance with Trump You sort of had a number of opinion call on this coming out and saying, you know, Biden she needs to step aside. So there was kind of a parade of that And so what should that look like on the app and making sure that that feels different from our news coverage, which was also very dynamic So you know,re we are the beneficiaries of having a very well resourced newsroom and a very well resourced opinion. department But I think you're getting at something important, which is articulating what is different Horseshoe Online Casino has a special offer for you, New Jersey. New users can get five hundred bonus spins in their first month on games like Huff and lots of puff and more. It's simple and rewarding to play your casino favorites. Download and play today. Must be twenty one plus and physically present in New Jersey. minimum wagering within five days required to unlock bonuses. Full terms and wagering requirements at horseshoe onnlinecasino dot com slash promos. If you or someone you know is a gambling problem, call one eight hundred gambler This is Kea Miller from OK Storyime So, I have a furry friend named Mia to me. She's more than a pet, she's practically family Part of that love is what's best for them. And for my dog, that includes the best diet. At Jinx, all dogs deserve to eat well. Jinx has premium all natural food to transform your dog's health and happiness, no matter your dog's size or age. Jinx never has any fillers like corn, wheat, or soy. For Mia, she loves the minittie biscuits the most. Jinx offers plenty of healthy and fun options for your dog. Shop at national retailers like Walmart, Petmart, Chheewy, or Amazon This is Tony Yeo from the Re Report with Tonyo and Uncle Murdder. You ever notice how everything keeps going up, rents going up, streaming services are going up? Even your favorite burrito spot suddenly thinks Sosa should cost extra. But with Boost Mobile, you and your phone bill don't have to play the willill's go up soon game because Boost Mobile has an unlimited talk, text and data plan at a price That'll never go up. It's the same price you'll pay for life, meananing you're set to never worry about your bill increasing again for as long as you're on the plane. While the world keeps finding new ways to nickel and dime you, Boostce Movul gives you unlimited wireless at one set price for life. Imagine something in your budget actually staying the same. You'll pay the same for unlimited wireless When you're posting mirror selfies in your twenties and when you're posting mirror selfies in retirement, S things never change. Switch now for unlimited wireless at a price that'll never go up only at Boost mobile. After thirty gigabytes, customers may experience slower speeds. customers will pay twenty five dollars a month as long as they remain active on a Boost unlimited plan Experience vibrant senior Living with award winning services at Brightview Senior Living Communities At Brightview, our residents enjoy resort style amenities, daily programs, exciting social and cultural events, and delicious chef prepared meals That's not all. Brightview residents also enjoy complimentary transportation, safety, security, and high quality care if needed In Brightview, Senior Living Communities. Learn more about the possibilities at brightviewseniorliving d. com Well we saw with the Nick Kristkov controversy. And I think the question was are the standards at the opinion section when it comes to fact checking, you know, how much do we know for sure it's the same standards, right? Be we know and I think It to me was a fair question to ask if you're from the outside because we know A columnist gets a bit more leeway than somebody writing even news analysis, right? A Peter Baker news analysis piece is going to get the fact checker scrutiny that and I'm not saying fact checks aren't getting the scrutiny on the opinion page, but there's sort of that there's a it's just slightly different. I mean, you know And so But is it? you know, in that specific case Was the good old fashioned New York Times fact checkers on this or was it was it treated slightly differently Yeah, the I mean, I'm obviously not involved in the production of the opinion pieces or Nick piece. I know that they they obviously have spoken to this and they have a u checking system. I think what you're getting at is a little bit different, which is point of view Uh and coming at something and presenting it It's not so much, do they have fact checkers? It's presenting something with a point of view and through that framework. That's the essence of what they do. What we're doing is obviously something different No, and I just think that that the problem is, I know you're doing that. I went through this argument all the time internally. Yeah. And it took frankly, and NBC didn't act until it's been too late, right? They didn't spin off M NBC until it was too late, I think personally. But it was the same issue, which is, we know there's a difference What does the public see Right? What is the, you know, and I always said the peacock was on m show and the Peacock was on Rachel's show. and the Pacock was and there are plenty of people who don't see the distinction Why are we making the viewer do more work or the reader do more work to understand your system, right? type of thing. And that's always to me, that's the line I feel like you have to you have to find it And find a way to walk Well, I get that, I mean, part of what you're getting at is news literacy and part of what we need to do better. I think and what we are investing in doing better is telling our story, you know basically explaining and describing how we do our work U and it's sort of amazing to me still How many people imagine that reporters are at their desk coming up with takes when they're out, you know in the country or they're out on Capitol Hill and they are checking things with with sources and but we have we, you know, I need to cock to it. I've been in this business for a while. I don't think we've done a great job of explaining what it means to be a reporter what it means to confirm facts, what it means to get a story ready for a place like NBC or the New York Times. And that's partly why we are trying to You know, be really forthright Some of the videos that we're doing, frankly, are just explaining what we do and want in answering the kinds of questions that you have, like about like how do we handle it when someone wants to write a book it was As you know, on social media, some narrative will take hold and it could be wildly off But it's up to us to Respond What are the other U, things that I think I worry about with myself and my own coverage, is geography capture, if you will, right. And that is You know, I've often I've often joked if the capital of the media world were Topeka instead of New York City, I promise you the coverage of religion would be different That's right in that because you just the local culture of church going and stuff would be different. It would sort of its way into the system, right? So Um I have been heartened by one of the trends that I've noticed at the times, which is that you are trying to have people geographically located outside of the Acela Cridor. like whether it's try to remember the reporter, but there was one of your public reporters based in Cincinnati And I'm like, good. I want to know that your industrial Midwest reporter actually lives in the industrial Midwest, right? And those sort of things How much are you doing that? What is your balance of political staff not based in DC Nework versus based in DC and New York I mean, this is a huge effort of ours and frankly, an obsession of mine. the kinds of conversations that you and I have had this conversation years ago in different ways backack when we were both sort of, is there ways we can work together better? Like is can we do some things because we had the same issue. We wanted to be We you know, we had our Mbed program that was that had a lot of success with it. and you guys did I mean, we were constantly worried about this issue. But back then, you still felt, like you needed a lion share of these reporters in your own newsroom in New York and DC, right? You couldn't afford to let them live in these other locations I sense that's changed. That's changed. And you mentioned religion. I mean, one of our best reporters, Ruth Graham is down in Texas She covers uh, you know, mainly covers Christianity and B. contxts that she has with ministers, with pastors, with heads of Ces congregations, members of congregations, the conversations that she has, you know, you call Rh Graham and she's sitting in the kitchen of a pastor of a church who's going to be in a story. And it's just a different level of trust. It's just a different level of familiarity. The people we have in Georgia You know, the investment that we've made there and in some of the other states like in the SEC corridor, which you're familiar with It just it really makes a difference. And then when something happens, like in Rome, Georgia, when they had the COVID outbreak or some of the political fights, you know, you have a different level of granularity. These are people who are living in these places. They know the cost of living in these places. They know frankly, where the traffic , you know, problems are the airport, it's just a different context So I think Arthur Sulzwg AG is really thoughtful about this. We want to be everywhere And we don't want to be what they used to call a toe touch. You know, Johnny Apple would come in and parachute in and and they did change the byline. There it is, you know in Saratoga, you whatever. And readers see through that, you know, immediately. So it really matters if you're in places like Ohio, if you're in places like Western Pennsylvania And readers sense it and It's it's actually good for us it's it's kind of a way of giving a reporter an experience and also hiring people. We're hiring people who are in Texas, who know Texas Right. You know and it's really helping our coverage overall. Well, and I'm just going to be cass about it. It's when you're in when you're kind of by yourself. in a geographic location away from the main The main parts of where the decisions are being made and stuff. You really find out who can sink or swim and you realize, I mean, the stars you develop and the stars we were able to develop with our embeds, like we just throughre these, you know,, obviously you try to hire people that you thought could be could handle it But you know Every best pter that we were able to develop over the last twenty years Almost all of them came through our MBedT program because frankly they had to go and They had to go do that. And I'm like, you just have to go start meeting people. I'll give you four or five people to start calling. But after that, just, you know, go go, go, go go. and It's a great way to separate, you know, basically the career journalists from those that Don't have it That's exactly right. those and you know, we we elevated somebody out of Florida and you know, the politics editors saying how they knew she would do so well Because the way that she owned Florida and that system like she knew everyone, she knew how to get to them, she knew who to trust. And like, you know, I felt like people who came out of Massachusetts and New York politics, you got to see a little bit of what they could do. And so we want to do that all over the country and we're lucky enough to have kind of areas where we're growing these hubs And that to me is the future and and we can also work in partnership with some of the locals organizations. Where are you strongest outside of New York? and where are you looking for Where do you where you this is your time to ask your bosses fite publicly for more investment. Where do you feel a little underserved Look, I love that we're investing in Texas for a couple of reasons. I think it is the best story right now just in terms of the future of America where things are going. You sort of have everything there. You got urban, you got agricultural, you got demographic groups Um, so we're creating a news hub there U So that means that you'd be doing deeper political stories, but you also the news of the day, if something happens, people who know those comm who know Houston or Fort Worth going to be on it So to me, that's a really good model. So you'll get a Texas perspective on a spike in gas prices as well as your sort of The typical stuff that had been done. And I know that that seems like a silly thing, but geographic diversity and reacting to a story, I mean, that's the American political electorate. You got to have those things. I mean, the other places where we're doing that are like agricultural manufacturing. You know, we're strong in the southeast part of the US and we're getting stronger and stronger in the Midwest. Minnesota Certainly like Wisconsin, Jilly Bosman can kind of own Wisconsin. So some of those areas, the Mountain West is also like generationally and growth wise, a really important area for us So it feels to me like a true national strategy. You want to have somebody in every state U and you want to keep developing the next generation of journalists and instilling those values out there Um I think one of the hardest things to do right now in covering Washington and the Trump administration is deal dealing with a source that you know is lying to you But it is the on the record statement. it is the or even on background explanations. And certainly you guys do a good job of identifying, you know, here's, you know, it'll be this. and then here's this, you know, statement from them I think this has been a very difficult thing for all of us in journalism to convey the sort of This is unprecedented This is unique, this is different. this is Am And I know I'm out of vocabulary you know, type of thing And You know, there's always been this pressure you guys get put under Just say it Say it in the lead of the story, you know, the Trump administration lied about this today, you know? And you're like, look The L word is a, you know, That's motive And, you know I'm I'm always you know You know, you got to you can't none of us know how to crawl inside other people's heads, right You know, we don't know. Is somebody misleading us on purpose? Maybe they've been misled, right? There's always there's a potential explanation in you, the journalists can't eliminate any of the outcomes. Yeah. bike There's a pattern here. Right And we know there's a pattern here. And while you can show a pattern maybe every once in a while, like Peter Baker will do terrific, you know, news or news analysis that sort of strings all this together. Um, but the day to day It's a real challenge. I mean, is it do you have a hard and fast rule. I mean, how have you guys wanted to tackle this when it's just sort of Literally, they want to tell you the sun is rising in the west. You know this isn't true, but you have to cover what they're saying Yeah. I mean, I was part of the I think the first conversation about whether to put lying on the front page back in twenty sixteen, which was I used falsehoods and I got criticized for using falsehoods And that's what I used in my infamous Kellyanne back and forth. I said, you know, that that was, you know And there's a re if during the v never I thought about saying lie And I was like I'm not handing He defense to hang herself on. How do you know we're lying? That's, you know, that I can't believe you're calling somebody a liar, right? You get I wanted to avoid going down that rabbit hole and keep the focus on the on the on the on on the falsehood is right right. And and I got critiqued for like quote pulling my punches and I'm like, I didn't feel like I pulled a punch I was being as accurate as I could be in that moment. Well, that's the thing. I mean, in terms of accuracy, you have to be able to show intent. The story that we called Trump but described him as lying. which you'll remember is when he came out And it was over the Berther thing, his attack on Obama and said it started with Hillary Clinton. And so we did a very direct story. Dean Becket, Michael Mow and I had a really long conversation about how to do that and how to make sure we were signaling to theer how we knew that. B And I think, you know Quite honestly, some of the journalistic conventions and forums were not ready for Trump in terms of this very question that you're getting at. And there was a little bit of a way, I think, initially throughout the media that the forms themselves lagged what people what people want is very direct I don't think hyperbolic but very direct description of what is happening and what we can say. I have said that yeah, I have said, for instance, I will confess to have rounding the edges over the years. because you you're, you know, I look, I took very definition of being a broadcaster broadcast network which meant I had a broad audience. I was trying to speak to the largest group of people to trust or at least at least consider what I was reporting to them, et cetera. So I did believe you had to round some edges because I'm widening the aperture And then there was a point, I'm like, you know, we have to stop rounding the edges Right. And and now it's a fine line, like it doesn't mean you're between being straightforward and coming across as an activist Right, right. No, I think that's right. And look, there's going to be scrutiny of There's going to be a lot of wordsmithing and I get it. and people really care about how we describe this stuff. I feel proudest of are reporting about the Department of Justice and what they are doing And with that level of precision and directness about how the Department of Justice is being used by this president That's the kind of thing. I think Joe Khan, who's our executive editor He does not want language to be hysterical. He wants it to be very direct and forth right. and that's what we're trying to do No, the words themselves matter, right? Be it is It is it's like you don't want to make it fuzzy, right? You're not trying to blur things Um But it's the high it's it It's the hyperbole. Like it's why I think the corruption stories don't hit anymore And and so I think the corruption stories don't hit It's because we've it's the it's my it's a my broken windows theory of corruption of political corruption, meaning takeake the Ruben Gaallego story. Okay, so Ruben Gaa is being investigated for basically using his political campaign fund for personal expenses If you scrutinize ninety seven of one hundred senators in how they use their campaign money, I'm sure they've all done this and some are moreusing abusive of the process, right? And so what I'm saying is that we've You know Over time We've Even us as reporters, you're like, Yeahah, that's just your typical That's, that's the typical congressman rip off part of this. It's the price of doing business, right? whichich is that's a, you know anotherother plane land safely at National Story And it's unfortunate that it is, right? It goes to it's like the broken windows theory right? If you let few if you don't repair the broken windows, eventually, people will stop caring if something's happening in that community. If I think we've done this with corruption because there's so much low level sort of legalized wealth creation in the political space or I'm expense abuse or whatever you want to call it that it has numbed us to the big stuff And I don't have a good answer to this. I think it's the genius of Trump, right? whichich is there's, you know, he is always able to say what about the what about is and is always technically there. Well That is true. You know, Hunter Biden did make money off of his last name selling paintings. And it is nowhere near the corruption of the crypto side of things, right? So I don't have a good answer to how to make how to, but I think that's my theory is why this doesn't land the way. It did in the seventies Well, I you know, we don't have time to test this, but I would guess I would just say a couple things to that one. I think the scale of what u himself, the ways that he's benefiting, including our story today about I mean, it's eye popping amount of money. But they're numbers that don't even seem real don you're just like, wow, the president of the United States pocketed two billion dollars as president What? It's very difficult to But I would say has the impeachment investigation started yet? Like, it's one of I don't be like, you know, it's like You know, there's a reason JD Vance said Nick Nixon would be a ten hour story. Yeah compared to this Well, there I guess I would push back on a couple things. One, I was really struck this week that the New York Post editorialized in favor or in support of some of our investigations into some of these questionable practices, I think that it resonates And This is a whole different show or conversation, but I think some of the agitation against the establishment is because people are really hurting economically and they're seeing people get rich in this way. So I think it resonates. it's just It's not in the immediate way that you might have seen in the seventies. No, and I think that's right. It's taken a different. It is sort of It's like, well, I can't to Trp so I'm going to get to you Congresswoman to get like, you know what I mean? Like there's a and you know, u, you know, I can't I can't get to Trump. so sorry, Michael Bennett, I'm not promoting you to governor. You know, That's just not going to happen. You're part of this system. you You either didn't do enough to prevent it And you're a bad police officer O you're on the take too Right O or you're not fighting it in a way that feels like if you look at Colorado last night, why did the AG do better but it's because he's seen as fighting it. And I think A little bit of the frustration. I think It's not entirely unrelated to corruption. You know, it's funny, Carolyn th, I like had a flashback to the Tea Party because the biggest hit on both Michael Bennett and John Hickenlooper by their opponents wereere there votes to confirm handful of Trump cabinet secretaries. voted to confirm the supposed less controversial ones like Brooke Rollins at USDA or And I'm like, Boy, I remember when that was a litmus test on the right, when you voted to confirm an Obama cabinet secretary. How dare you type of thing? This is where there are the similarities. We're starting, you know, nothing is exactly the same, nothing is a mirror image, but there's certainly a reflection there that looks familiar Absolutely. I mean, and, you know, what does that become? That's where the energy is right now. Does that become a bigger part of the identity of the Democratic Party Yeah O does it break away in some way? and It's really unclear to me how the Democratic establishment is going to respond. I think it depends what the results are in November I think it's a I think it's a fascinating The House becomes a fascinating place on the Democratic side if the Democrats do not win the Senate they win the Senate, then there's probably a little bit more the fight doesn't begin for a couple of months between the ye. But if they only get, if they don't succeed the way then the finger pointing, right and the cross, you can picture that. Let me get you out of here on this And it's slightly different, but it's the Is it I don't want to say not being at the Pentagon good is somehow a good thing for reporting But what would you say is being missed by not being there? Is there an upside to sort of not having to Be force fed the koolid. Well I mean, I think our reporters are such that they would not They're not cool They're coolade drinkers,ool drinkers. I would give you I think our access We have protested and challenged the restrictions Says you're you're the almost the financial lead here. So it's an important part. You guys have to do this on behalf of all of us. So I'm glad you're doing it. Just though I'm curious like In some ways, it's not going to prevent good reporting, is it? Well, you're making a really interesting point. I mean, I do think the notion of a policy put for by the federal government saying that you cannot speak to members of the military who are not authorized is unconstitutional and frankly ridiculous. And it's just firstirst Amendment violation. hard st. But the thing But to your point about New York Times reporters and the investment in good beat reporting around the Pentagon and within the administration. what story do we break in the midst of all these Pentagon crackds throwing us out, taking away our badges It was one of the most dramatic stories out of the Pentagon, which was they were about to give a briefing on China Elon Musk when Elon was riding high, and that's a story that you break because of devotion consonscientious cultivation of sources within the military and that's reporting And so as you say, reporting is not being force fed something at a press conference. That's reporting. that's what we're going to keep on doing. You know, it's one of those things that's like, I just I think it's important to fight for access to these spaces H stop It is not an excuse not to report Yeah, and it goes back to what we were saying earlier. We're going to fight for access. We also need to explain to the American people and people beyond what is reporting? like and what your point is, like we're going to report the hell out of these stories wherever we are however we can. How look acccess matters to a point. I always say, you know, people talk about access journalism and like You know If you If got rid of access journalism, you wouldn't have a sports reporter in the country getting you any information because, you know, that's a world that if you're not allowed in the facility and those are private organizations,'re not you're just not going to get information. It is, yes, you can source build. It it is, you know, I always said it's at least us political reporters have the power of a Freedom of Information Act You know, I can't make Dan Snyder do anything via a FIer request when he was the owner of the Washington football team. But you can force the Pentagon to have to disclose them. now they may drag their feet. They may do all these things, but there's some And so I'm always, I don't want to be an absolutist about access journalism because there's certain beats You have to be there. That's right. you know, the body matters and and I think that explaining That's why I hate the term access. Look, we know who the acis journal was, but you know what Journalism needs those folks too That's right. People need a lot of they need a lot of entry points to this stuff. We need Yeahah, we need vability into these worlds. And you and I are both sports fans. So a good beat reporter On a team you care about, that's priceless too It is and you do trust them in the same trust. it's really Frankly, Caroly,'s what I think what you and I always aspire do. We wanted to be as trusted as the beat report the sports beat reporter for our favorite team. And you're right. there is something there is something to that. Yeah. Absolutely. Well, this was great. I the only thing I left on the table was, you know, is is the it was going to be a question about the athletic. Are they? Fully New York Times reporters, or are they a separate entity U They're run as a separate entity. They're' they're a separate newsroom. they have u kind they were built up differently out of local markets and they have a very strong presence in London and ball over there. So they're run separately from us you know, as much as I care about their coverage of the Red Sox and Wimbledon and all that stuff, I have nothing to do with it. And, you know, they're growing. and having a real impact and u You know, but they are they are entirely separate. differentnt news from different union, different work forms, like most people New York Times reporters come into the office and so forth. They're out coovering a team, it's just a whole different system Great to talkking and me great catching up. Yeah, love seeing you Extra toence on all your good work, It's great well in, you know G me, I just need some Nebraska. I'd also like Kansas. That's an obsession of mine, Mississippipp I'm obsessed with that one too. So you know, you got a few more and don't forget our independent friend in Montana who might be making a little bit of an interesting an interesting right. I'm gonna pass this We got to get Nate on, man. We we got three or four more states. We got to add to the punch. But other than All right, we'll do. It's great to see you. takeake here Horseshoe Online Casino has a special offer for you, New Jersey. 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There's probably a good way to understand. if you're trying to understand the difference between the New York Times polls that you saw over the last week and the Fox newews polls you've seen over the last week and think, whoa T is showing Democrats doing better than the Times is Well, first of all, it's a reminder that pollsters all have their own formulas for what they do things. And I can tell you this Times is doing is weaiting their results based on what they projecting the November turnout to be. It is a forecasting as much as is it it is not designed to tell you where the race stands today It is designed to tell you where the race is likely to be given the current circumstances assuming the turnout we assume So the point is is that yes It made the Republicans look stronger because we have seen this trendline that come election day, there will be a higher floor for the Republican vote what the Fx poosters are doing is the Snapshot in time type of poll They're basically saying here's what it says at the moment. We're going to wait it to to what, you know what turnout looks like, right what it would look like under these circumstances at the moment. And right now at the moment, the Democrats have the large advantage, right? They have the advantage and enthusiasm. they there So it is how both polls can be right and yet at the same time show a different result because one is waiting towards a forecasting model projection of what November is going to look like And one is literally doing the snapshot in time. Where is the race right now And I do believe the race right now in Iowa. He is a Democrat lead both in the governors and centation. And I do believe that come Election dayay, it's going to be a one point race one way or the other U So the point is is that treat the Fox polls as the snapshot and treat the Tes polls as the forecast Anyway, just a little consumer advice for understanding all of these conflicting poll numbers that you have out there. By the way, this is why the people that want to wait but want to just combine and aggregate poll numbers are doing a disservice because you're literally aggregating two types of methodologies, two types of weighting. And this is why people like me think that anybody that relies on this combined stuff is literally down the road misleading themselves With that Let's get to the time machine. I got a good one today and it involves expansion of the US Center So july tenth, eighteen ninth. That is the anniversary of Wyoming being brought into the statehood So here's a fun little fact that many of you, I bet she didn't know Between November of eighteen eighty nine and July of eighteen ninety The United States admitted six new Western states or Dota Southota, Montana, Washington, Idaho, Wyom. Those six states immediately sent twelve new senators to Washington every single one of those twelve was a Republic. Now imagine if that happened today. Imagine Congress admitting six new states in eight months Imagine all twelve new senators belong to the same political party We'd spend the next ten years arguing about whether the system had been manipulated and corrupted And yet, that's exactly what happened in the late nineteenth century Now the funny thing is we almost never tell the story this way We call it westward expansion Manifest destiny. We tell the story through wagon trains and railroads and homesteaders All of that happened It's not untrue, but it's just one part of the story. So while settlers were building the American West, politicians Buing the United States Senate So to understand why though, you have to understand the moment Lonight the Civil warar was over The Union had won, which meant Republicans had won They preserved the Union. They ended slavery. They passed the Reconstruction amendments built a stronger national government created a national banking system funded the Trcontinental Railroads American industry with high tariffs. That was the theory of the case of trade at the time, considering how slow shipping was around the world Whether you agree with all of those policies today is not the point By the eighteen eighties, Republicans had spent twenty years building this governing philosophy Then reconstruction began collapsing Federal troops that were stationed in the south were wrong? You know, the eighteen seventy six compromise, rigged election, if you will, gave us this. One southern state after another returned to democratic control The solid South wasn't just becoming deemocratic It was becoming politically unreachable for the Republicans So put yourselves in the shoes of a Republican senator in eighteen eighty eight You've just watched the seouth completely slip away The region one your party once hoped to compete in is now almost entirely gone preventing All these new black voters from voting coalition that won the Civil War is shrinking The question isn't whether you'll lose seats, The question is whether you're going to eventually lose the country. Where do you find replacement votes for all the lost votes in the South Where do you find replacement senators? The answer wasn't New England or the Midwest. they'd maxed out It was West. The frontier wasn't simply America's future, it became the Republican Party's future Now this is where the map becomes really political. We tend to think of maps as geography. pololiticians think of maps as votes Every territory represented a choice Congress could leave it as a territory or they could admit it as a state Congress controlled the timing And timing is one of the oldest political weapons in Washington. the Dakota territory Today, we assume there were always two Dodas History says otherwise, Congress hadn't. pllenty of options. One territory could have become one state Instead, it became two, one territory, four new senators Now there were some legitimate reasons to divide it The territory was enormous. population centers have developed differently But we let Montana be an enormous land grab state And there were some administrative arguments, but politics doesn't require to invent opportunities. It rewards you for recognizing opportunities that already exist and Republicans understood exactly what two Dakotas meant, and Democrats understood it too. Nobody in Washington was confused about this. And the admissions came quickly North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, Washington, Idaho, Wyoming, eight months, S states twelve new senators All twelve over reposs It wasn't the whole Republican coalition, but it became one of the strongest pillars. And boy did the timing matter because these weren't just senators They were votes to preserve a governing philosophy votes for prrotective terror which Republicans believe would help American industry compete against cheaper foreign imports. They were votes for continued railroad development They were votes for Western infrastructure. They were votes for veterans' pensions They were votes for a much stronger national government than many of the southern Democrats of that era water So the Senate wasn't simply deciding legislation It was literally deciding what kind of economy the United States was going to build for the next fifty years And one thing that struck me while researching this story is how often we talk about manifest destiny as though it explains Wester alone explains. Western expansion It explains why Americans wanted the land sure, but it doesn't explain why statehood happened when it did And that's a much different question. And it's a very political Institutions aren't built in a vacuum built in moments of political opportunity Republicans believe they had an opportunity. Just as importantly, many Northern voters believe they should take it Remember, this is only twenty five years after Apomatx. Many people who fought the Civil War were still alive The memory of secession wasn't some distant chapter in a textbook was pretty recent. So aggressively admitting Western states, if that is what was going to help prevent the old southern Democratic establishment from regaining power in Washington, many Republicans and many Northern voters That was perfectly legitimate Even if the means were a little questionable And that context matters, right? You had basically, you had a popular mandate to get away with it So this wasn't simply partisan hardball, it was partisan hardball operating inside the long shadow of the bloody shirt of the civil So did it work? Certainly helped Republicans didn't win every presidential election. for the next fifty years, but Grover, Cleveland interrupted them Woodrow Wilson interrupted them after Teddy Roosevelt split the Republican Party in twenty nineteen twelve But they were literally interruptions to a broader era of Republican dominance from Lincoln through Hoover Republicans built and largely maintained the governing coalition that defined the Gilded age and much of the Progressive era Now those Western states didn't create the coalition by themselves The industrialization actually mattered. immmigration mattered, Civil War mtered. All of that matt But a Western leaning Senate helps sustain it And that's the part of the story we don't tell with great emphasis Now fast forward to today Listen to debates about Washington, DC statehood and Puerto Rico. representation. The Senate. suppuorters argue democracy, opponents argue partisan advantage. Everybody insists they're motivated by principles. Everybody also understands them. And that shouldn't surprise us. America hass been arguing over who gets to build the Senate for more than a century. The parties have changed The coalitions have changed, right? The solid Democratic south is now the solid Republican south Right? The issues have changed. The incentives, though barely have changed at all And that's the larger lesson We imagine our institution sadly evolved The Constitution tells us every state gets two senators, but it says remarkably little on what it takes to become a state That's always been left to politics And politics asks the same question most of the time, not whether an opportunity exists, but how much of it can we legitimately take advantage of The question has never been whether politicians will seek the maximum political advantage They always will. The real question is how much of that advantage is the public willing to tolerate in that particular historical moment and in the late nineteenth century after a civil warar. And a collapsing reconstruction, the answer was quite a lot So we remember the pioneers. The railroads Michael landed Remember manifest destiny We spend much less time remembering that while Americans were settling the frontier politicians or're settling something else They were settling the future of the United States more than a generation And once you see that, the map of America stops looking inevitable And it starts looking like what it has always been a series of political decisions made at very specific moments by people who understood that geography Political So the point is, we're going to get two new states out it DC and Puerto Rico are coming It's just a matter of wind does political will match the public's Appetite for acceptance Mat political party who wants it? being in power, having enough power to pull it off. So you need timing. You need u some form of a popular mandate for it And you and you can see how this will happen We just haven't hit that moment yet Horseshoe Online Casino has a special offer for you, New Jersey. 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Customers will pay twenty five dollars a month as long as they remain active on a Boost unlimited plan Experience vibrant senior Living with award winning services at Brightview Senior Living Communities At Brightview, our residents enjoy resort style amenities, daily programs, exciting social and cultural events, and delicious chef prepared meals. But that's not all. Brightview residents also enjoy complimentary transportation, safety, security, and high quality care if needed. In Brightview Senior Living Communities. Learn more about the possibilities at brightview seniorliving d. com Bast jke All right, let's do a little last check. We're gonna to start with Kevin from Spokane, Washington, Ltime listener, firstirst time questioner. I've heard you advocate for expanding the house, but I'm curious about your thoughts on DC statehood. withith roughly seven hundred thousand residents and no full congressional representation. Do you support statehood? And is partisan politics the main obstacle? what would realistically need to happen to make it possible? Thank you for all you do. Kevin How great is it that I just did a Todcast time machine? U This week in history on this very topic about the last time We went through an aggressive expansion of the states. It was always done with political power in mind And I think that gets lost. The point is statehood is usually a political it is always a political question. It is not else entirely. And the fact of the matter is When you have a bunch of people without rights whose population is larger than neearly a dozen states or approximately a dozen states You got a problem, right I mean, you know, no taxation without representation seems like a pretty good slogan for statehood, which has been the Mantra of Washington, D.C for some thirty years now. It's been on the license plate. So It's going to happen. I still think DC and Puerto Rico coming together.ve done I've done if you want to go back into my archives, I've done had an interesting conversation with a DC politician and a Puerto Rican politician about You know, right now the two sides don't work with each other But there's real Republican support for Puerto Rican statehood Rick Scott Markco Rubio both publicly are on the record for it And so the point is and Porterto Gt is currently as a Republican governor Paces deserve state H If you can make the argument that might not necessarily upset the balance of power, but will make people more rep. I think that's how you would sell it in today's political environment But I will say this the next time Democrats if they can if they get to say they're not going to leave DC the cutting room floor like they did during the Obama era when they had sixty Senate votes and in massive, you know, when they had the ability probably to for statehood They could have done it then and they chose not to because Obama didn't he feared this backlash. He really didn't want to become a polarizing president. certainly was less polarized than Donald Trump because he chose to avoid some of these fights over power. Now some base fors, the Democratic Party look back and say, this and see the Obama era sometimes as a failure because he didn't aggressively use power when he had Right? when he had sixty senate seats, even it was brief or fifty nine even for a period of time that he could have He could have done some things that cemented certain certain parts of the system that over time might have favored the Democratic Party but would have been defensible as being an advancement for the country, right? So The point is is that I'm curious how you would have Kevin reorded your question. after hearing my little history lesson for the week about aggressive expansion and the Republican power play of the late nineteenth century All right, Mark writes, Hey, Colorado seeven here, I miss you at MTP, but really enjoy what you're able to do with this medium. I am a commercial pilot who can't hear His girlfriend, when she talks in a noisy restaurant or bar but can' hear a cricket around the corner. You need a WD forty spritz on that chair. Ha. Oh, interesting. so I see what you're saying. My question, given how third party voters votes can become counterproductive in presidential elections, what would actually have to change for America to have a viable third option with a real chance of winning in schemes we trust, Mark.