September 14, 2026 • 33 mins
In this episode of It’s a Numbers Game with Ryan Girdusky, Ryan breaks down the massive wave of Republican money pouring into the 2026 midterm elections and what the spending reveals about the races the GOP believes it must win.
The battle for Texas takes center stage as Republican groups and Elon Musk's America PAC reportedly prepare major investments while Ken Paxton faces James Talarico in a crucial U.S. Senate contest. Ryan examines new polling in Texas, the enormous spending battle taking shape, and why Republicans appear determined to prevent the Lone Star State from becoming a major Democratic breakthrough.
Ryan then follows the money across the country, looking at Republican offensive and defensive investments in Michigan, Ohio, New Hampshire, Maine, Iowa, Florida and key House districts. He explains what these spending decisions may reveal about internal polling and which Senate and House races could ultimately determine control of Congress.
Plus, Ryan digs into the latest polling from Minnesota, Maine, North Carolina, Michigan and Iowa, along with troubling national generic-ballot numbers for Republicans. He explains where the GOP may still have opportunities, where Democrats currently hold the advantage, and whether an enormous influx of campaign cash can change the political environment before Election Day.
Finally, Ryan answers listener questions about the shift from “Merry Christmas” to “Happy Holidays,” voter-registration trends, the Texas Senate runoff, and whether political books like Regime Change can be trusted.
Follow Clay & Buck on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/clayandbuck
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back to a numbers game with Ryan Groduski. Thank
you guys for being here. OK, Labor Day is over.
It's officially football season. We're almost at fall and we
are deep into campaign season. And we have so much
to talk about today because can you hear it? Can
you hear that sound? That's the Calvary coming. That is
the GOP Calvary coming because. Money is being spent like
(00:23):
you will never believe in these races. For so long,
I've been saying, you know, Trump has a billion dollars.
He's sitting around close to a billion dollars. All this
PAC is about a billion dollars. When are we spending?
When are we spending? When are we spending? Well, you know,
I was like a kid right before Christmas. I was like,
when is this campaign money coming in? It's coming in.
And it's not coming in in a drizzle. This is
(00:44):
not a flurry. This is not sleet. This is pouring
rain of money. And it is... And it's also going
to give us insight into where Republicans are putting any
hope at holding the Senate and the House. So let's
get into it. So we are talking about first, let's
talk about the lone star state of Texas.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
Right.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Obviously, big governor's race with Abbott running for a fourth term,
unprecedented fourth term. And then, of course, the U.S. Senate race. Very,
very important with James Tallarico versus Ken Paxton. And then
there's a bunch of house races that could decide the
majority in the U.S. House. It was announced that Elon
Musk's America pack, his super pack, is putting between $ 50
(01:28):
to $ 200 million in the next couple of weeks into Texas.
That was according to Mark Halperin. He says he has
four sources confirming that number, which is horrible. Very large.
It's not only going to commercials either. This is going
to a ground gain operation. This is going to get
late registration for people who don't typically vote, get them
(01:49):
registered to vote, or they don't vote at all, actually,
get them registered to vote if they lean Republican and
get low propensity voters out. That's a lot of money.
$ 200 million is game changing. It comes right after Trump's
MAGA Inc. spent $ 10 million in the initial pro paxton
anti-telerico ad and it that seems like a lot of
(02:10):
money but for texas it's not it's interesting where they
spend it they spend it during the football games the
college football games which is oh you know college football
in texas has its own religion its own thing so
that's why they spend it in during that time that's
a big ad to spend during college football play that
ad now of paying.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
More in taxes.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
Ken Paxton pushing his new plan to make living more
affordable for Texans.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
Paxton's plan, doubling the child tax credit, big write-offs for
medical expenses, and a $ 50, 000 deduction for first-time homebuyers. James
Tallarico supported a trillion-dollar tax hike. Higher property taxes and
higher taxes on Social Security. Tallarico, higher taxes.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Paxton, lower taxes.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
A clear choice. Mega Inc. is responsible for the content
of this advertising.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
So that's not a spicy ad. And I wanted you
to hear the ad because it's not a spicy ad.
It is an ad on quality of life and money.
This is the issue for a lot of voters and
they don't feel confident in Trump's economy. It's a very
clear cut. Tallarico is going to raise your taxes. It
feels like almost a throwback ad. It's not about transgender children.
(03:20):
Not saying those ads won't come in the future. It's
not about guns. I'm not saying those ads won't come
in the future or abortion or anything. It is about
your wallet and pocketbook. That is a very telling ad
as to what the polls internally. I mean, we all
know that, but that's really I'm not. I would bet
that they focus group that ad and they were very
(03:40):
decisive in making sure that that was the initial ad
that they were doing. And it wasn't all culture war stuff.
I think that that's a sign for where we're going
to see more of the ads and what they're going
to be sounding like is that the Republicans are actually
better on the economy than Democrats are. And they're not
the only one spending. The Senate Leadership Fund, that's the
(04:01):
Republican Senate sewer pack. Now, remember, I said over and
over again that they've been telling everyone they're not spending,
they're not spending, they're not spending. Something changed because they
are going in $ 14 million into the Texas campaign to
help out Paxton. That means all of this new money
between the Senate Leadership Fund, between MAGA Inc., between Trump's
(04:25):
other affiliated PAC and Elon Musk, that means that in
just the last week alone, the race went from being
Tallarico outspending Paxton by $ 13 million to Paxton outspending Tallarico
by $ 20 million in one week. Democrats have an additional
(04:46):
$ 4. 5 million coming in for Tallarico. Republicans have $ 33 million
in just a few days. This is Wild. I heard
from someone who I really trust in Texas politics that
she told me that she expects 50 million to come
in every single week from now to the election. That's wild.
(05:09):
But they know that Paxton needs it. They know that
Paxton is in trouble, that this is not a game.
This is not Texas is Texas, that they need to
save Paxton, that they need to save Texas. Because if
Paxton loses... It's not just about Paxton. It's about Texas.
If Texas goes blue, that is a huge deflation to
the base going to 2028 that they can still win
(05:31):
the White House. This is just this is bigger than
just the Senate. It's about the Senate, but it's bigger
than just the Senate. And there was a poll that
came out over the week really highlighting that this is
a point. I know a lot of people are saying, oh,
we don't trust polls. We don't trust polls. This poll
came from Tony Fabrizio. Who is Tony Fabrizio? Tony Fabrizio
is Trump's pollster. He nailed 2024. Every swing state. And
(05:53):
I remember when the Iowa caucus poll came out from
Ann Seltzer that said Kamala was winning Iowa, I think,
by like six or seven points, whatever. I texted Tony.
I never said this on the podcast before. I texted
Tony saying, did you do any polling in Iowa? And
he said, Ryan, calm down. We don't have to. It's
in the bag. And he was right. He was like,
we don't even have to do it because we know
(06:15):
verbatim it is in the bag and he was completely
right i trust tony fabrizio he is not a con
man and he's been around for a very long time
he's a very expensive pollster to hire he is a
new tony fabrizio uh ward wards the democrat i think
our workers in the polls aarp sponsored the poll it
found that james talarico is winning the senate race in
texas 48 to 44 points This comes with a big
(06:39):
lead with voters under 50. Tallarico winning voters under 50
by 27 points. Independents, Tallarico winning them by 22 points.
Weakness among older Republicans for Paxton. He's not winning them
with huge numbers. 12% of older Republicans that are voting
for Tallarico. Independents under 50 are going for Tallarico by
43 points. Women by 11 points and Latinos by 30 points.
(07:01):
Paxton is performing poorly also among whites. He's winning them
by less than 20 points in Texas. That's awful. So
they all know that he is struggling. And not only
is he struggling, Greg Abbott is not doing amazing numbers.
In the most recent poll that Tony Fabrizio put out,
Abbott's up by three points. That's within the margin of error.
(07:25):
I mean, Greg Abbott is a very popular governor. It's
a sign of just how the electorate is. I think
there's different things happening in Abbott's race versus Paxton's race.
I do think data centers are hurting Abbott right now.
I think that's why he had to go in to
do the year-long pause. I think if you look at
the polling, Texans have really turned against data centers. I
(07:46):
talked to a friend yesterday whose family owns like 5,000
acre major farm in Texas, big, big farm. In Texas,
I think they do corn or something like that. But
they produce lots of corn from Texas. And they said
that they are, I think it's 5,000 acres. They were
being offered half a billion dollars for their farm. That
(08:09):
basically these companies are coming in offering some insane number
per acre. It's usually like $ 10 an acre or whatever.
It's now going for like $ 100 or $ 200 an acre.
It's some insane, or $ 1, 000. It's $ 1, 000 an acre they're
going for. So yeah, $ 500 million was being offered for
their family farm. It was, or $ 1, 000, $ 100 an acre.
(08:31):
I forget the exact number. Forgive me for all that.
The point being, crazy numbers. If you have a farm
in a certain area, that I believe is hurting, that's
hurting Abbott. Paxton's about the scandals and the fact that
he was, I mean, if you watch the convention, he's
a fairly low energy candidate, unfortunately. So that's what's happening.
They know they can't lose Texas. Fabrizio's poll is showing
(08:51):
that their internals probably look the same because Fabrizio does
a lot of internals for the campaigns. They're probably all
seeing the same thing circling. Now, this is not the
only race that Republicans are jumping head first into. Where
they're spending their money is very interesting. It tells us
a little bit what their internals probably look like. There
is a new poll called No Going Backpack. It is
(09:14):
affiliated with Trump. We don't know who the donors are.
They haven't disclosed them yet because they formed after the
filing period we won't know who they are for quite
some time they're putting two hundred thousand dollars almost in
kentucky's sixth district that is a trump plus 15 district
in central kentucky that's concerning that they need to put
200k now that's not an amazing amount of money but
(09:36):
that's a lot of money for a district that trump
will make 15 points that's That shows the amount of
defense that they're trying to play right now. No going
back is also putting $ 70 million in other major races. Michigan, Ohio,
New Hampshire, Alaska, North Carolina, and Georgia. Interestingly, no Maine,
no Iowa. I wonder why that is. It's very, very telling.
(09:58):
Those are the two states that they're not putting any
money in. The number one state they're investing in is
Michigan with $ 16 million, Ohio with $ 11 million, and then
New Hampshire with $ 11 million. Going on offense in two
of the key races. Very telling. There is a press
reports that the Democrats are increasingly uncomfortable about Maine Senate
(10:19):
candidate Troy Jackson. He really doesn't like being a candidate
that much. He's not performing as well under the scrutiny
of being a candidate. That might show that there's that
Susan Collins, they believe, can win this without the money.
It also shows weakness on the part of Chris Pappas,
who's the Democrats nominee in New Hampshire. And Al Saeed
in Michigan is just, you know, a constant story. about
(10:42):
uh for democrats his address on 9-11 was so disgusting
i wanted to i was about to scream it was
so the man is campaigning with somebody who said we
deserve 9-11 and he's making a whole statement about you
know his mournfulness on 11 screw off i mean he's
disgusting person all right then there's the house races they're
putting money in number one house race florida 25 to
(11:03):
unseat jared moskowitz congressman democrat congressman jared moskowitz Almost $ 5
million in that race. Followed by New York 17, other
big race for moderate Republican Mike Lawler. Then another aggressive race,
$ 1. 7 million in Washington's third district to win in another
Trump Democrat seat. They're doing a mix of offense and defense.
(11:27):
It would be my idea hearing these numbers saying they
know they're going to lose some places. They can save them.
that they're basically going to hopefully pick up a few
spots and just take the losses where they can. That's
what I'm estimating. Musk is also putting money separately in
his pack, in his America pack, into the Iowa race,
(11:48):
which is interesting. He's also doing it in Michigan and
New Hampshire, once again, two offensive places. That's interesting. And
he's also putting it in Maine. So Collins is getting
some money, but she's not getting money from the MAGA Inc. crowd.
or the no going back crowd. The DCCC did announce
they are spending $ 1. 6 million in their congressional races coming up. Now,
(12:09):
it's interesting where they're putting their money. They're putting their
money in districts that were redistricted. There are seats that
Democrats currently hold that are redistricted so Republicans can win them.
Alabama second, North Carolina's first, Texas 28, and Texas 34.
I think that they probably believe that their incumbents are
strong enough that they can win despite redistricting. That's very
(12:31):
interesting because the redistricting fight was supposed to change the
map completely, and it definitely changed it in some places,
but maybe not enough to really matter. We'll see as
the polls come out in the next two weeks how
much this onslaught of money have changed the direction of
the races. It takes about two weeks to kind of
settle in. We'll also see when these early mail-in ballots
(12:53):
start coming in. They come in already right now, actually.
Mail-in ballot requests have already started. This is full election season.
We have election season, not election day. So we are
in the middle of election season right now. I'll have
more on this in the next two weeks, but this
is the first sign that Republicans are going down, not
going down, without a major fight. So, by the way,
(13:15):
if you are on a TV station in any swing state, congratulations,
you're very rich after this, after this onslaught of money. Okay,
let's go to the polls. That's coming up next. We
had a flurry of polls that I want to address
over the last week. So let's talk about first the
Florida special election. This is for the Marco Rubio seat.
Qantas Insight, one of the most accurate pollsters from 2024.
(13:38):
They said that Senator Ashley Moody is on her way
for a comfortable reelection by seven points. Kiwanis Insight also
put out something else that was really, really interesting because
they're not a bad pollster. So this was shocking. They
said that Minnesota Lieutenant Governor Democrat Peggy Flanagan is only
up in her race by two points. Now, Peggy Flanagan
(13:58):
is nuttier than an almond bar. Like, she is crazy. Like,
she's just nuts, this woman. So she's running. She's only
up by two points. Ironically, that's not the only pollster.
Not ironically, but coincidentally, that's not the only pollster to
say this. TIPP said it's a two-point race. SurveyUSA said
it's a five-point race. And Emerson University said it's a
(14:18):
six-point race. Minnesota is a pretty democratic state. So they're
all saying it's either slightly outside the margin error, but
maybe tightening and getting inside the margin of error. We're
not seeing any outside spending yet. So I can't justify
that these polls are accurate. If their internals start showing that,
we're going to see money being put in Minnesota. We
(14:39):
don't see that yet. But this could maybe be the
first time that hey, there could be blood in the
water in Minnesota. Maybe that will be like Michigan and
New Hampshire, where Republicans are going to go on the offense,
considering they've already basically said we're not going to hold
North Carolina and we're not going to flip Georgia. So
interesting what this poll said. Now let's look over in Maine.
(14:59):
Maine had two polls that came out. One that I
kind of respect, CNN does decent polling. They said that
Susan Collins is down by three points. YouGov had a
poll out. I don't trust YouGov polls, but they said
that Collins is actually down four points. Nonetheless, it's all
within the margin of error. Collins has beaten her polling
average on average over the last three election cycles, over
(15:21):
the last 18 years, by an average of eight points.
In the last five polls since mid-July, Collins has been
within the margin of error in every single one of them.
That is far better than what she was doing against
Graham Plattner when he first announced. That is way better
than what she was doing in 2022. And when you're
(15:42):
seeing that no back down, not back, no going back, rather,
PAC is not investing in her race. And she's not
the top person Republicans are getting money from, getting money to.
Maybe Collins is going to be OK. I don't know.
I'm not saying she is. But man, can that woman
fight an election for a woman of a certain age
(16:05):
who only whispers, who doesn't yell? She is really showing
signs of life in a tough, tough, tough state in
a horrific environment. Over North Carolina, East Carolina University and
Elon University polls, which are not great polling firms, but
they did these polls in North Carolina, they found that
Governor Roy Cooper, Democrat governor, is beating Republican Michael Watley
(16:27):
eight points and 11 points, respectively. Once again, not great pollsters,
but it's all pointing towards the signs. When you look
at how little Michael Watley is receiving money-wise goes, I
think Republicans have conceded that likely Roy Cooper is going
to win this by high single digits. In Michigan, a
bunch of new polls came out. Trafalgar said that El
(16:48):
Saeed leads Mike Rogers by one point. CNN said El
Saeed leads Rogers by three points. Detroit News says Rogers
leads El Saeed by two points. Overall, this race is
lean El Saeed. El Saeed has an advantage, not a
big advantage. And that is why El Saeed is the
number one target. That's why El Saeed is going to
(17:08):
get the James Tallarico treatment of $ 30 to $ 40 million
being pumped. I don't even know about the APAC spending it.
APAC is going to have their affiliate packs probably put
in $ 30 to $ 40 million as well. The money is
going to be astronomical in Michigan. He is the number
one target to beat because all the signs are saying
(17:28):
he's beatable. That's the truth of the matter. They wouldn't
be dumping. This is why Asif is not the target
because they don't believe that he's beatable. This is why
Peggy Flanagan is not the target. El-Sayed is the target
because they think that he's beatable. Emerson University did a
poll out in Iowa, finding that the Republicans have a
comfortable lead of five points while they are down in
(17:50):
the governor's race by three points. I'm going to tell
you guys, a lot of people are saying that Rob
Sands has this over in Iowa. The Republican campaign for
Zach Land is doing something very interesting right now. This
is what no one's talking about because it's not making
major news national news, but it's happening in Iowa. Rob Sands,
the Democrat, His wife is in the chemicals industry and
(18:13):
the chemicals allegedly I'll just say allegedly because I don't
want to I don't want a lawsuit. But allegedly the
chemicals in these products that the wife's family creates are
cancer causing. And exactly. And the Republicans all about the
war on cancer and trying to reduce cancer and cancer
is very high in Iowa. And they are saying, you know,
(18:35):
Rob Sand is the king of cancer in Iowa. I
don't know if that's going to work, but to a
lot of suburban moms who care a lot about things
like that, about health and about their children's health, it's
a powerful attack ad that is different than the data
center conversation. It's different than the other conversations that are happening.
It doesn't mean it's less important, but it could be
hitting people on a nerve level that is not being
(18:57):
picked up in the national media at all. Let's go
over the Ballots, the generic ballots. There's four generic ballot
polls that came out over the last week. Signal, which
is a Republican-leaning firm, has Democrats plus nine. Quinnipiac has
Democrats plus 11. The Economist, YouGov, has Democrats plus 11.
And the Financial Times have Democrat plus seven. What does
(19:18):
that mean? It means that polls show Democrats have actually
grown in their support over the last few weeks. This
is the time that Democrat support usually starts falling down.
And they're all saying, no, it's actually getting stronger. This
looks like 20, you know, 2008 level numbers. I don't
think it can stay this high. I frankly don't. I
think all this infusion of cash into the races means
(19:41):
a lot. But man, and a lot of it's related
to the Iran war. I mean, this generic ballot is rough.
And what we're seeing though, is in these places where
there's beloved incumbents, like in Maine, or where there's very
problematic challengers, like in Michigan with El-Said, this money could
be the difference because they are underperforming the generic ballot
(20:04):
significantly in these places. It's very interesting. We'll see if
this infusion of cash all over the country happening. I'm
hearing four or five hundred million dollars in the next
few weeks alone for Republicans across the entire country will
improve the overall generic ballot. But it's pretty dire, this
generic ballot number overall. So we'll circle back on that
(20:26):
and I'll tell you guys if this means anything or not.
But that's not wonderful news.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
All right.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
Ask Me Anything is coming up next. Stay tuned. Now
it's time for the Ask Me Anything segment. If you
want any part of the Ask Me Anything segment, email
me Ryan at numbersgamepodcast.com. That's Ryan at numbersgamepodcast.com. First question
from Shelly. Shelly says she's a Gen Xer. When she
was a kid, everyone always said Christmas. Cities had Christmas parades.
Public schools had Christmas programs and stores had Christmas sales.
(20:55):
It all changed to holiday. When did this happen? Do
you recall? There had been talk for decades about having
Merry Christmas again, but I don't think we're ever going
to go back to when I was young. Any guesses?
to who, what, the man behind the curtain started the
removal of Christmas in our national culture. Okay, so I
looked this up as far as data around the word
Christmas versus holiday goes. So the word happy holidays being
(21:20):
regularly incorporated in our conversation was in the 1850s, actually.
I did not know this. There was a poem called
Merry Happy Holidays in 1843. It kind of started the
whole entire thing. There was a book by... There's a
book called about the holidays and when the word came
around and it really started increasing around World War II
(21:41):
and then in the 1970s, the 1980s. And then but
Merry Christmas was still used more. Merry Christmas is still
used more than Happy Holidays is. But the margins have decreased.
So Merry Christmas was used more than Happy Holidays by
like a marginal like 500 to one. And now it's
18 to one by the year 2000. I couldn't find
(22:03):
any specific date, though, when it really started declining, but
it was over those decades. The person who, as far
as an elected leader, to really push holidays out there
instead of Christmas was Bill Clinton. In 1992, the White
House stopped using Christmas for the duration of Bill Clinton's presidency.
It used Happy Holidays. So if that's anything to you,
(22:25):
that's the man behind the curtain is Bill Clinton with
the Happy Holidays over Merry Christmas. Next question comes from Sean.
Sean writes, hey, Ryan, I always enjoy your show. Love
that I'm able to get hold of you. Hope you
don't get so big that it's like me trying to
call or email Rush Limbaugh's show. I don't think that
that will be a problem. But thank you for that.
(22:45):
You have two questions, so I'll try to get to
them quickly. First question is new information on voter registration data.
For a while after Trump was inaugurated last year, I
kept writing about all the states that track registration by
party that were shifting right. It's been rather quiet the
last few months, and I haven't heard much of anything.
So there have been a lot of cleanup in the
voter rolls in the last year. So it's a little
(23:09):
difficult for me to say, oh, this party is registering
more people than that party is. There are a number
of states like Pennsylvania. There was one month that they
reported a 15,000 swing for Republicans. But all it was
was they cleaned up the dead rolls and there were
more dead Democrats than Republicans or people had moved or whatever.
So it's a little difficult for me to try to
(23:30):
tell over the short term as far as trends go.
Democrats have definitely picked back up in registration. It's not
overwhelming numbers. It's not like 10 to 1 margins in
any particular state. But they are registering new voters more
than Republicans are in most consequential states. Once again, slightly
over the margins. And that probably tells about the unapproval
rating of Donald Trump not looking at anything You know,
(23:52):
there's not anything shocking for anybody, but that is probably
where that's coming from. Second question is regarding the U.S.
Senate race in Texas. Why didn't John Cornyn voters show
up in the runoff? So this is very interesting. When
Texas voters voted the first time, every election was up, right?
All the House races, the state legislative races, the U.S.
Senate races. And when they had the runoff, it was
(24:14):
only a handful of races statewide. Not just statewide, but
a handful of races throughout the entire state. So- Maybe
you wanted to go vote because you care who your
local mayor was. That wasn't on the second election. Or
maybe you care about this election or that election. That
wasn't on the ballot. And it looks like lower propensity
(24:36):
voters were probably Cornyn supporters over people who vote in
every single election. And they were probably Paxton supporters. Obviously,
the Trump poll, the Trump endorsement helped a bit for Paxton.
But it looks like Cornyn's voters were probably just there
to vote for other races. And they were more, I
would say, established and Republicans. And they weren't they were
(24:56):
voting for Cornyn because they because they always vote for Cornyn.
They weren't voting for Cornyn. They weren't getting out of bed.
I got to vote for John Cornyn today. They just vote.
And they were motivated a second time. It's hard to
get the vote so many times in a single election year.
It's actually extremely difficult. OK.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
OK.
Speaker 1 (25:14):
Last question for the episode comes from Robert. Robert writes
to me, I bought the book Regime Change. I'm really
enjoying it. Regime Change by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan,
who came on this program. Very honored that they did.
You know what? I know a lot of people don't
like the New York Times reporters, but I will say
this about Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman. Do you know
how many will not come on a conservative podcast? Do
(25:36):
you know how many Washington Post reporters are basically told
you are not to go on a conservative podcast? That's
what one of them told me. I have asked. Most
Democratic politicians will not come on a conservative podcast. Most
liberal pollsters will not come on a conservative podcast. I
ask these people all the time, please come on. And
they are like, no, I won't. either they are afraid
(25:57):
of their own people doing it or they are like
being attacked for coming on my show or they are
told by their bosses, no, we don't, we have a
very enclosed circle. So I am very thankful those who do.
It's actually slightly brave that they do because there is no,
(26:17):
no one, you don't get an applause for coming to
talk to me. You're usually actually told by your boss
biggest supporters how dare you speak to them so i
give them credit okay back to the question you said
um it almost feels like i'm at the book uh
i love learning about what happens behind the scenes when
the cameras aren't rolling and what feels like i'm experiencing
these events in real time especially since many of the
(26:38):
people involved are still working there your episode gives behind
the scenes look at some of my favorites uh the
book's hilarious at times you talk about that your question
is this how accurate do you think the reporting is
i think the accurate is very reporting because there's not
a single scene in the book that has ever been discredited.
Trump has attacked the book, but no one from the
White House has discredited a specific event. And they are
(27:00):
very detailed, very, very detailed in that book. You write,
is there any possibility that regime change is somewhat of
a hit job? It portrays Trump in a very negative light,
which makes me question how much I should trust the reporting.
I will say this, and this is how I approach
New York Times reporters in general. A lot of them
are very good. A lot of them are very, very good,
(27:21):
but they come from a liberal starting point. So when
they talk about the book, right in the book, there's
a chapter that talks about Trump's big, beautiful bill. They mention,
they pass by the Trump savings account and the drug
pharmaceutical business or the Trump pharmacy thing, whatever, to reduce
(27:43):
drug prices. They mention the tax cuts, but it's in passing.
It doesn't highlight what that is. So they don't not
tell you all the facts. They highlight things and they
come from a perspective that the liberal order is the
good way. That's why when Maggie and Jonathan were on
this podcast, I said to them, how much do you think?
(28:06):
Because it's very clear that they are uneasy about, you know,
not having the post-World War II consensus and having that
being challenged. And my question to them was, is this
Trump or is this the way things were going to
happen regardless of him? And they both said, this is
the way things were going to happen. Trump was just
(28:28):
the accelerant. So they acknowledge it when being pressed. The
problem is that most people who talk to authors is one,
they don't read the book. I always read the book beforehand.
And two, they also come from the liberal perspective. Of course,
of course, this is all good. Of course, we're all
in agreement on this. Of course, you're like, you know,
(28:48):
you have the same perspective as me. It reminds me
of an interview, Dolly Parton, may she rest in peace.
didn't she didn't interview with some, I don't know, libtard.
And they were they said they mentioned Donald Trump and
they love Dolly because everyone loves Dolly. And the liberal
perspective is, oh, you're a good person and I'm a
good person. So therefore, we must hate all the same people.
(29:10):
And they mentioned Trump to her. And she said, why
don't we pray for him? Something like that. I was
either Bush or Trump is a Republican president. And they
were so taken aback by the fact that she approached
it from a Christian perspective and not a judgmental one
and not letting her feelings being known and trying to
(29:30):
be somebody everyone could love. I think that the reporter
was taken so off guard because he's what do you
mean you're supposed to be a good person like me
and just hate this person? And so I think a
lot of times these reporters, it's not that they're withholding facts.
They highlight certain things that are hair on fire moments
that are not hair on fire moments. But it's their
(29:52):
values were being challenged and they don't like that and
they're only around people whose values aren't being challenged. I
think that that is really kind of what that part
gets to. You also talk about there's influences of flattery
against him and you talk about the interference of the
Justice Department. Is that accurate? To what degree? You know,
(30:13):
Maggie and Jonathan in this book, you know, everyone likes
to say, oh, my gosh, this has never been done before.
A big part of it, which I brought up to
Maggie and Jonathan, I didn't bring it up in this context,
but I brought it up. Maggie and Jonathan's talked about
the Federal Reserve, about how Trump is trying to change
the Federal Reserve's interest rates and how that's interference with
the independent Federal Reserve. You know who else did that?
George H.W. Bush at the at the State of the
(30:36):
Union mentioned that. I'm sorry, but like we've seen almost
the reason that Trump's attacks against Trump don't hit is
where a lot of us are old enough to have
seen the movie already. We're not that shocked. It's not
that unprecedented. Maybe the way he's doing is maybe unprecedented.
It's a new way. It's a remake, but we saw
(30:57):
the original. It's not that shocking. So calm down, right?
Just calm down. All of it's not that surprising. Did
he interview with the Justice Department? I don't know. Did
Obama tell his Justice Department to go after nuns for
years over abortion? I mean, why was it the Obama
(31:17):
Justice Department doing every liberal thing in the world, going
after Republican organizations and Obama's IRS withholding nonprofit status? Did
the campaign arm interfere? Did President Obama interfere himself? I
don't know. But it's really weird how that all happened
under his administration. It didn't happen under another administration. You
just have to ask yourself those questions and everyone can
(31:39):
just calm down. Part of it is probably unprecedented, but
a lot of it is, you know, Trump's around, grab
a brown paper bag and start breathing into it. Like, relax.
You mentioned the pardons. I think the pardons are actually
a really, really big problem. I do think that the
financial stuff is actually a really big problem with Trump.
And you said, finally, could you recommend a book similar
(31:59):
to regime change? I'd especially be interested in books behind
the scenes on political campaigns. OK, I have a tick
that I read every political campaign book about a presidential
election like in history. I've read basically every single one.
I don't know why I'm a sycophant. I'm actually pulling
out my phone to look at my audio books as
I Walk my dog and listen to audiobooks. And I
(32:21):
will say to you that the ones that I enjoyed
the most, 2024 by Josh Dossi and Tyler Page. Pretty good.
That was a pretty good book overall. Original Sim by
Jake Tapper. Alex Thompson was on this podcast about the
Biden administration. Honestly, was very, very, very strong. I really
liked that book. Art of Power by Nancy Pelosi. Horrible book.
(32:43):
Would not recommend it to anybody else. She did a
terrible job. She didn't she didn't actually include anything about herself.
Amateur Hour by Charlie Spearing was also not a bad book.
So those were the ones I recommend. 2024 is probably
the most accurate one. That was a pretty decent one
about the 2024 election. And the Alex Thompson book was
with Jake Tucker was good as well.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
Dan St.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Blois' book was horrible. All right, that's this episode. I
hope you liked it. If you like this podcast, please
like and subscribe on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever
you get your podcasts, and on YouTube. I will talk
to you guys on Wednesday.
Welcome back to a numbers game with Ryan Groduski. Thank
you guys for being here. OK, Labor Day is over.
It's officially football season. We're almost at fall and we
are deep into campaign season. And we have so much
to talk about today because can you hear it? Can
you hear that sound? That's the Calvary coming. That is
the GOP Calvary coming because. Money is being spent like
(00:23):
you will never believe in these races. For so long,
I've been saying, you know, Trump has a billion dollars.
He's sitting around close to a billion dollars. All this
PAC is about a billion dollars. When are we spending?
When are we spending? When are we spending? Well, you know,
I was like a kid right before Christmas. I was like,
when is this campaign money coming in? It's coming in.
And it's not coming in in a drizzle. This is
(00:44):
not a flurry. This is not sleet. This is pouring
rain of money. And it is... And it's also going
to give us insight into where Republicans are putting any
hope at holding the Senate and the House. So let's
get into it. So we are talking about first, let's
talk about the lone star state of Texas.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
Right.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Obviously, big governor's race with Abbott running for a fourth term,
unprecedented fourth term. And then, of course, the U.S. Senate race. Very,
very important with James Tallarico versus Ken Paxton. And then
there's a bunch of house races that could decide the
majority in the U.S. House. It was announced that Elon
Musk's America pack, his super pack, is putting between $ 50
(01:28):
to $ 200 million in the next couple of weeks into Texas.
That was according to Mark Halperin. He says he has
four sources confirming that number, which is horrible. Very large.
It's not only going to commercials either. This is going
to a ground gain operation. This is going to get
late registration for people who don't typically vote, get them
(01:49):
registered to vote, or they don't vote at all, actually,
get them registered to vote if they lean Republican and
get low propensity voters out. That's a lot of money.
$ 200 million is game changing. It comes right after Trump's
MAGA Inc. spent $ 10 million in the initial pro paxton
anti-telerico ad and it that seems like a lot of
(02:10):
money but for texas it's not it's interesting where they
spend it they spend it during the football games the
college football games which is oh you know college football
in texas has its own religion its own thing so
that's why they spend it in during that time that's
a big ad to spend during college football play that
ad now of paying.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
More in taxes.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
Ken Paxton pushing his new plan to make living more
affordable for Texans.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
Paxton's plan, doubling the child tax credit, big write-offs for
medical expenses, and a $ 50, 000 deduction for first-time homebuyers. James
Tallarico supported a trillion-dollar tax hike. Higher property taxes and
higher taxes on Social Security. Tallarico, higher taxes.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Paxton, lower taxes.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
A clear choice. Mega Inc. is responsible for the content
of this advertising.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
So that's not a spicy ad. And I wanted you
to hear the ad because it's not a spicy ad.
It is an ad on quality of life and money.
This is the issue for a lot of voters and
they don't feel confident in Trump's economy. It's a very
clear cut. Tallarico is going to raise your taxes. It
feels like almost a throwback ad. It's not about transgender children.
(03:20):
Not saying those ads won't come in the future. It's
not about guns. I'm not saying those ads won't come
in the future or abortion or anything. It is about
your wallet and pocketbook. That is a very telling ad
as to what the polls internally. I mean, we all
know that, but that's really I'm not. I would bet
that they focus group that ad and they were very
(03:40):
decisive in making sure that that was the initial ad
that they were doing. And it wasn't all culture war stuff.
I think that that's a sign for where we're going
to see more of the ads and what they're going
to be sounding like is that the Republicans are actually
better on the economy than Democrats are. And they're not
the only one spending. The Senate Leadership Fund, that's the
(04:01):
Republican Senate sewer pack. Now, remember, I said over and
over again that they've been telling everyone they're not spending,
they're not spending, they're not spending. Something changed because they
are going in $ 14 million into the Texas campaign to
help out Paxton. That means all of this new money
between the Senate Leadership Fund, between MAGA Inc., between Trump's
(04:25):
other affiliated PAC and Elon Musk, that means that in
just the last week alone, the race went from being
Tallarico outspending Paxton by $ 13 million to Paxton outspending Tallarico
by $ 20 million in one week. Democrats have an additional
(04:46):
$ 4. 5 million coming in for Tallarico. Republicans have $ 33 million
in just a few days. This is Wild. I heard
from someone who I really trust in Texas politics that
she told me that she expects 50 million to come
in every single week from now to the election. That's wild.
(05:09):
But they know that Paxton needs it. They know that
Paxton is in trouble, that this is not a game.
This is not Texas is Texas, that they need to
save Paxton, that they need to save Texas. Because if
Paxton loses... It's not just about Paxton. It's about Texas.
If Texas goes blue, that is a huge deflation to
the base going to 2028 that they can still win
(05:31):
the White House. This is just this is bigger than
just the Senate. It's about the Senate, but it's bigger
than just the Senate. And there was a poll that
came out over the week really highlighting that this is
a point. I know a lot of people are saying, oh,
we don't trust polls. We don't trust polls. This poll
came from Tony Fabrizio. Who is Tony Fabrizio? Tony Fabrizio
is Trump's pollster. He nailed 2024. Every swing state. And
(05:53):
I remember when the Iowa caucus poll came out from
Ann Seltzer that said Kamala was winning Iowa, I think,
by like six or seven points, whatever. I texted Tony.
I never said this on the podcast before. I texted
Tony saying, did you do any polling in Iowa? And
he said, Ryan, calm down. We don't have to. It's
in the bag. And he was right. He was like,
we don't even have to do it because we know
(06:15):
verbatim it is in the bag and he was completely
right i trust tony fabrizio he is not a con
man and he's been around for a very long time
he's a very expensive pollster to hire he is a
new tony fabrizio uh ward wards the democrat i think
our workers in the polls aarp sponsored the poll it
found that james talarico is winning the senate race in
texas 48 to 44 points This comes with a big
(06:39):
lead with voters under 50. Tallarico winning voters under 50
by 27 points. Independents, Tallarico winning them by 22 points.
Weakness among older Republicans for Paxton. He's not winning them
with huge numbers. 12% of older Republicans that are voting
for Tallarico. Independents under 50 are going for Tallarico by
43 points. Women by 11 points and Latinos by 30 points.
(07:01):
Paxton is performing poorly also among whites. He's winning them
by less than 20 points in Texas. That's awful. So
they all know that he is struggling. And not only
is he struggling, Greg Abbott is not doing amazing numbers.
In the most recent poll that Tony Fabrizio put out,
Abbott's up by three points. That's within the margin of error.
(07:25):
I mean, Greg Abbott is a very popular governor. It's
a sign of just how the electorate is. I think
there's different things happening in Abbott's race versus Paxton's race.
I do think data centers are hurting Abbott right now.
I think that's why he had to go in to
do the year-long pause. I think if you look at
the polling, Texans have really turned against data centers. I
(07:46):
talked to a friend yesterday whose family owns like 5,000
acre major farm in Texas, big, big farm. In Texas,
I think they do corn or something like that. But
they produce lots of corn from Texas. And they said
that they are, I think it's 5,000 acres. They were
being offered half a billion dollars for their farm. That
(08:09):
basically these companies are coming in offering some insane number
per acre. It's usually like $ 10 an acre or whatever.
It's now going for like $ 100 or $ 200 an acre.
It's some insane, or $ 1, 000. It's $ 1, 000 an acre they're
going for. So yeah, $ 500 million was being offered for
their family farm. It was, or $ 1, 000, $ 100 an acre.
(08:31):
I forget the exact number. Forgive me for all that.
The point being, crazy numbers. If you have a farm
in a certain area, that I believe is hurting, that's
hurting Abbott. Paxton's about the scandals and the fact that
he was, I mean, if you watch the convention, he's
a fairly low energy candidate, unfortunately. So that's what's happening.
They know they can't lose Texas. Fabrizio's poll is showing
(08:51):
that their internals probably look the same because Fabrizio does
a lot of internals for the campaigns. They're probably all
seeing the same thing circling. Now, this is not the
only race that Republicans are jumping head first into. Where
they're spending their money is very interesting. It tells us
a little bit what their internals probably look like. There
is a new poll called No Going Backpack. It is
(09:14):
affiliated with Trump. We don't know who the donors are.
They haven't disclosed them yet because they formed after the
filing period we won't know who they are for quite
some time they're putting two hundred thousand dollars almost in
kentucky's sixth district that is a trump plus 15 district
in central kentucky that's concerning that they need to put
200k now that's not an amazing amount of money but
(09:36):
that's a lot of money for a district that trump
will make 15 points that's That shows the amount of
defense that they're trying to play right now. No going
back is also putting $ 70 million in other major races. Michigan, Ohio,
New Hampshire, Alaska, North Carolina, and Georgia. Interestingly, no Maine,
no Iowa. I wonder why that is. It's very, very telling.
(09:58):
Those are the two states that they're not putting any
money in. The number one state they're investing in is
Michigan with $ 16 million, Ohio with $ 11 million, and then
New Hampshire with $ 11 million. Going on offense in two
of the key races. Very telling. There is a press
reports that the Democrats are increasingly uncomfortable about Maine Senate
(10:19):
candidate Troy Jackson. He really doesn't like being a candidate
that much. He's not performing as well under the scrutiny
of being a candidate. That might show that there's that
Susan Collins, they believe, can win this without the money.
It also shows weakness on the part of Chris Pappas,
who's the Democrats nominee in New Hampshire. And Al Saeed
in Michigan is just, you know, a constant story. about
(10:42):
uh for democrats his address on 9-11 was so disgusting
i wanted to i was about to scream it was
so the man is campaigning with somebody who said we
deserve 9-11 and he's making a whole statement about you
know his mournfulness on 11 screw off i mean he's
disgusting person all right then there's the house races they're
putting money in number one house race florida 25 to
(11:03):
unseat jared moskowitz congressman democrat congressman jared moskowitz Almost $ 5
million in that race. Followed by New York 17, other
big race for moderate Republican Mike Lawler. Then another aggressive race,
$ 1. 7 million in Washington's third district to win in another
Trump Democrat seat. They're doing a mix of offense and defense.
(11:27):
It would be my idea hearing these numbers saying they
know they're going to lose some places. They can save them.
that they're basically going to hopefully pick up a few
spots and just take the losses where they can. That's
what I'm estimating. Musk is also putting money separately in
his pack, in his America pack, into the Iowa race,
(11:48):
which is interesting. He's also doing it in Michigan and
New Hampshire, once again, two offensive places. That's interesting. And
he's also putting it in Maine. So Collins is getting
some money, but she's not getting money from the MAGA Inc. crowd.
or the no going back crowd. The DCCC did announce
they are spending $ 1. 6 million in their congressional races coming up. Now,
(12:09):
it's interesting where they're putting their money. They're putting their
money in districts that were redistricted. There are seats that
Democrats currently hold that are redistricted so Republicans can win them.
Alabama second, North Carolina's first, Texas 28, and Texas 34.
I think that they probably believe that their incumbents are
strong enough that they can win despite redistricting. That's very
(12:31):
interesting because the redistricting fight was supposed to change the
map completely, and it definitely changed it in some places,
but maybe not enough to really matter. We'll see as
the polls come out in the next two weeks how
much this onslaught of money have changed the direction of
the races. It takes about two weeks to kind of
settle in. We'll also see when these early mail-in ballots
(12:53):
start coming in. They come in already right now, actually.
Mail-in ballot requests have already started. This is full election season.
We have election season, not election day. So we are
in the middle of election season right now. I'll have
more on this in the next two weeks, but this
is the first sign that Republicans are going down, not
going down, without a major fight. So, by the way,
(13:15):
if you are on a TV station in any swing state, congratulations,
you're very rich after this, after this onslaught of money. Okay,
let's go to the polls. That's coming up next. We
had a flurry of polls that I want to address
over the last week. So let's talk about first the
Florida special election. This is for the Marco Rubio seat.
Qantas Insight, one of the most accurate pollsters from 2024.
(13:38):
They said that Senator Ashley Moody is on her way
for a comfortable reelection by seven points. Kiwanis Insight also
put out something else that was really, really interesting because
they're not a bad pollster. So this was shocking. They
said that Minnesota Lieutenant Governor Democrat Peggy Flanagan is only
up in her race by two points. Now, Peggy Flanagan
(13:58):
is nuttier than an almond bar. Like, she is crazy. Like,
she's just nuts, this woman. So she's running. She's only
up by two points. Ironically, that's not the only pollster.
Not ironically, but coincidentally, that's not the only pollster to
say this. TIPP said it's a two-point race. SurveyUSA said
it's a five-point race. And Emerson University said it's a
(14:18):
six-point race. Minnesota is a pretty democratic state. So they're
all saying it's either slightly outside the margin error, but
maybe tightening and getting inside the margin of error. We're
not seeing any outside spending yet. So I can't justify
that these polls are accurate. If their internals start showing that,
we're going to see money being put in Minnesota. We
(14:39):
don't see that yet. But this could maybe be the
first time that hey, there could be blood in the
water in Minnesota. Maybe that will be like Michigan and
New Hampshire, where Republicans are going to go on the offense,
considering they've already basically said we're not going to hold
North Carolina and we're not going to flip Georgia. So
interesting what this poll said. Now let's look over in Maine.
(14:59):
Maine had two polls that came out. One that I
kind of respect, CNN does decent polling. They said that
Susan Collins is down by three points. YouGov had a
poll out. I don't trust YouGov polls, but they said
that Collins is actually down four points. Nonetheless, it's all
within the margin of error. Collins has beaten her polling
average on average over the last three election cycles, over
(15:21):
the last 18 years, by an average of eight points.
In the last five polls since mid-July, Collins has been
within the margin of error in every single one of them.
That is far better than what she was doing against
Graham Plattner when he first announced. That is way better
than what she was doing in 2022. And when you're
(15:42):
seeing that no back down, not back, no going back, rather,
PAC is not investing in her race. And she's not
the top person Republicans are getting money from, getting money to.
Maybe Collins is going to be OK. I don't know.
I'm not saying she is. But man, can that woman
fight an election for a woman of a certain age
(16:05):
who only whispers, who doesn't yell? She is really showing
signs of life in a tough, tough, tough state in
a horrific environment. Over North Carolina, East Carolina University and
Elon University polls, which are not great polling firms, but
they did these polls in North Carolina, they found that
Governor Roy Cooper, Democrat governor, is beating Republican Michael Watley
(16:27):
eight points and 11 points, respectively. Once again, not great pollsters,
but it's all pointing towards the signs. When you look
at how little Michael Watley is receiving money-wise goes, I
think Republicans have conceded that likely Roy Cooper is going
to win this by high single digits. In Michigan, a
bunch of new polls came out. Trafalgar said that El
(16:48):
Saeed leads Mike Rogers by one point. CNN said El
Saeed leads Rogers by three points. Detroit News says Rogers
leads El Saeed by two points. Overall, this race is
lean El Saeed. El Saeed has an advantage, not a
big advantage. And that is why El Saeed is the
number one target. That's why El Saeed is going to
(17:08):
get the James Tallarico treatment of $ 30 to $ 40 million
being pumped. I don't even know about the APAC spending it.
APAC is going to have their affiliate packs probably put
in $ 30 to $ 40 million as well. The money is
going to be astronomical in Michigan. He is the number
one target to beat because all the signs are saying
(17:28):
he's beatable. That's the truth of the matter. They wouldn't
be dumping. This is why Asif is not the target
because they don't believe that he's beatable. This is why
Peggy Flanagan is not the target. El-Sayed is the target
because they think that he's beatable. Emerson University did a
poll out in Iowa, finding that the Republicans have a
comfortable lead of five points while they are down in
(17:50):
the governor's race by three points. I'm going to tell
you guys, a lot of people are saying that Rob
Sands has this over in Iowa. The Republican campaign for
Zach Land is doing something very interesting right now. This
is what no one's talking about because it's not making
major news national news, but it's happening in Iowa. Rob Sands,
the Democrat, His wife is in the chemicals industry and
(18:13):
the chemicals allegedly I'll just say allegedly because I don't
want to I don't want a lawsuit. But allegedly the
chemicals in these products that the wife's family creates are
cancer causing. And exactly. And the Republicans all about the
war on cancer and trying to reduce cancer and cancer
is very high in Iowa. And they are saying, you know,
(18:35):
Rob Sand is the king of cancer in Iowa. I
don't know if that's going to work, but to a
lot of suburban moms who care a lot about things
like that, about health and about their children's health, it's
a powerful attack ad that is different than the data
center conversation. It's different than the other conversations that are happening.
It doesn't mean it's less important, but it could be
hitting people on a nerve level that is not being
(18:57):
picked up in the national media at all. Let's go
over the Ballots, the generic ballots. There's four generic ballot
polls that came out over the last week. Signal, which
is a Republican-leaning firm, has Democrats plus nine. Quinnipiac has
Democrats plus 11. The Economist, YouGov, has Democrats plus 11.
And the Financial Times have Democrat plus seven. What does
(19:18):
that mean? It means that polls show Democrats have actually
grown in their support over the last few weeks. This
is the time that Democrat support usually starts falling down.
And they're all saying, no, it's actually getting stronger. This
looks like 20, you know, 2008 level numbers. I don't
think it can stay this high. I frankly don't. I
think all this infusion of cash into the races means
(19:41):
a lot. But man, and a lot of it's related
to the Iran war. I mean, this generic ballot is rough.
And what we're seeing though, is in these places where
there's beloved incumbents, like in Maine, or where there's very
problematic challengers, like in Michigan with El-Said, this money could
be the difference because they are underperforming the generic ballot
(20:04):
significantly in these places. It's very interesting. We'll see if
this infusion of cash all over the country happening. I'm
hearing four or five hundred million dollars in the next
few weeks alone for Republicans across the entire country will
improve the overall generic ballot. But it's pretty dire, this
generic ballot number overall. So we'll circle back on that
(20:26):
and I'll tell you guys if this means anything or not.
But that's not wonderful news.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
All right.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
Ask Me Anything is coming up next. Stay tuned. Now
it's time for the Ask Me Anything segment. If you
want any part of the Ask Me Anything segment, email
me Ryan at numbersgamepodcast.com. That's Ryan at numbersgamepodcast.com. First question
from Shelly. Shelly says she's a Gen Xer. When she
was a kid, everyone always said Christmas. Cities had Christmas parades.
Public schools had Christmas programs and stores had Christmas sales.
(20:55):
It all changed to holiday. When did this happen? Do
you recall? There had been talk for decades about having
Merry Christmas again, but I don't think we're ever going
to go back to when I was young. Any guesses?
to who, what, the man behind the curtain started the
removal of Christmas in our national culture. Okay, so I
looked this up as far as data around the word
Christmas versus holiday goes. So the word happy holidays being
(21:20):
regularly incorporated in our conversation was in the 1850s, actually.
I did not know this. There was a poem called
Merry Happy Holidays in 1843. It kind of started the
whole entire thing. There was a book by... There's a
book called about the holidays and when the word came
around and it really started increasing around World War II
(21:41):
and then in the 1970s, the 1980s. And then but
Merry Christmas was still used more. Merry Christmas is still
used more than Happy Holidays is. But the margins have decreased.
So Merry Christmas was used more than Happy Holidays by
like a marginal like 500 to one. And now it's
18 to one by the year 2000. I couldn't find
(22:03):
any specific date, though, when it really started declining, but
it was over those decades. The person who, as far
as an elected leader, to really push holidays out there
instead of Christmas was Bill Clinton. In 1992, the White
House stopped using Christmas for the duration of Bill Clinton's presidency.
It used Happy Holidays. So if that's anything to you,
(22:25):
that's the man behind the curtain is Bill Clinton with
the Happy Holidays over Merry Christmas. Next question comes from Sean.
Sean writes, hey, Ryan, I always enjoy your show. Love
that I'm able to get hold of you. Hope you
don't get so big that it's like me trying to
call or email Rush Limbaugh's show. I don't think that
that will be a problem. But thank you for that.
(22:45):
You have two questions, so I'll try to get to
them quickly. First question is new information on voter registration data.
For a while after Trump was inaugurated last year, I
kept writing about all the states that track registration by
party that were shifting right. It's been rather quiet the
last few months, and I haven't heard much of anything.
So there have been a lot of cleanup in the
voter rolls in the last year. So it's a little
(23:09):
difficult for me to say, oh, this party is registering
more people than that party is. There are a number
of states like Pennsylvania. There was one month that they
reported a 15,000 swing for Republicans. But all it was
was they cleaned up the dead rolls and there were
more dead Democrats than Republicans or people had moved or whatever.
So it's a little difficult for me to try to
(23:30):
tell over the short term as far as trends go.
Democrats have definitely picked back up in registration. It's not
overwhelming numbers. It's not like 10 to 1 margins in
any particular state. But they are registering new voters more
than Republicans are in most consequential states. Once again, slightly
over the margins. And that probably tells about the unapproval
rating of Donald Trump not looking at anything You know,
(23:52):
there's not anything shocking for anybody, but that is probably
where that's coming from. Second question is regarding the U.S.
Senate race in Texas. Why didn't John Cornyn voters show
up in the runoff? So this is very interesting. When
Texas voters voted the first time, every election was up, right?
All the House races, the state legislative races, the U.S.
Senate races. And when they had the runoff, it was
(24:14):
only a handful of races statewide. Not just statewide, but
a handful of races throughout the entire state. So- Maybe
you wanted to go vote because you care who your
local mayor was. That wasn't on the second election. Or
maybe you care about this election or that election. That
wasn't on the ballot. And it looks like lower propensity
(24:36):
voters were probably Cornyn supporters over people who vote in
every single election. And they were probably Paxton supporters. Obviously,
the Trump poll, the Trump endorsement helped a bit for Paxton.
But it looks like Cornyn's voters were probably just there
to vote for other races. And they were more, I
would say, established and Republicans. And they weren't they were
(24:56):
voting for Cornyn because they because they always vote for Cornyn.
They weren't voting for Cornyn. They weren't getting out of bed.
I got to vote for John Cornyn today. They just vote.
And they were motivated a second time. It's hard to
get the vote so many times in a single election year.
It's actually extremely difficult. OK.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
OK.
Speaker 1 (25:14):
Last question for the episode comes from Robert. Robert writes
to me, I bought the book Regime Change. I'm really
enjoying it. Regime Change by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan,
who came on this program. Very honored that they did.
You know what? I know a lot of people don't
like the New York Times reporters, but I will say
this about Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman. Do you know
how many will not come on a conservative podcast? Do
(25:36):
you know how many Washington Post reporters are basically told
you are not to go on a conservative podcast? That's
what one of them told me. I have asked. Most
Democratic politicians will not come on a conservative podcast. Most
liberal pollsters will not come on a conservative podcast. I
ask these people all the time, please come on. And
they are like, no, I won't. either they are afraid
(25:57):
of their own people doing it or they are like
being attacked for coming on my show or they are
told by their bosses, no, we don't, we have a
very enclosed circle. So I am very thankful those who do.
It's actually slightly brave that they do because there is no,
(26:17):
no one, you don't get an applause for coming to
talk to me. You're usually actually told by your boss
biggest supporters how dare you speak to them so i
give them credit okay back to the question you said
um it almost feels like i'm at the book uh
i love learning about what happens behind the scenes when
the cameras aren't rolling and what feels like i'm experiencing
these events in real time especially since many of the
(26:38):
people involved are still working there your episode gives behind
the scenes look at some of my favorites uh the
book's hilarious at times you talk about that your question
is this how accurate do you think the reporting is
i think the accurate is very reporting because there's not
a single scene in the book that has ever been discredited.
Trump has attacked the book, but no one from the
White House has discredited a specific event. And they are
(27:00):
very detailed, very, very detailed in that book. You write,
is there any possibility that regime change is somewhat of
a hit job? It portrays Trump in a very negative light,
which makes me question how much I should trust the reporting.
I will say this, and this is how I approach
New York Times reporters in general. A lot of them
are very good. A lot of them are very, very good,
(27:21):
but they come from a liberal starting point. So when
they talk about the book, right in the book, there's
a chapter that talks about Trump's big, beautiful bill. They mention,
they pass by the Trump savings account and the drug
pharmaceutical business or the Trump pharmacy thing, whatever, to reduce
(27:43):
drug prices. They mention the tax cuts, but it's in passing.
It doesn't highlight what that is. So they don't not
tell you all the facts. They highlight things and they
come from a perspective that the liberal order is the
good way. That's why when Maggie and Jonathan were on
this podcast, I said to them, how much do you think?
(28:06):
Because it's very clear that they are uneasy about, you know,
not having the post-World War II consensus and having that
being challenged. And my question to them was, is this
Trump or is this the way things were going to
happen regardless of him? And they both said, this is
the way things were going to happen. Trump was just
(28:28):
the accelerant. So they acknowledge it when being pressed. The
problem is that most people who talk to authors is one,
they don't read the book. I always read the book beforehand.
And two, they also come from the liberal perspective. Of course,
of course, this is all good. Of course, we're all
in agreement on this. Of course, you're like, you know,
(28:48):
you have the same perspective as me. It reminds me
of an interview, Dolly Parton, may she rest in peace.
didn't she didn't interview with some, I don't know, libtard.
And they were they said they mentioned Donald Trump and
they love Dolly because everyone loves Dolly. And the liberal
perspective is, oh, you're a good person and I'm a
good person. So therefore, we must hate all the same people.
(29:10):
And they mentioned Trump to her. And she said, why
don't we pray for him? Something like that. I was
either Bush or Trump is a Republican president. And they
were so taken aback by the fact that she approached
it from a Christian perspective and not a judgmental one
and not letting her feelings being known and trying to
(29:30):
be somebody everyone could love. I think that the reporter
was taken so off guard because he's what do you
mean you're supposed to be a good person like me
and just hate this person? And so I think a
lot of times these reporters, it's not that they're withholding facts.
They highlight certain things that are hair on fire moments
that are not hair on fire moments. But it's their
(29:52):
values were being challenged and they don't like that and
they're only around people whose values aren't being challenged. I
think that that is really kind of what that part
gets to. You also talk about there's influences of flattery
against him and you talk about the interference of the
Justice Department. Is that accurate? To what degree? You know,
(30:13):
Maggie and Jonathan in this book, you know, everyone likes
to say, oh, my gosh, this has never been done before.
A big part of it, which I brought up to
Maggie and Jonathan, I didn't bring it up in this context,
but I brought it up. Maggie and Jonathan's talked about
the Federal Reserve, about how Trump is trying to change
the Federal Reserve's interest rates and how that's interference with
the independent Federal Reserve. You know who else did that?
George H.W. Bush at the at the State of the
(30:36):
Union mentioned that. I'm sorry, but like we've seen almost
the reason that Trump's attacks against Trump don't hit is
where a lot of us are old enough to have
seen the movie already. We're not that shocked. It's not
that unprecedented. Maybe the way he's doing is maybe unprecedented.
It's a new way. It's a remake, but we saw
(30:57):
the original. It's not that shocking. So calm down, right?
Just calm down. All of it's not that surprising. Did
he interview with the Justice Department? I don't know. Did
Obama tell his Justice Department to go after nuns for
years over abortion? I mean, why was it the Obama
(31:17):
Justice Department doing every liberal thing in the world, going
after Republican organizations and Obama's IRS withholding nonprofit status? Did
the campaign arm interfere? Did President Obama interfere himself? I
don't know. But it's really weird how that all happened
under his administration. It didn't happen under another administration. You
just have to ask yourself those questions and everyone can
(31:39):
just calm down. Part of it is probably unprecedented, but
a lot of it is, you know, Trump's around, grab
a brown paper bag and start breathing into it. Like, relax.
You mentioned the pardons. I think the pardons are actually
a really, really big problem. I do think that the
financial stuff is actually a really big problem with Trump.
And you said, finally, could you recommend a book similar
(31:59):
to regime change? I'd especially be interested in books behind
the scenes on political campaigns. OK, I have a tick
that I read every political campaign book about a presidential
election like in history. I've read basically every single one.
I don't know why I'm a sycophant. I'm actually pulling
out my phone to look at my audio books as
I Walk my dog and listen to audiobooks. And I
(32:21):
will say to you that the ones that I enjoyed
the most, 2024 by Josh Dossi and Tyler Page. Pretty good.
That was a pretty good book overall. Original Sim by
Jake Tapper. Alex Thompson was on this podcast about the
Biden administration. Honestly, was very, very, very strong. I really
liked that book. Art of Power by Nancy Pelosi. Horrible book.
(32:43):
Would not recommend it to anybody else. She did a
terrible job. She didn't she didn't actually include anything about herself.
Amateur Hour by Charlie Spearing was also not a bad book.
So those were the ones I recommend. 2024 is probably
the most accurate one. That was a pretty decent one
about the 2024 election. And the Alex Thompson book was
with Jake Tucker was good as well.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
Dan St.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Blois' book was horrible. All right, that's this episode. I
hope you liked it. If you like this podcast, please
like and subscribe on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever
you get your podcasts, and on YouTube. I will talk
to you guys on Wednesday.
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