Tim Miller: We Told You So

Well, thank god. It is Friday. And thank god that, I am joined once again by Tim Miller. I was telling my wife, Tim, just a few minutes ago. I am so glad that I have Tim on the podcast today because there’s so much going on.

And and I think that you and I are probably, you know, in the same lane on our reaction to the debate slash the mug shot. I mean, we have to start with the mug shot. Okay?

Oh, so satisfying.

Talk to me about it. Talk to me

about that. That’s just so satisfying.

The presidential portrait, the first presidential portrait of its kind.

It’s been a long time coming, you know, it really has. I mean, for us, eight years now, and, but really even before that, I he’s been a criminal for a long time. The people he screwed over at Trump university, people he screwed over other places. He’s been a con man and a criminal his whole life. And We knew it.

We said it. And, you know, it’s been kind of this one long, slow rolling, unsatisfying. I told you so.

I was hoping you were gonna say it first. If only they had been warned, what did you tweet out? You know, never trump from the jump?

From the jump.

Guys, We told you this eight years ago. And that was my thought this morning. I’m I’m looking at the mug shot, and, you know, and I say, you know, what twisted bizarre tangled road this has been. I mean, there’s been so many chapters, you know, so many clowns and cowards and co conspirators but it all comes back to to Donald Trump. And it was always going to end this way.

Wasn’t it? I mean, you elect someone like that.

Yes. You

know, a wannabe mob boss. You know, a serial fraudster liar and, you know, hey, shock that it ends this way.

Yeah. I mean, anybody that knew anything about Donald Trump would have known that it would have have ended somewhere like this. I mean, did we know we were gonna get ninety one felony counts in the storm of the capitol? You don’t know, the particulars. But, no, you knew it was gonna end in the in a fucking flaming dumpster fire disaster.

And here we are, and it’s just so, you know, there’s a lot of you know, what are the impacts and what, you know, there’s a lot of other ins and outs and what have yous, but it’s like this is just an absolute unmitigated disaster for the Republican Party that is going to have ripple effects forever. Right? I think this stuff is Like, his his mug shot is never gonna go away. These guys complicity is never gonna go away. The whole parade of mug shots.

I mean, I was enjoying everyone. I was the Trump, when I was worried, is gonna be a little disappointed, but Rudy, and any of his chief of staff. And, you know, that people were bringing right the old pictures of Halldemons mugshot from, you know, and and and flashing back the Meadows, hold them in comparison, which was satisfying. And and Jen Alice and Sydney Powell, I’m still waiting for Jeff Clorox, but it was needed, but, you know, I guess the only one thing that cuts the other way for me on this is like, we do kind of feel we’re at the point now where everyone that’s gonna jump off the ship has jumped. You know, usually on on each of these inflection points, there’s been an exit ramp that, like, far too few people have taken but a couple have taken, but they’re nobody’s taking any eggs at Rams yesterday.

Nobody say, you know, none of Nobody would

mean the politicians, the political class types and everything.

Yeah.

Yeah. You know, let’s come back to this a little bit later because, you know, there are some there are some polls out there suggesting that, you know, despite our default setting of nothing matters and he could shoot somebody and all of that stuff that he could set, you know, live monkeys a fire in Yeah.

No. I meant that. I’m not talking about that. No.

I mean Let’s talk about the political vote. Okay. Right. So but, you know, and of course, there’s all these, you know, the the whining about the weaponization of the justice department. And the point that I made in in morning shots this morning is, you know, if you know Donald Trump, this was always coming, but also this is a result of his choices.

This is what he wanted. I mean, there there’s an alternative reality. I mean, he chose to lie about the election. I mean, he could have behaved like every other president in US history and conceded and allowed the peaceful transfer of power. Instead, he chose to orchestrate a coup.

And, you know, he he chose to defame election workers, and he chose to try to intimidate officials into stealing votes. It was his choice to form a criminal enterprise, right, and conspired to defraud the government. It was his choice to summon the law. I mean, all of these things. It was his choice to steal the classified documents and then ignore the subpoena.

You know, it was his choice to, you know, try to, you know, erase the tapes and all of this. And frankly, and I guess this is, like, you know, Tim, I’m sorry. We’ve had this conversation. To your point, this is also the Republican Party’s choice because they had so many communities to say no. They could have been impeached and disqualified him.

Yeah. And I have to say that what an amazing moment at that debate, when they were all asked, the, you know, the candidates for president of the United States were all asked for the show of hands. Whether they would support Trump even if he was a convicted felon. And then six of them raised their hands. Yeah.

Two of them sort of, you know, awkwardly that that moment, you know, Ron DeSantis looking around, like, what is everybody else saying?

Maybe ending up being the only thing that ends up being memorable from that I we’ve talked about it a bit more, but DeSantis is slow hand raised. Feels like might be the thing that has legs out of all that. On the weaponization really quick before we get to that though, I just I I know our listeners know this. It is important to say it. Just how it is.

And if anything, Merrick Garland, was too timid as you’ve covered quite quite extensively. Mike Pence. Doesn’t have any mug shots. He hasn’t been arraigned. He’s been indicted.

Bill Barr hasn’t been indicted. Ron DeSantis, nobody’s coming for him for, you know, the firing of prosecutors or anything like this. Like this whole, like, the whole preposterous notion that these guys are coming after Trump because they’re whatever scared of him or whatever. It’s, like, it’s ridiculous. I I mean, most of these Democrats frankly are so stupid they wanna run against trump and risk burning our entire society down, with it.

So there is no Nothing to that. And the fact that otherwise smart people, otherwise, ideally educated people like Ted Cruz, like, continue to advance this, just shows, like, the depth of the rot on this side. And I I think that is what connects for me. The two things you brought up there just you have a Republican party primary field where we’re gonna give Chris Christie three and and they saw just in one percentage point where ninety six percent of the vote share is what people who said that they would vote for a convicted convict, where, you know, the vast vast majority of Republican elected officials are advancing the obvious lie, you know, that this is some politicized, like, indictment. So somebody asked me,

you know, If you were a producer for setting that live, what would you do with with that debate, you know, with the slow hand raise of, you know, Ron DeSantis looking around? The thought that comes to my mind, is that and, you know, this is the problem of parodies these days, is that Brett Bear then actually asks a follow-up question. Well, okay. Let’s have a show of hands. How many of you would still vote for Donald Trump if he set baby monkeys a fire, in the middle of fifth avenue.

All the hands would go up. How many of you would vote for Donald Trump for president if he beat baby whales to death with the bodies of baby seals it would just keep beetle escalating. And of course, all the hands And

you can picture on everyone, Vivak, getting more and more excited, raising his hand more fervently as, like, DeSantis looks around to be really? We’re doing it again. We’re doing it again. Okay. I guess I’ll raise my hand again.

Okay. I did

I just wanna just stop for a moment because they every once in a while, you need to underline things. You know, how extraordinary it is for the party of law and order. Because five minutes ago, Tim, it would have been the easiest question in the world because nobody would ever think of voting for a candidate who had been indicted, tried, and then convicted of felonies, found guilty of felonies by a jury of their peers, nobody would have thought of endorsing or supporting that person, not for city council, the legislature, secretary of state. I mean, Much less the presidency of the United States. I mean, this is like mind boggling.

If you just wanted just one moment that captures what has happened to the Republican Party? I mean, on one level, you know, the extent to which they’re still in the thrall of of Donald Trump, but also Just the incredible intellectual and moral corruption that they’re all up there on stage saying, yeah, convicted fellan, actual criminal. Yeah. We’re okay with that. I mean, can you imagine this in in two thousand five?

I was thinking about this reading your newsletter. I’m just thinking about the confirmation process. Right? Like, any confirmation, any official that gets appointed to the federal government needs to be confirmed. Take out all the coup stuff.

Take out all the coup stuff. Just the documents case. Somebody that was indicted for this level of mishandling of documents would not get approved by the Senate for any office. Like, there’s nothing that they would approve. This person, deputy, secretary of commerce.

Or hired by any public company, you show up again, do apply for the shift manager at Arby’s with this rap sheet. You’re not gonna get the job.

And it’s just, like, It is crazy. And the moral bankruptcy is part of it at all. And then also just the self preservation element. I think the thing that just was astonishing to me on that stage on Wednesday was, I guess, Nikki Haley kind of made the practical argument about how Donald Trump was the most unpopular politician in America. But but nobody was like, guys.

Guys, we might love him. But Have you seen this court date calendar next year? Like, are we really gonna nominate somebody who’s who’s gotta be sitting behind a table? For a vast part.

It’s Christie kinda flirted with that. Yeah. But no. No. You’re right.

You’re right. It’s like people, like, have we lost our minds? Do you know what we’re about to do here? Okay. There’s a lot of heavy stuff here, and I I wanna get to the debate.

I wanna get to Vivic and all of that stuff. And but a couple of things. Number one. Donald Trump’s weight. Donald Trump self reports his weight.

He he says he’s six foot three and two hundred and fifteen pounds. I mean, for fuck’s sake, Tim. Yeah.

I was, like, he could be Mack Jones quarterback of the New England Patriots. You know, I thought that his basketball comp was guy, Lou Dort, who’s, like, the most muscled man and all of Dadle, all of the NBA plays with a funder. So that’s not true. I I was just going with the fact that it’s a typo and that it was three fifteen. Yeah.

But, you know, you’d think that It’s

gotta be two ninety. Right? At minimum.

You’d think that the Fulton County Court would have just been, like, guy. You know, come on. Okay. Give us something

give us

something in the ballpark here. I mean, yeah,

this is actually an official document.

I was disappointed in that, but I’m not gonna I’m not gonna let myself get too disappointed because elijah is so obvious. Okay. More intriguing thing was that he he volunteered his hair as a strawberry blonde. When it’s more of like a burnt sienna

for me.

But maybe it’s

just because those wants

scalp is like you can see his scalp going through, but a straw he’s not really a strawberry blonde, I wouldn’t say. It’s kind of it was kind of an effeminate choice even. Strawberry blood.

K. What was with the motorcade? I mean, you asked this really excellent question. What is the possible security rationale for eighty motorcycles flanking a loser who is being arraigned. I mean This

actually pisses me off.

Well, and also the media doing they cannot freaking help themselves. They have to do the whole OJ slow moving bronco stuff. But what was with that motorcade? I mean, I don’t know that there were eighty motorcycles, but it was intense.

There were so many motorcycles. And then there was in the in the New Jersey side and the Georgia side, you know, one of the one of guys that replied to my tweet, you know, on there was, like, it was, like, they when the king of Zamunda comes to America and coming to America, you know, you would think that this was a g twenty or, you know, the the queen of England going to visit her, you know, an imperial capital. Like, I don’t legitimately, I don’t understand the security rationale. I mean, like, do you think that And there’s gonna be, like, an armed antifa con fab that comes after them. I mean, how many people could you possibly need to protect the president?

But it seems more dangerous. Right? Like, if you’re worried about a bomb threat or something, stochastic terrorism, everyone being able to watch this slow moving motorcade you know, parading through Bulwark and then parading through Atlanta. It seems like a bigger threat, to me. I’m not security expert, but it seems like a low profile in George Con where you pointed out tweeted, you know, there’s a video of Obama going to something that he that he picked up at post presidency, and it’s it’s two, yeah, it’s two SUVs and one police car, no sirens, no nothing.

I mean, that seems like

No. Like

That seems just from a security point more appropriate. But then just from the optics, like, this thing, this pisses me off. Right? Like, he’s not he has no office. Right?

He’s a former president, So, you know, we have secret service. We get that. But in America, just to start with, you know, we don’t have royal kings and queen. Right? Like, we have citizen leaders, and they should be treated as such.

You know, it’s a long time rant of mine. Like, I just think I think that politicians should sit at stoplight Like, I I don’t I don’t understand why anybody maybe the president for security reasons, but why anybody else gets a motorcade that that doesn’t set at stoplights. We have citizen leaders in this country. We do not have royalty. And just a visual of this guy going to get arrested, you know, with that kind of pomp and circumstance, It fucking pisses me off.

I and then is the taxpayer element of it? I just I don’t like it. And I I real I don’t know the real answer. Right? Cause he had the same treatment in New Jersey and in Atlanta.

So is it the local police? Is it the Secret Podcast guys doing them a solid? I genuinely don’t get it.

I think it’s a legitimate question. I mean, this whole thing, like, no one is above the law. You will be treated like anybody else. No. I mean, I mean, look, I understand that there are security Ron DeSantis.

But this was this was essentially, you know, a taxpayer funded parade, and we know that Donald Trump really, really likes parades, doesn’t he? Hey, folks. This is Charlie Sykes, host of the Bulwark podcast. We created the Bulwark to provide a platform for pro democracy voices on the center right and the center left for people who are tired of tribalism and who value truth and vigorous yet civil debate about politics and a lot more. And every day, we remind you folks.

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I promise. So let’s talk about the debate. I think you and I may have a slightly different, take on all of this. I mean, that Okay. Good.

How do you think Fox handled it? I mean, I I thought, you know, this was supposed to be the redemption. I thought Joe Pertacone had a great newsletter. Was this was a reminder that Fox News is still Fox News, and I I thought it was kind of a shit show. What did you think?

Just about the way the moderators handled it. The fact They went a full hour without even mentioning the orange elephant not in the room. I mean, come on. Questions about country western songs and u f o

Yeah. The three minute propaganda thing at the beginning was very strange. Like, eight people walk out on stage, and then there’s, like, a two minute sizzle reel about how Joe Biden’s the worst president in American history. And then they they play the preponderance of the Richmond North of Richmond song. For everyone to sit there and listen to.

Like, while all eight of them just stand there, I don’t know. There’s something communist about that. Like, I just I I don’t know. It was very strange. I think the most telling thing about Fox’s treatment of Trump is like the crowd is booing.

And at one point, you know, Brett has to turn around and calm everybody down Like, you know, I know we all wanna move on from this. I know we all wanna get on to other things. And it’s like, do we though? He has about half of the primary electorate right now. There’s this whole like, farce that gets perpetuated in in the, you know, polite society conservative media world where it’s like, you know, it’s just those deranged never trumpers and the and the New York Times that are just an MSBC that’s obsessed with Trump and we wanna talk about other things.

We wanna get on to serious matters, like, you know, whether kindergartners are ready to read about the Stonewall riots and, you know, vape pens, And it’s like, I don’t think that that’s right, actually. The it’s Republican voters. I would love for Donald Trump just go the fuck away. I’d love for him to fall into and disappear forever. I’d I’d love to never have to think about them again.

Yeah. It’s Republican voters that want Tim. And so they might not be happy that they have to talk about all the bad things that he did. And I’m and I’m sorry for them that, you know, that they need their binky. But to not talk about the guy winning by forty points in the first hour, is proposing a little weird.

Apologize for

it to the crowd when you have to bring them up. And the whole thing’s preposterous.

I mean, this especially because, I mean, Donald Trump decision not not to come. Is basically an f u to, Fox News. It’s an f u to, to the the RNC and to Republican voters and to the other people on this stage. But, you know, this has been the pattern. Right?

That the response to being humiliated and slapped by Donald Trump is to say, thank you, sir. May I have another one? Yeah. Instead of pushing back on him

just like nobody made the practical case against him about the arrest of, like, we were talking about him earlier. Nobody tries to do the This guy’s a wuss. He’s a wuss. He can’t even come out here.

Yeah. I was hoping that Christie would say, by the way, we are here, you know, doing this. You know, where is the coward who won’t even face this by later?

Yeah. A little baby won’t even come. Giving the empty podium treatment. I you know what I mean? Like, do something.

But thank you, sir. I may I have another is exactly the vibe.

Alright. So this was the VVAC show. I think the one thing that united everybody on that stage the one point of unity is they all, loathe of Vivek. They think that he’s a fraud, that he’s a fake, and they’re all right about all of this. And — Yeah.

— and they’re just they’re just sick and tired of him. But the crowd seem generally to like him. He’s the one that he’s got the he got the buzz. Now, again, we we may disagree, but I thought they were kind of if there were two lanes the Moggle lane and the normie, you know, donor lane, clearly Vivek won the Moggle lane. He speaks fluent Maga.

I mean, he he hit every single one of those buttons. I’m gonna argue later that I thought Nikki won the Normandy Lane, but let’s talk about Vivek because There’s a guy who has been just, you know, throwing feces up against the wall for, you know, several weeks. You’ve seen him, you know, how entertaining he is. I mean, he is He’s gifted. He’s a gifted, and therefore, even more dangerous demagogue.

But he’s out there talking about, you know, nine eleven being an inside job, January six being an inside job. Embraces every bat shit crazy conspiracy theory about Ukraine policy, you know, more trumpy than trump unappeasement. Give Taiwan, to the Chinese, you know, let Vladimir Putin win. I mean, what’s the downside? Defund Israel.

And yet, Tim, he is the new hotness. He is the new rock star for the Maga ripe.

Yeah.

You feel like there’s a trajectory line. Right? Mean, since you’ve done Trump, should we be surprised that the next man up is not, say, Mike Pence, that the next man up is this, you know, shallow, utterly shameless demagogue Vivec Ramaswamy?

Yeah. So just really quick on the merits of what he’s saying. Did you see the clip from after the debate where he’s asked about Ukraine? And he’s talking about how you know, actually us cutting a deal with the Russians is the best thing for Ukraine because if we don’t, then some warlord is gonna take over from Zalen and they’re gonna turn into Afghanistan. And she’s like, it’s buffoon.

That’s just rank idiocy and offensive. And the Pope Zelensky stuff, a total charlatan on this stuff. You know, and he’s up there just machine gunning, like, conspiracy nonsense. It’s like the one that caught my ear that I didn’t anybody else to talk about was he’s like, you know, one way to resolve our our crime issue is we need to bring back insane asylums should you catch that?

Oh, yeah.

He’s like, yeah. He’s like, we’ve been shutting down our mental institutions. We gotta bring those back. And it’s like, okay. Well, that’s a hot take.

You know, we we need more comps We need qualified immunity for them so they don’t get sued. And then we need to give them the right to lock people up in the loony bed. That’s That’s the freedom first agenda right there. But I think he maybe overstepped on some of that stuff. And I think that his personality is is more grating than Trump’s.

But just directionally about what the people want in the party and and not everybody, but what a big portion of the party wants. On the Ukraine thing, the other hand raised question, when Brett Bear is like, should we stop sending money to Ukraine, Vivak shoots his hand up. I mean, it’s coming out of his shoulder

side up.

Yeah. He he didn’t give

a DeSantis sort of little alligator arm thing. He was up there. Like me.

Yeah. Tiptoes. Me. No one else on their state trade is their hand. Okay.

In recent poll, seventy one percent of Republicans are with Vivic. So this was a little reminiscent to be of Trump at twenty sixteen when people

are like,

this guy’s a clown. He’s saying conspiracy stuff, and that was true. But there were also a handful of issues, immigration, Muslim ban, Iraq War where he was the only one on a big stage saying something. The people in the crowd agreed with. And so I’m not saying that everyone should pander and change their view on Ukraine.

I’m I’m just saying that if if we’re in reality about where the party is, that that’s good for Vivek, he’s the only one on a seventy percent issue on the side of the seventy. And then there are six people rolling on the side of the thirty and then Ron DeSantis does the alligator arms thing and kind of tries to do. Well, you know, the European should pay more. And and so he tries to tiptoe on both sides of that whole thing. So, you know, and then there’s six on the side of of we should give Ukraine more money, which is you know, a a decent chunk of the party, a quarter of the party, thirty percent.

You could replicate that on some other issues too.

You’re right. That’s a reality check. That in fact, he knows, you know, where all the erogenous zones are for the right.

Yeah. And he has flipped. I mean, he is he has flipped. Like, his criticisms of Trump In his book, we’re like, oh, he has a baby like Stacy Abrams, and I and I I didn’t like the tariffs. And he’s like, the spending was too high.

And that was just in a book that he wrote, like, two years ago, and he’s trashed all that he is he’s learned from Trump. He’s gotten on the road. He listens to what the people want. And now he’s just like, oh, okay. Well, I can adjust.

I can just give these people an unfiltered candice islands. Like, that’s easy.

None of these people have any memories whatsoever. So did you see what your what your old friend, Lisa Defonic tweeted out today?

Oh, no. I’ve missed that one.

All in caps, trump won. One what? You know, I mean, here’s somebody who again, you know, has got this great educational pedigree who was once considered a rising star among the, you know, thought Right? Bulwark with her at the RNC. Her transformation has been, you know, to absolute complete shameless shell.

I’m just watching how many of these people have just completely shed

everything that they used to be

and believe, you know, starting with JD Vance and and and Lindsey Graham. It’s like there’s some weird drug out there that they have to go in the room and they get the juice or some You know what I’m saying? It’s just and so VVAC in some ways is, well, of course, it’s going to lead to somebody like this.

Oh, yeah. And this is the other thing that just and and I wanna get into Nikki next, but this isn’t really the top And there were some things that I liked about the stage. I didn’t in my not my party this week, I talked about how Nicki was surprisingly good for me and so so was Penn. So there are things I didn’t like. Both raised their hands and said they voted for a conflict, for example, but but there are some things that I like, which we can talk about.

The thing that I I get frustrated with is I saw a lot of there was some conventional wisdom out there and particularly in the center right world. It was like, there was some refreshing elements of this debate that this is what the party could look like under Trump. Like, there’s one weird mega guy, but there’s a lot of relative normies up there, and then there’s the same just kind of straddling. And it’s like, well, wait. The stage was like that because Trump wasn’t there.

If Trump died, if Trump had a heart attack, Maybe I’m wrong, but I don’t think the field would be this field. Right? I think that there would be other people trying to fill that Vive vague would not be alone. There would be other people trying to fill the Trump lane because that’s where the majority of the party is. I mean, Ben Shapiro did this tweet yesterday.

That was like, the party is thirty five percent mega twenty percent mega adjacent, twenty five percent Reagan, twenty percent never trump. Yeah. And I’m like, I wish. If that was true, the stage would make sense. Right?

Cause it was just kind of a competitive. It’s like fifty five forty five mega traditional. Like, that’s not what it is. It’s like sixty five thirty five or seventy thirty. And so that is the thing that that I just think is is sobering.

And Bill put this well. I think on Thursday night for Bulwark plus subscribers, only is, like, seventy five percent of the party is gonna be what the three worst candidates or eighty percent. It’s like that is that’s the concerning thing. And I think that that, like, is some context about the VIVA situation.

Before we get to Nikki, who is the biggest loser on the on the stage? Did you think?

Tim Scott, for sure. Okay.

That’s what I thought.

He was weird. He disappeared. And — Totally.

—

I mean, again, he proved what people know. I might my my friend Peter Hamby writes for puck. I just I wrote this article, like, a month it’s just like, I don’t think that these donors that are giving Tim Scott money have met Tim Scott. Like, he’s a nice guy. He’s fine.

You know, obviously, he’s way too. Lick spittle about Trump, but inter personalized guy. But, like, he doesn’t have these performing skills. Like, this is reverse tokenization efforts. So I put somebody up that the that they could feel good about, but it’s like, he just didn’t have it up there.

And so I just think that Larry Ellison just lit sixty million totally on fire for no reason. I’m also also confused what Tim Scott’s thing was. Remember when he said he agreed with Mike Pence? It’s like, okay. So now you’re not gonna be VP.

It’s like, why are you running just because some rich guy gave you sixty million and you had nothing better to do just like the motorcade I genuinely do not understand. If anyone is listening and knows why Tim Scott is running for president, please let me know because I assumed he was running for VP. But now he’s never gonna be VP because I had

the same assumption. And, of course, you know, if he was not running for VP, this was a great up opportunity for him to be the, hey, give me a second look. I’m the non trump acceptable candidate, and he just faded away. I mean, he spoke for about eight minutes. By the way, I’m totally bored now talking about Ron DeSantis.

The Rhonda Santis is really, really bad at this. Okay. Have we done this? But, I mean, clearly, that was not the debate that he wanted or were needed. And, you know, talk about a guy who is just not comfortable in his skin.

So you’re you’re a veteran of these debates

It was Ted Cruz for me. I don’t need to go on. It was Ted Cruz again. Now remember Ted Cruz finished second, and it was kind of a distant second. But Do you remember?

I you know, he he hit his marks. He said that mostly the things the Mag of people like. Know, the awkward hand raise is gonna be bad. He he has weird facial expressions. He’s a kind of an awkward person just like Ted Cruises and and his likability factor is low, but He is minimally acceptable for people in all these lanes to the extent that, you know, you wanna calm lanes.

And so I, you know, I wouldn’t be surprised. If polls come out next week and he gained a point or two or something. You know what I mean? I I got I’m

expecting that VVAC is gonna overtake him, though. What do you think? I mean, with the polls next week, who’s in second place?

I think that you’ll see some for both of them. I put out a tweet that I was like, I bet you’ll see one poll that has Vive in the high teens Ron DeSantis in the low teens. That’s my priors. We’ll see. Maybe that’s wrong.

Remember, DeSantis was in the twenty. And has lost altitude. So, you know, can you win some of those people back? Sure. I think that Vivint gets some momentum for sure.

Nicki does He needed to really regain alpha status, you know, and and regain, oh, oh, right. This is why we liked him. You know, the migrant guy. And he didn’t do that. Yeah.

And he was fine. You know, the national review people liked him, but they liked him already.

Yeah. Of course, they did. I just thought that by the end of the debate, he felt like an afterthought. Okay. So this is bringing me to Nikki.

I actually was very, very surprised by her performance. I have to do admit that I mean, I’ve been, you know, quite critical of her. I wrote a piece called the unbearable lightness of of Nikki Haley. When I was, like, you know, gamed me out in my mind what I thought might happen at this debate, wasn’t even thinking about her And she comes out right away with that statement about the spending of all things, you know, this high lob, you know, ripping fellow Republicans you know, calling out Donald Trump raising eight trillion dollars in in debt. And that was the moment I thought, okay.

So, she has decided that she’s running for president, not for vice and she’s gonna call them out. I thought she was really strong on Ukraine going after Vivec. I thought Vivec dominated that stage until that moment. And I think if you listened to the crowd, there was a turn. Now it doesn’t change the fact that it was his dominant night, but Feel free to disagree with me here, but I think a lot of that that and maybe they’re irrelevant.

Maybe this doesn’t make a difference. Maybe there is no donor class. Maybe there is no normie class at all. Maybe there’s only thirty percent. But the folks who’ve been sitting around going, you know, we need somebody else because DeSantis is so awful.

The people who are on the phone to Glenn Yonkin or hoping that, Brian Kemp gets into the race. On Thursday morning, didn’t they wake up going, hey, we gotta give this Nikki Haley a second look.

Yeah. And that’s why the real big winner of the debate was Nikki Haley’s political consultants because they are now gonna get cash in on on some TV ads that they didn’t think that they’re gonna have the money for. And so I wanna congratulate those guys in the new, the new pool they’re putting in in Bethany Beach. Because they

are real. Cynicism here.

Okay. Here well, I’ll be Ernest for a second. It was refreshing to hear her about Ukraine to give just a in touch with reality position about abortion. Even if you don’t agree with all the particulars, I I thought that it was directionally good to have her a woman up there saying that and, like, offering, like, at least some kind of reality based position on on how to balance different contingencies on abortion, the spending thing. But I again, yeah.

Let’s just say. And I think that this could be possible. Right? That she coalesces the Scott vote, the Christie vote, her own, you know, the the little ones and twos of the aces and and the and the will herd altogether. Maybe even takes one or two of the normie, national review types who are with Ron DeSantis, and they and they pop over.

What’s their ceiling? Twenty five? Sealing, like sealing sealing twenty eight. Right. It’s just I I just don’t Well,

what did DeSantis have at his peak?

Well, like, twenty eight, twenty eight, twenty eight. I I’d have to look. I don’t have it in front of me, but something around that. Yeah. Yeah.

But I the thought with Ron DeSantis was only set he could unite the tribes. You know, this is the fundamental issue with the anti trump — Exactly. Right? Which is I was actually talking to a guy that’s working for a super pack trying to beat Trump and still a Republican. And and I was like, just test me out on this, but I think that the persuadable, but if you say that Trump has this thirty five percent rock hard base.

Right? Like, to me, the persuadable vote then, the remaining sixty five is basically split down the middle of of mega and norm. Right? Like, thirty, thirty. And he was like, yeah, it might be a little better than that.

It might be it might be thirty five, twenty five. And I was like, okay. But still then, then that that puts the peak up at thirty five. You know, when you’re doing the math here, it’s like you have to get into the Maga world somehow. You gotta get some percentage of those people.

Right.

And, you know, maybe Nikki can find some mega women who, like, the fact that she’s a woman, she does. She does do pretty well with Sarah’s focus groups on that stuff. But Trump hasn’t really started attacking her yet yet, Like, I think that the, oh, we need that Joe Biden isn’t giving enough money to Ukraine. We need to cut spending, cut entitlements. I don’t think this is the party for that anymore.

There there’s a strong minority of that within the party, but I I just don’t think there’s enough people there to do it.

Going back to previous primaries, and we’ve seen in the Republican primary, you know, strange phenomenon where, you know, Michelle Bachman has her moment. Right? Herman Caine surges to the top of the pack. Newt gingrich is all hot, you know, after the debate in South Sarah Longwell, There was the Rick Santora moment. And then, of course, these things fade.

Vivache strikes me as the kind of guy who’s gonna burn very, very hot and very bright, but, burnt out because the the more scrutiny he gets, the worse it’s going to get. And, you know, he he’s gonna get a time in the barrel, not just from the media, not gonna be vetting him aggressively, but from fellow Republicans who thoroughly detest him. So I don’t know that he is that his bump is going to be sustainable. I think that it’s got a short fuse on it. On the other hand, Nikki Haley, I think, has the potential for more staying power.

I mean, she is substantive. I mean, she’s been all over the place. I we you wanna we’ve all written about her and how pointing she is.

Are you sure people want substantive?

Well, that’s an interesting question. But at least in terms of if the donor class, does, you know, start calling her up, she’ll have more staying power. And the more attention she gets, the more people are gonna say, okay. You know, this is, you know, a strong woman. This is somebody who is worth listening to.

She makes a lot of sense and she’s, she’s strong and she’s gutsy and here’s my other point. It had to occur to some people after Wednesday. Can you imagine what a general election matchup between Joe Biden and Nikki Haley would look like? If you’re a Democrat, you cannot be relishing that prospect. And if Democrats see how bad that would be, Some Republicans are also going to come around to thinking, well, wait, we could have another Biden trump match up.

Or what if we put a young ish woman who’s still very much in her prime, by the way, up against Joe Biden Yeah. It’s kind of a nightmare scenario. I mean, look, I’m I’m just I’m just sort of gaming this thing out. I’m I’m not

sure if

she’s gonna win because the numbers are the numbers, and the Republican Party is the Republican Party. But if I’m a Larry Ellison, and I’ve just burned through all this money for Tim Scott, and that’s not going anywhere. And I’m thinking, wait. If She was the nominee. What would that look like, Tim?

Yeah. I mean, if you’re sitting in the Biden White House, what do you think of running against her?

So I actually kind of see the other side of this. Mhmm. Christian Vander Book had a good article for the board this week about What exactly is the plan? Like, like, even for for Ron DeSantis, he was talking about this Ron DeSantis, not Nikki, but

—

Yeah. — you know, let’s say Eaked it out. Let’s say that he had this is before the debate. Let’s say he had a great debate, and he wins over Trump and the caucuses narrowly. And then and then in South Carolina, everybody unites behind him and he wins narrowly.

And then they kinda split delegates on super Tuesday. And, you know, he’s in the delegate lead slightly. Then what? You know, like, where do they go from here? Have they thought about that?

Like, do they think Trump’s gonna concede to him, but Donald Trump’s gonna give the keynote to the Rhonda Santa’s convention in Milwaukee next summer. And so, anyway, that is even more intense for Nikki. I think that there’s a huge chunk of the party that would never go for her. Never. And I think you end up with a r f k Or Vivic style third party candidate, if Nikki is the nominee.

And maybe not, I don’t see people getting in line for her. Like that thirty five percent rock hard Trump based. Have you looked at that Duine register pool, I guess it was twenty eight. And I think I was a bad state for him. You know, I’m laughing.

I’m, in in Louisiana. My my new, home state, there was a poll that came out Trump seventy five DeSantis ten recently. And so it’s like, where is Nikki getting votes in Louisiana? Like, she’s not. Right?

She’s just not. Like, they don’t want her.

Thought that was really a good analysis because there’s been a lot of magical thinking. Like, something something something happens, and then Trump, you know, graciously concedes. You know, trump you know, gives the nominating speeches. The convention, this will never happen. You know, the the magical thinking always has to end with, and then Trump dies.

I mean, there’s there’s really no other way because he is never going to admit that he lost. He will never graciously lose. He will never go away. But I noticed, Tim, that you did dodge my question.

Okay. I’m sorry.

Okay. Because since we’re doing the what if what if what if is and now, by the way, I totally accept the premise that it’s really hard to imagine this. But what would a Joe Biden, Nikki Haley matchup look like in the general election? Yeah. I’m not saying it’s going to happen.

Sure.

See, this is the vulnerability. I think Joe Biden can beat Donald Trump because he’s Donald Trump. But what if the meteor strikes? What if the big mac takes him out? What if there is a younger candidate?

Yeah. If I’m a Democrat, I think the that matchup just has to be terrifying to them.

I guess. So this is my point is I just don’t think that we would ever that for this reason, which is that if Nikki if Nikki were the likely nominee, I don’t think Joe Biden is running again. Right? I think that the Democrats would have primary or even Kamala would be the nominee, and and and we could, you know, game out fantasy politics, what Kamala versus Nicki would look like, but it’s different. I I just I don’t think you’re ever seeing a stage where it’s Joe Biden and Heiley on that stage, and I because I think that, you know, there’d be a mega third party candidate and or Joe Biden would get out of the way.

Right? I but sure. Yeah. You’re right. Like, in a on Earth seven.

Earth seven point o. I think that’s a huge problem for Democrats. Right? Because Nikki Haley is whatever forty eight or how old she is and and Joe Biden and, you know, is is gonna look like the past up there, but I think that for a variety of reasons within the Republican party and within Joe Biden’s strategic, thinking there’s no path to that.

But the Biden reelection campaign does seem to be premised on the assumption that it’s going to be Donald Trump at this point.

So Pretty good assumption. I mean, he’s winning by a lot.

Well, you know, the this is really the just watching the agony of the anti anti trumpers, you know, who had who, you know, are stuck with. Like, we have to beat Joe Biden, but we can’t go along with Donald Trump. And they they project did so many qualities on to Ron DeSantis. There was so much wishcasting there. It’s really been a struggle for them.

They’re not gonna go along with VVAC. But this realization seems to be sort of settling in on them that the magical thinking, I think, in DeSantis world and the anti anti trump world, was the assumption that these criminal indictments would take care of Trump for them. And so it is still an amazing moment, even for people within that world. That Republicans look at these perk walks and these mug shots and say, yeah. We’re fine with that.

We are okay with that. Okay. You know, he set baby monkeys on fire, but, like, who doesn’t?

Their agony takes us back to my very first answer in this question, which is just are slow rolling. I told you so. It’s like, they hate us so much. And and for people who don’t know, sometimes we just throw out the anti entities. People don’t know what we’re talking about.

But, You know, these are the people that that really dislike trump privately, politicians, the the right wing commentators that dislike trump privately, but that have just continued to stick with him because the Democrats are bad and the Democrats are scarier and Elon Omar and, you know, transgender youth or whatever the the excuse of the day is. And they’re gonna find themselves now for, like, the ninth, tenth, straight year, having to suck it up and, you know, just be Donald Trump’s, you know, what, again? Apologist The thing is, like, they hate us because, like, we are a mere up to their choices, and and they they would, you know, say they have TDS and they’re they’re Democrats now and whatever, but it’s like, had they listened to us in twenty fifteen? Well, had they listened to us in twenty sixteen? Twenty seventeen.

Impeachment one. The twenty twenty election, the after the stop the steal, impeachment two. They had so many fucking off ramps. They had so many offerings, and it was so obvious. It wasn’t hard to figure out that they were gonna end up here.

It was so obvious that they’re gonna end up here. And they refused to take every single off ramp, and now they are stuck on this hellship with the flaming monkeys and Donald Trump’s mugshot. And I just I don’t feel bad for them. I’m kind of enjoying their pain. I have to admit.

Are we gonna do the the t shirt? Come on. We’re gonna do the t shirt. Right?

Yeah. I wish, you know, we were whenever trumpers were right t shirt, please.

Yeah. This is Tim’s brilliant idea. That do you have the mug shot And he said and what what does it say?

Never trumpers were right. The bulwark dot com.

There’s a slightly more obnoxious, which we could say we told you so.

Oh, we told you so. Sure. We told you so. The Bulwark dot com. Either of those are acceptable to make.

We we are gonna have that t shirt, because I want that t shirt.

Okay. Great. Let’s do it.

I wanna walk down Main Street in Cedarburg with a big mugshot. We told you so or you know, never trump from the jump. Just some version of that. I really want that. Same.

So anyway, by the way, because you will sometimes throw yourself on this word. Did did you watch any of the soccer counter programming with Donald Trump. This

was the one time I have not thrown myself in the store. I I watched a clip show put together by somebody, and that was that was it. So I’ve seen somebody’s highlights.

Low energy, tired, weird. Philip bump, though, is debunking some of these, you know, crazy numbers that are coming out. And basically, look, it turns out one in three, likely Republican primary voters watched the debate, which is a pretty big number. One in six watched all of it, all two hours, Only one in twenty watched Trump talk to Tucker instead. So let’s just put this in some context.

And that may actually be good for Trump because, you know, he’s continuing to retcon January six, you know, talk about, you know, the riot, the attack on the capital, you know, when which you had, all of these police officers bloodied and a death toll is this beautiful day, this wonderful picnic of patriotism, And he is all in on all of this. And, of course, we’re gonna get a lot more of that because he is absolutely committed to making January six his attempted coup into a great proud moment in American history. Yeah. And Republicans ought to realize that that’s gonna be their platform in twenty twenty four.

And I think that’s an interesting stat because I’m genuinely intrigued by the poll Not the very first ones, but, like, maybe two Fridays from now. By two Fridays from now, I think that we’re really gonna know a lot, you know, because it will have been in the water for a week and, you know, you gotta let this stuff trickle down to the two thirds of people who didn’t watch the debate, but these guys had about as good a chance as they’re gonna have. They had a third of the party watching them without him there at all. Right? Free shots.

And then he gets arraigned the next day. Now everybody’s gonna see that. Everybody’s gonna see the mugshot. That’s number four. People are gonna be able to you know, judge, like, whether that’s someone that they’re gonna wanna put up, if there is no meaningful gain, What else is left to happen that would it be a game for people?

I know that the, you know, delusional or rational confidence people will say, maybe when they get to the voting booth. Right? Then they’re finally gonna get serious. But that was about as clean as honest they’re gonna have.

No. No. No. I you and I have lived through this before. Right?

Yeah. Yeah. No. I’m sorry to bring this back, but I’m sure that you remember back in twenty fifteen at exactly this point. Everybody would say, well, there’s, you know, five months.

No votes have actually been cast. And lots of things. It’s way too early. In fact, it was already too late. Alright.

But I do think that it’s important to to, provide a little bit of an antidote to the, you know, the more he’s indicted, the stronger he gets. Because, yes, within the Republican Party, that may be true. But, hello, that’s still a minority right now because you’re getting one poll after another suggesting that this is not helping him shockingly in a general election. I’m reading this from politico. A new political magazine Ipsos poll provides some bad news for Trump, even as he remains the clear front runner for the Republican nomination, The cascading indictments are likely to take a toll on his general election prospects.

Amazingly, we have not repealed all of the laws of political gravity. The survey results suggest that Americans are taking the cases seriously, particularly the twenty twenty election case and that most people are skeptical of Trump’s claim to be a victim of a legally baseless witch hunt or, an attempt to, weaponize law enforcement public sentiment in certain areas, including how quickly to have a trial and whether to jail trump, is moving against the president when compared previous political poll. So right now, most respondents wanna trial before the general election. Most Americans right now, Trump is guilty in the eyes of half of Americans. Do you believe that Donald Trump is guilty of the alleged crimes?

Total? Fifty one percent. Yes. No. Twenty six percent.

Among independence, fifty three percent. Yes. He’s guilty. Only twenty percent know, and that’s before the televised trial. That is before one court date after another.

So You know, once again, even though there are those polls showing him running neck and neck with Joe Biden, guys, how does a year of litigation and arraignments and trials and testimony. How does that help Donald Trump win swing states in a general election. I mean, isn’t isn’t that the heart of it right now?

Yeah. In the front page of the Atlanta Journal Constitution Constitution morning is the mugshot with books. You know, I used to work in campaign PR. That’s not really what you’re generally going for for your candidates. Is, is to be on the front page of the biggest swing state paper with your mugshot.

Generally not seen as helpful. You know, think back to the old WDII controversy right before the two thousand. Election, but it

seems so trivial now. Right?

But, you know, and the other bizarre thing about all this, we did a little gimmick on the next level on the next level podcast this week when we were like, The jail or the White House are are really the two main options for this person in the next two years is one of the most bizarre dichotomy I think in the world history. It’s just I was looking at that same poll. I guess it was in your newsletter. It was like fifty percent of the country wants him jailed. But I’m I’m part of that fifty percent.

Yeah. And it’s like it’s like fifty percent of the country wants him jailed. Forty one percent wants him to be the leader of the free world. It is, like, it’s just I mean, it’s it’s kinda hard to wrap your head around. I know it’s our job to help people wrap their heads around that, but it’s that’s a tough one.

Yes. It is a dichotomy. And, yeah, you’re not the, crazewinds. Okay. Put a personal privilege, mister Miller.

Please. So Let’s do it.

I think I’ve told you this before, but this is actually happening. I’m gonna have a teenager in the house again. Congrats, dad. But he wasn’t really sure until right before we started this podcast. My grandson Elliot, who’s French, wants to come and live with us and attend school here in Mequon, Wisconsin.

There were some paperwork, obviously. There’s there’s some, you know, passport stuff. And so, he and his mom, my daughter, you know, took a train to Paris to go to the US Embassy today, And if if things were gonna go wrong, it was gonna go wrong today. He’s coming tomorrow. Okay.

So I don’t need things till the last minute. So at four thirty this morning, I roll over you know, hear my phone buzzing. And there is a picture of him, and I put it in my newsletter outside the US embassy holding his passport. He’s got it. And so he is coming.

This is actually going to be happening. I’m going to have a teenager in the house for the next semester. I’m a soccer dad. I’m going to be a soccer dad again. I mean, like, man.

Football dad, I think. Well, soccer here.

A reality check. I k. When I have a request, I think. You know, I don’t know anything about your grandson, so feel free to to recheck this. But Maybe around Christmas.

I want our Friday podcast to end with, I wanna interview him. I want, like, five minutes to, I wanna ask him about, being a, you know, a parisian in in Machwan, because I am fascinated by what it would be like to be an eighth grader. Who just gets dropped into Beck one, Wisconsin. You know, we could just a little break from the parade of Horables. Because I’m very intrigued by this.

Well, that’s a deal that I will at least talk to him about and see what he’s comfortable doing that. I mean, I think a podcast is kinda No pressure.

No pressure.

No. No. It’s it’s low pressure because, I mean, we don’t have, like, cameras around us or anything like that. So, yep, and it will be fascinating to know because and again, I am so out of touch with what the culture, the social media culture is. I mean, it is I I think it’s hard to be in middle school.

Was was your middle school years difficult.

My middle school years were fucking awful.

Can you imagine going through middle school with social media now? No. I don’t wanna catastrophize it, but You know, it’s one thing for, you know, people to have clicks and talk about people behind their back, but now, of course, it’s so much more difficult, you know, you know, one jerk with a with an Instagram account. And I don’t know. It does seem I have to tell you the school system has been so responsive and they are so supportive and they’re sort of aware of all of the problems.

And so, you know, they they will have a support network to help him. His English is extremely good, but the have people who are going to help him with the with the English and with math and things because you don’t know what you don’t know.

I’m sorry, Troy. I’ve been told that our school system is in complete tatters and disarray. And, the only thing people care about is critical race theory, and they don’t actually teach anything anymore. Is that not does that not seem right?

Not in mequon, Wisconsin. I have been reliably informed the same thing. I will report back it doesn’t appear to be the case in McOne, Wisconsin. So you have a great weekend, Tim Miller. And I’ll talk to Elliot about this and say that the least put the request in.

It may And again, probably not till the end of the semester.

Sounds good. Congratulations. We’ll talk to you soon. And congrats on the mug shot.

Congratulations to all of us. For the mugshot, to all of Americans. If only they had been warned, if only they had been warned. But Tim, keep pushing for the t shirt. And if we can get coffee mugs — I love it.

— that would be pretty cool too. Okay? So use your extensive influence on all of this. Thank you all for listening to this weekend’s, Bulwark podcast. I’m Charlie Sykes.

We will be back on Monday. We will do this all over again. Volebrook podcast is produced by Katie Cooper, an engineered and edited by Jason Brown.