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00:00Abby, I think I want to start with you this morning, because as we've been talking about
00:03the president's popularity, the unpopularity of some of these economic policies, the war
00:07in Iran, et cetera, we've seen an interesting thing, which is, you know, the president does
00:12not suffer usually from a lack of loyalty within Republicans, but we are seeing a few
00:17candidates pivoting away from mentioning Trump in some of their speeches and almost going
00:22against him.
00:23You know, we have Maria Elvira Salazar, a Republican in Florida, making a statement.
00:26We have Byron Donalds, who kind of scrubbed his campaign website of some of the more
00:30outright Trump mentions.
00:33Is this a pattern we think we're going to see?
00:35And how has the reaction been to this?
00:38I think it's to be determined.
00:41And what's interesting about those two races you mentioned is those are pretty competitive
00:44races.
00:45Maybe the Florida one shouldn't, the governor's race shouldn't have been.
00:49But as this wave may expand into redder areas, do we start seeing some of the
00:56these, you know, very red, very, very conservative politicians putting distance?
01:01And I think when that, what we've seen previously is very normal for a midterm.
01:05But if we see this expand deep into conservative country, I think it's a really uncharted territory.
01:10Ashley, you have your finger, of course, on the pulse of polling.
01:13And there was this NPR-PBS Marist poll that came out this week.
01:15And I think the headline from that is that by a 12-point margin, I'm quoting here from an
01:19NPR piece, registered voters say they would prefer to elect a Democrat to Congress over a Republican.
01:25How seismic is that likely to be as we get closer and closer here to the midterms, just
01:28a few weeks away?
01:30Yeah, we're five weeks out at this point.
01:32And we see that Democrats in the generic ballot are up by high single digits or, like some
01:37of these polls, are actually showing low double digits.
01:40On average, Democrats are up by about nine in the generic.
01:44We're seeing more and more favorable chances for Democrats to take over the House, most certainly,
01:49and possibly even the Senate.
01:51We see a lot of toss-ups here, a lot of changes to leaning or likely Dem.
01:57It's looking like a very good field for Democrats right now.
02:00In fact, in the generic, they've gained a point and a half.
02:02We see the president at his lowest approval ratings, at least during his second term, low
02:08ratings when it comes to the economy and the inflation and gas prices.
02:12It's a pretty abysmal picture right now for Republicans heading into the midterms.
02:16Ashley, is the Senate realistically in play?
02:19And what are some of the unexpected flips to watch, either in the House or the Senate
02:23as you're looking at these races start to tighten?
02:25The Senate could very well be in play.
02:27In fact, prediction models have it anywhere from the upper 50s to 60 percent likelihood.
02:32We definitely need to see Democrats hold on to states like Georgia, New Hampshire, Michigan,
02:39Minnesota.
02:40We even have some wild cards when it comes to Montana and Idaho, where we see some strong
02:45independents running.
02:46And then Democrats absolutely have to get, and these are a bunch of toss-ups right now,
02:51states like North Carolina, Texas, Ohio, Alaska, Iowa, and then Maine, of course, we know has
02:57been a big one.
02:58Now, we saw that in the latest New York Times, Siena, Susan Collins was up by a couple of
03:03points, but obviously this was before the pay-to-play allegations.
03:07So, you know, and we see Kansas as well.
03:09So there's a big spread here and a lot of different opportunities for Democrats to get
03:13that net plus four.
03:15Abby Livingston, let me dovetail this conversation with what we were just talking about over the
03:19first part of the show.
03:20That is President Xi's visit to the United States and kind of the anxiety among a lot of
03:23farmers in this country about their prospects for exporting agricultural goods to
03:28China.
03:28And as we were saying, we don't have kind of full readouts of what that conversation consisted
03:32of.
03:33We have kind of a broad promise from President Trump that things are going to get better
03:36for farmers.
03:37When you look at some of the states that Ashley just mentioned in the Midwest, agricultural
03:41states like Iowa, how much is this issue among farmers in particular playing a role in
03:47the way that we're seeing these percentages shift?
03:50I think it's absolutely why this state is in play, and I'd throw Kansas into that as well.
03:55And you have other issues hitting farmers.
03:57You have the price of diesel, which I'd never heard diesel mentioned in a political conversation
04:03before this year, and now it comes up all the time.
04:05And you also have Elon Musk's elimination of USAID, which farmers use to export their
04:11crops to third world countries.
04:13And so this is a profession that has a cycle to it, and it has been completely disrupted.
04:18And, you know, I don't think Democrats are going to win rural America, but I have a sense
04:23that they're being heard in a way they haven't in many, many years.
04:26Ashley, there's also this interesting polling gap between who voters say they're going to
04:31support and who they expect to win.
04:33Can you explain that?
04:35So, you know, of course, this is perception by the public.
04:39And so the public still sees in some of these red states that the Republican is going to win.
04:45But we see also that there's polling that's showing that the Democrat is up by a few points
04:50or it's looking like a tie.
04:52So, you know, very interesting juxtaposition here of voters just believing in what has happened
04:59before, the history of where they live and who people have historically voted for versus
05:05what's actually going on.
05:07And like we had mentioned, especially in some of these redder states where historically it may
05:11have been a Republican, we see some very close races or we see potential wins for Democrats.
05:17Abby, I know you want to talk about Texas.
05:19I know you want to talk about Paxton and Tallarico.
05:22Go for it.
05:24Well, I would say it's a five alarm fire, but that Republicans were saying that in March.
05:29And what I can say is this race is taken extremely seriously by operatives in both parties in the
05:35state.
05:36And there is a real, real possibility Texas could flip at the Senate level and possibly
05:41other statewide races in November.
05:43Ashley, pick up on this.
05:45I look at the Texas Tribune this morning.
05:46This is the headline in large font.
05:49All recent polls have Tallarico ahead of Paxton in the U.S. Senate race.
05:53What are those data telling you?
05:54I'm one of those people you polled that just doesn't quite believe this.
05:56But OK.
05:58You know, Tallarico has been ahead in, I think, 15 out of the past 16 polls.
06:02I mean, we always talk about never looking at one singular poll because polls are a snapshot
06:07in time.
06:07But when you're looking at averages and multiple polls together, this is really telling you
06:12something.
06:12I mean, you know, of course, we have talked about polling error in the past and what polling
06:16error could mean.
06:17But polling error also doesn't necessarily go in one direction.
06:20It could favor Democrats as well.
06:22So this has been a pretty telling race where we're seeing Tallarico lead in virtually all of
06:27the polling that has been done there.
06:29Abby, there's also some other interesting races.
06:32You mentioned Ann Wagner.
06:34She's in the St. Louis suburbs.
06:35She could be in trouble.
06:37Why would that be so significant for Republicans?
06:40So Ann Wagner was in trouble in 2018.
06:43And Missouri legislators redrew that to be an even safer seat.
06:47She's a pretty good politician.
06:49But if that seat is even being polled, that means that there is concern.
06:54And not all of these red district Republicans are capable of running general election campaigns.
07:00They only know primary campaigns.
07:02And so we are on the precipice.
07:04It may or may not happen.
07:05But if the bottom falls out, this wave could start compounding where you have candidates
07:10who are not prepared to make the case to general election voters.
07:14And things could deteriorate over the next few weeks.
07:16But we'll have to wait and see if the Republican ad spending can staunch the bleeding.
07:20As we kind of survey the landscape here, we've got a guest from Rutgers, guest in New Jersey,
07:24have to ask about this scandal that erupted.
07:26I guess it was contained.
07:27It erupted and was contained very quickly here.
07:29Dale Calder, lieutenant general, governor of that state, resigning after this ethics scandal
07:34kind of emerged.
07:35Get us up to speed, sort of your read of what's unfolded here and the way in which Governor
07:40Sherrill responded to this and what she said about it in recent days.
07:45I feel like there's always something going on in New Jersey politics.
07:48It's never a dull moment here.
07:49And we certainly had quite a quick firestorm over the past couple of weeks with the allegations
07:54against now former Lieutenant Governor Dale Caldwell.
07:58And so, you know, Mikey Sherrill, Governor Mikey Sherrill, has been a rising star for quite some
08:04time in the Democratic Party, obviously has national appeal and has been supporting veteran
08:10candidates across the country in her party.
08:13And so this was something kind of with the theme that she has been campaigning on since
08:172025, trying to make sure there is accountability and transparency in her actions.
08:24And after an investigation with independent counsel, they found that there were some ethics
08:30violations with the former lieutenant governor.
08:33She had asked him to resign.
08:34And 24 hours later, he is now out of office.
08:37So, you know, a potential here for something that could have been prolonged and very difficult,
08:42but something that had been handled in the end very swiftly.
08:46Not the first time lieutenant governor has caused problems for higher office.
08:49Abby, we've only got about 30 seconds left, but I do want to ask you quickly.
08:53The president seems to have a different opinion on AI than Americans are polling.
08:59And this is increasingly an issue going into the midterms that people are worried about and talking about.
09:03We talk so much about economic numbers.
09:05We talk so much about pulling on the Iran and the war, the war in Iran.
09:08How big of an issue do you think that the president isn't really lockstep with the American public when it
09:13comes to AI concerns?
09:14I think it's an absolutely massive issue, and it's hitting local politicians harder and faster.
09:20And the only question coming into this election is how hard it's going to hit the federal legislators who are
09:25more closely tied to the president.
09:27And it's very serious and very active.
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