Why Marco Rubio Is Suddenly a 2028 Frontrunner, Vance’s GOP Challenge and Iran’s Real Story

- And we've evolved into our second year.

Next up, when you're in a nursery,

“in the rear view mirror, year two begins now.”

I'm Mark Alpern, welcome to next up, you next to us. I'm the editor in Chief of Two Way, and your host here for another year. Greatful to you for being here. A great show for you, two fine gentlemen.

We're gonna walk us through a bunch of stuff, Leland Bitter, that'll be here, the news nation. Chief Washington anchor host of on balance with Leland, Bitter at 9 p.m. on News Nation. And Leland I'm gonna talk about how the media has covered

the Iran conflict and what are things that are going well, maybe not so well, and his perspective is a former Middle East correspondent, and someone who understands the nuances. Would you book the Iranian Foreign Minister,

or the head of the Iranian Parliament?

Would you book 'em on your TV show

or your podcast if you had one? Leland, I will sort that out. And then, hi, my more will be here. He's a Principal at Cornerstone government affairs. He used to be a big job at the DNC,

and is a new member announced this week on the morning meeting on two-way. We're gonna talk about how things are going politically from the Democratic perspective. Also, our new segment, eight for 28,

hate will take a look at how many of you reacted, including some brutal feedback to the may rankings that I put out, including my daring, shocking, maybe super-risky inclusion of Bernie Sanders on the list, for the most likely Democrat nominees.

What are you all saying about it, and where do people think I got things wrong, and a few of you think I got some things right? So, we'll take a look at that.

But first, my reported monologue this episode

is on two Republican heavyweights, JD Vance and Marco Rubio. They have to be close personal friends, and this week, because of how they spent their Tuesday, an explosion of interest amongst my sources

in the question of who will and who should Republicans pick as their presidential candidate in 2028. We haven't done eight for 28 rankings for the Republican side because up until now, it's been a one-person show, JD Vance, and the polls continue to show that.

But let's get into this conversation that I've had with my sources. A lot of Republicans and some Democrats this week on question of why is this happening?

“Why is there an explosion of interest in Marco Rubio?”

Didn't just start this week. His speech in Europe a few weeks ago, his general performance and media interviews, and some of the questions around JD Vance have really led to this really interesting question

of why is it happening? Why is Marco Rubio up and vance down in the estimation of some at least? I talked to a lot of Republicans since Tuesday about what's driving this, what's propelling this again?

Marco Rubio did the White House briefing on Tuesday, Caroline Levitt, out having her baby congratulations, Caroline. And JD Vance went to Iowa for a political rally for a House Republican incumbent there

who's unbattled and being targeted by Democrats. So this is a great moment if you like American history because it's certainly the case. Cut away all the things that I think are off base. It's certainly the case that as we sit here today,

there's an argument to be made that Marco Rubio is the most likely next president of the United States. And I say that because we don't know who the Democrats are going to nominate. At this point, if you take vance in Rubio

and there's other people who are interesting, including Ted Cruz, between the two of them, I don't know how to divide the pie for odds of being the not Republican nominee, but the two of them would divide that pie.

And if they take 100%,

“I think they divide about 95% of it right now.”

And if you're the nominee of a major party, your chance of being present, maybe not 50, 50. But they're pretty close to 50, given the way the electoral college is currently stacked. So before I thought Rubio Vance was a lock,

a lock to be the nominee. And now I'm less sure. I'm less sure. I still think he's most likely and I'll get to that. But no doubt Rubio is up.

And a lot of it was supercharged for my sources by the briefing room appearance. He went in and he talked to the media about almost all the questions were about Iran. There were someone cute, but a few other topics.

But it was a love fest. And if you're a Republican running for president in the current age, having the press, the mainstream, the dominant media love you, is a double-edged sword.

Rubio's right now is part of this moment he's having, is he's loved by Maga, even though he used to support immigration or form that's anathema to a lot of folks in Maga. He's loved by everyone in the administration.

University praised him for the job he's doing. The unorthodox thing where he's both national security

loved by a lot of the Republican establishment

“who supported him in 2016 when he ran for president,”

donor class elected officials, beloved by the media. His poll numbers aren't that great in honesty. So that's an interesting question and variable. But when he walked in the briefing room from the moment he walked in,

throughout the entire time he was there with reporters, some reporters who are from conservative organizations, but a lot of dominant media reporters, it was a love fest ladies and gentlemen, laughter and respect and just a love fest.

Here's Marco Rubio, some of Marco Rubio in the briefing, this is S3, please. - Are you guys all the TV people? - No. - I'm learning, they gave me a little map.

I don't know where I put it of the people here. Some of you had like red X is I'm kidding. No, you could tell. - What happens? - Why is everybody giggling?

What happened? - I have two questions on two separate issues that come together. - Two questions for these questions. - Two questions.

- There's a lot of people in here. - There's a lot of people in here.

“- All right, you can ask me two questions.”

I'll give you one answer, but he's closer. - No, you don't have Blacky up blue one. I'm colorblind, but I know blue one's up. - Right there, yes, here. - This is Kay Oscar, right?

- What is our territory? - Many people want to know what is your D.J. name? (laughing) - D.J. name? - D.J.

(laughing) - You're not ready for my D.J. - I mean, again, not there are other Republicans who could have that kind of a banter, but not for that late the time,

not around a topic on which the press is pretty contentious with the administration. So from that event, one of the last answers, the Secretary of State gave was he was asked about his vision

for the country and that the answer is gone viral.

And the State Department decided to take the audio of his answer and set it to music and include images of Secretary Rubio and the President to make a bigger splash. And again, it's gotten so many views.

This is the video of the State Department put together off of one of Secretary Rubio's answers in that White House briefing on Tuesday. Is that four, please? - I gotta ask you, what is your hope for America

at a time, such as this? My hope for America? And my hope for America is what it's always been.

“I think it's the hope I hope we all share.”

We wanted to continue to be the place where anyone from anywhere can achieve anything. Where you're not limited by the circumstances of your birth, by the color of your skin, by your ethnicity, but frankly, it's a place where you are able

to overcome challenges and achieve your full potential. I think that should be the goal of every country in the world, but I think in the U.S. we're not perfect. Our history is not one of perfection, but it's still better than anybody else's history.

And ours is a story of perpetual improvement. Each generation has left an ex-generation of Americans, freer, more prosperous, safer. And that is our goal as well. And as we come upon this 250-year anniversary,

I think we have a lot to learn and be proud of in our history. It is one of perpetual and continuous improvement where each generation has done its part to bring this closer to fulfilling the vision that the founders of this country had upon its founding.

- I mean, in all honesty, it's a great answer. And not everybody in politics could pull that thing off of the top of his head. Marco Rubio, since his earliest days in Florida politics, when he rose up in the legislature,

has been like Barack Obama before him tagged for greatness. As someone who will someday run for president, someday, if it's supporters would say someday would be president. And any ran in 2016 and didn't do all that well, but then stayed in the Senate, rose up in the Senate,

really developed a lot more confidence. There's the famous moment when he did this day, the unit response where he reached for the water bottle, not a highlight, but respected by his colleagues in the Senate overwhelmingly supported when he was confirmed

for Secretary of State, they've turned on him now, the Democrats have. But, and then becoming Secretary of State,

Secretary of State is always for both parties,

one of the most sought after jobs in politics. There are many people, and I put Joe Biden in this category, who would rather be Secretary of State than vice president, and would want to be Secretary of State more than anything but president.

It's just a huge job. And now he's got both jobs, right? So, people look at him in the party, and they say, here's the issue. Vance is not as impressive as Rubio,

and not in the minds of some. He's not going to be as tied to the administration as Vance is, and there's worry that the midterms could go poorly. The economy may not be in great shape by 2028. And so what these folks say is,

if we want to win the White House, we got to take the guy who can quit the administration, doesn't have to stay a Secretary of State harder for Vance to quit. Can run as more opposed to the Trump Vance record,

and remake the politics of America, and whose performance, whose likability, whose sense of humor, are all superior to Vance's. That's what the pro-Rubio crowd says. Now, I've heard, as I've said,

from so many people this week, unsolicited, over the last couple of weeks, we need Rubio, where public can say, and Democrats say, we wouldn't be the least bit afraid of Rubio, a Vance rather, if he were the nominee,

but we'd be afraid of Rubio, the Hispanic vote, likability, et cetera. So, but I've also heard of a lot of amateurish, just to over the top, really, posture towards Rubio.

Okay, again, I said this on two way and I got hammered. I'm not against Marco Rubio.

“I quite like the guy, I think he's a very nice guy.”

I've always been impressed by him,

but you got to, you got to not just go, you can't go overboard. You can't just say, oh, he's the greatest thing ever, and greatest thing since Jiffy Pop is I like to say. You got to look at the reality.

When and if Marco Rubio decides to run for president, there'll be mega people who will be shocked that some of the positions he's taken in the past, including on immigration. And there'll be a questions of, is he really just as impressive

and unbeatable as some of his supporters think? So, let's be serious folks. The guy's run for president before. Now, some people run for president and do poorly and they learn from it.

And there's no doubt that Marco Rubio's performance on the national stages improves since then, but there were some pretty weak moments when he ran. This is a decade ago now. He has learned a lot, but let's look at that.

Let's look at the question of his 2016 experience and are there cautionary notes there? Are there reasons to think maybe both in running for the nomination and in a general election if he's the nominee? Maybe Marco Rubio's got some issues, okay?

One of the things I was so fascinated by in 2016, when again, he ran not just the Instantal Trump in a big field, Ted Cruz, Jeff Bush, John Kasich, Rand Paul,

“a bunch of others, was widened catch on more, okay?”

On a couple measures, one is as a communicator, why wasn't he seen as greater with voters and pundits and then fundraising, small dollar donor? So, here's a video. He had a great team of working with him in 2016

to make videos intended to get his name ID up to raise money. Here's a video he made, guys, a huge sports fan. And again, just like with Vance, these are two normal guys, these are suburban dads who can speak to people

in a very natural way, who don't need to be called Mr. Secretary or Mr. Vice President, they're fine. If you call them JD and Marco, you met him at a restaurant, whatever they'd be fine with that. They do not stand on ceremony.

Here's an ad to video, Rubeo made in 2016, very representative of the kinds of ways his team tried to shape his image. He's a huge sports fan. This is S1, please.

(crowd cheering) You get that? Super Bowl pick this year. Same when I've made for the last 40 years, the Miami Dolphin Super Bowl pick winning percentage.

I have never gotten a Super Bowl right.

Sorry, what's your fantasy football team name?

“This year, I think we're gonna call it the Marco Polos.”

Best coach in advice, he ever gave you a team. Have fun. All right, a very likable and intended, again, to get his name out there and to raise money. This is of all the things from 2016

that most cautionary for me. And it goes back to what I said, which is his poll numbers aren't that great with the voters, is fundraising, okay? Marco Rubio in 2016 should have been a spectacularly

on paper, a spectacular strong fundraiser. Not the grassroots level. He should have raised a ton, and he didn't. Now this is a question I ask in general about candidates as they've trouble raising money online.

Some do some dough, it's a little bit ineffable. Talk to about this many times. It's hard to say what makes a great low dollar fundraiser. You all know the importance of being able to raise money at the grassroots.

It's cheaper than having big events. You can go back to people and keep raising from them until they max out. And people have skin in the game once they give you money. And the press sees it as a sign,

correctly of grassroots support. Look how much money this guy raised as a candidate in 2016 online. This is A1, please. And just comparing it to two other folks.

A Donald Trump in 2024, Kamal Harris in 2024.

Rubio raised about $7 million online.

Now that's 10 years ago.

“And there's more ways to raise money online.”

But look at this, Donald Trump raised over $300 million.

Kamal Harris $400 million. Again, it's as apples to oranges, because they were the general election nominees. But that's a poultry sum for someone of Rubio's profile. And again, I know that I know elites like him.

I know a lot of fat cat donors like him. I know a lot of his colleagues like him. Again, universally liked by a lot of elites. And we saw it in the media. But do regular people like him, right?

Then there's a question of performance. There's that famous state of the union response I mentioned. This happened in a debate in New Hampshire in 2016, when Chris Christie decided that he had to take out Rubio. Now, Chris Christie is a very good debate

or a very former prosecutor, very smart guy. Christie decided in this to go into this debate.

“It's saying in some college, basically I'm going to try”

take out Rubio. And Rubio went in there, having done extremely well in Iowa, with an opportunity to become the alternative to Trump. Look with Chris Christie, did to filet Marka Rubio. This is S5, please.

- It's the spell with this fiction that Barack Obama doesn't know what he's doing. He knows exactly what he's doing. He has tried to change this country. He wants America to become more like the rest of the world.

We don't want to be like the rest of the world. We want to be the United States of America. And when I'm elected president, this will become, once again, the single greatest nation in the history of the world, not the disaster Barack Obama has imposed upon us.

- You see everybody, I want the people at home to think about this. That's what Washington DC does. The drive by shot at the beginning with incorrect and incomplete information, and then the memorized 25 seconds speech that is exactly what his advice is, David.

(audience cheering and applauding) See Marka, Marka, the thing is this, when you're president of the United States, when you're a governor of the state, the memorized 30 seconds speech, where you talk about how great America is at the end of it, doesn't solve one problem for one person.

- Chris, your state got hit by a massive snowstorm two weeks ago. You didn't even want to go back. They had to shame you when to go back. And then you stayed there for 36 hours. And then he left and came back to camp me.

So to the facts, who's the bottom line?

This notion that Barack Obama doesn't know what he's doing is just not there is. - There it is, the memorized 25 seconds speech. So if you didn't follow it, they're just to make the point at the time. Again, this is a decade ago, gobsmacked people. Christy accuses Rubio of giving a pre-canned answer, a rehearsed line.

And response, part of Rubio's response was to repeat the exact same line he just said. And again, would he do that today? Probably not, but it was cautionary for people to say, how could the guy fall right into that? - The other thing that happened back then was when he thought he could be the Trump alternative.

He decided rather than denigrate Donald Trump's technique of criticizing people of mocking people in a very out there way, Rubio decided one brief moment, never did it again. Rubio decided, you know what? I'm going to fight fire with fire. I'm going to go after Donald Trump the way he's going after me, Rubio, and everybody

else in the race. This is a cringy, it's cringy. This is Marco Rubio for a brief moment in the 2016 campaign deciding to fight fire with fire and go after Donald Trump in personal terms. S2, please.

- He says he's always calling me little Marco, and I'll admit he's taller than me.

He's like six, two, which is why I don't understand why his hands are the size of someone who's five, two. Have you seen his hands? They're like this.

“And you know what they say about men with small hands?”

You can't trust them, you can't trust them, you can't trust them. All right. So again, if I'm using the 2016 Marco Rubio Presidential campaign as a template, as a sample space to try to understand how would he be as a presidential candidate? I don't know.

I mean, again, that wasn't great, that didn't go well, and he never did it again, because I think he recognized it didn't go well. He acknowledged it as much. So, or debate performance, or grassroots fundraising, or judgment about how to react to being attacked personally.

Does that mean he wouldn't be a good candidate? No. And again, he's improved so much since then, but I just think people who are measuring the overall office drapes form, or at least the Republican nomination drapes, whatever those would be, need to think about how was he as a candidate last time.

Okay. Then we get to, then we get to, what I think striving a lot of this, besides people loving Marco Rubio, and a lot of people in my sources do, is dance.

gas prices, and potential bloodbath in the midterms, and the Iran war.

“But I believe that the down side image of Vance is true.”

That he's a phony, that he's not good with people, that he comes off as a loof or odd to some. So, he went to Iowa on Tuesday, a big moment, if you're thinking about running for present, you're doing a big political event in Iowa. It's a big deal.

He met with some of the big power brokers in the party that kind of people you meet with if you're thinking of running for present someday, because the Iowa caucuses, while the Democrats have eliminated them, will be big for the Republicans, and then he gave a stump speech. Here's a little bit of Vance in Iowa. Please, please take a seat.

We're going to be here. You gave a politician a microphone. We've got about three hours to go, so I don't want anybody to, no, he had exhaustion. I mean, think fine and fraud in the federal government. It's kind of like fishing in a barrel with dynamite.

The media asked me how I voted for, none of your business. I can't wait to tell my wife when we get home, that we've watched about nine episodes of X-Men, and my son is eating four chocolate chip cookies. She's going to be very pleased. It'd be very pleased with the vice president.

Okay, I found that perfectly likable, but I will tell you, I've reached a conclusion. People improve. Rubio's improved. People who want to be president can improve. I will say that in the next two years, as people in the party and the media are comparing

Rubio and Vance side by side, I don't think Vance can win him when the performance competition. I don't think the, I don't, I don't, I don't like ability. I may be wrong, but I just think Rubio has improved enough, and the perceptions are such that Vance is going to have a hard time of people looking at him in a press conference, in

“the interview on the stump, whether he drops his nasty tweet, a person or not, I think”

he's going to have a hard time winning that. And that's a big part of how people think about presidential candidates and presidents, likability, performance, et cetera. Okay, here's how the Vance trip got covered by some of the local TV stations in Des Moines. This is, this is, yeah, as a S7, please.

Of course, this stop isn't all about 2026. There is a lot of speculation that Vance president JD Vance may actually run for president in 2028, because Republicans in Iowa kick off the presidential race right here, Vance visiting this early state gives him the opportunity to test out his message with voters and also lay the groundwork for a potential bid for the White House.

Trump's vice president JD Vance's trip to Iowa can help reengage with those mag of followers on things like tax cuts. Warner-Rona gas prices was one of the biggest things that people outside the event wanted to hear about today. They didn't really hear much of anything about it.

Vance also applauded the Trump administration's terror of policies and framed the GOP as being on the side of working class voters. If the vice president decides to throw his hat into the 2028 presidential run, Iowa will host the first contest to select the Republican party's next presidential nominee. Pretty good coverage.

Again, not as good as Rubio would have gotten probably here's the bottom line for me.

These two guys are genuine friends, and even though people tell me I'm naive, you cannot be an incumbent vice president running for president unless you rip their face off. They're just the way our politics work. So I do not think they'll run against each other. I also am not sure that one or both of them will run, because their young dads, Vance's

are about to have a baby, Rubio's kids are still relatively young, and they both know what scrutiny is like, and they both know, they're both smart enough to know that if they run, the level of scrutiny they get will be unlike anything they've ever gotten before.

“So if Vance chooses not to run, and I think that's a possibility, we could probably”

because of his kids, I think Rubio will be an extremely strong position. And I think you'll have the support of the president of Vance's friend, and I think he'll he'll be pretty close to a lock for the nomination. If Vance runs, I think they'll run together. I think they'll be a ticket, and they may even announce as a ticket from the beginning of

the campaign, potentially, and raise $2 billion before the New Hampshire primary.

Vance is a very competitive guy. They both are, but my sense of it is Vance is in some ways more competitive than Rubio. Vance is a little bit more laid back, a little bit more, let things come to him. Obviously, you don't get to be Secretary of State if you're not competitive. They're both competitive, but I think Vance is more so, and I still think for all the current

boom lit for Rubio, I still think in the end, if he runs, and he's more likely to run

Maybe run as his running mate.

“That's where I see things based on all my reporting, but I will tell you, this force for”

Rubio, this belief that among some in the Republican Party in both the establishment and the Magoing, that the Trump administration is not going to succeed enough to make it possible for Vance to just wallets into the White House, and this love affair with Marco Rubio ain't going away. He's still going to be charming and funny and have a capacity demographically to revolutionize

the party, young, air of an outsider, even though he's got experience, it's not going away. Unless Rubio really messes stuff up, that's not going away, and so this dynamic will continue, and it's going to continue until Vance decides whether he's running. But the minute he decides, if it's yes, I continue to believe, contrary to some of my sources,

and a lot of the conventional wisdom that Rubio will stand down, and we'll never know

if that happens in the context of 2028, whether Rubio could beat Vance, I don't think it's going to come to that. We'll see, but everybody needs to temper their Marco Mania is basically my message. Marco Mania is strong in my world, and I'm not saying he's not content because he is, but needs to temper the Marco Mania in part because of Vance's hold on the vice presidency,

and his support from Erica Kirk and others don't junior, and we need to temper it looking at the 2016 experience, and we need to temper it because as great as Marco Rubio is currently seen, there's always questions about what happens when you actually get on the field. All right, that's my report for today. Let me know what you think, and my undervaluing the strength of Rubio, and my under my overstating

the strength of Vance, let me know what you hear, what you think, what you see, send me an email next up, [email protected], and let everybody know about the show also, send it around to your friends, your family, the neighbors, let everybody know that if they not an extra they're missing out, if you're watching us on YouTube, make sure you subscribe to YouTube.com/at next up Halpert, and you'll get the full episodes, but also when we put

bonus content up there, and if you're listening on the podcast version, always make sure

your downloads are turned on, and please tell people about the show if you like it. Our ad budgets, not as big as it should be, let me just put it that way. We rely on you to spread the word. Thank you for that. All right, a quick break, and then when we come back next up, my friend Leeland Vitter

of News Nation, we'll talk about media coverage of the Iran conflict, Leeland Vitter is next up. Did you know that high blood pressure is the number one risk factor for mortality? One in two adults has it, so that means there's a 50/50 chance that you are walking time bomb.

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This is your life we're talking about. One 20 life can help. All right, next up, and joining me in just a moment, Leeland Vitter, these news nations, chief Washington anchor. And every night, he makes time to host on balance with Leeland Vitter on News Nation every

week, night, 9 PM, Eastern time. One of my favorite bill Clinton jokes, and let's be honest, Bill Clinton is not our funniest president, but one of my favorite jokes of his is he used to say, going up in Arkansas,

“we were so poor that the only way anyone could make money was we took in each other's”

watch. And when I tell that, Chuck, I think most people don't even understand what I'm talking about, because they don't understand what that means to take in each other's watch. The point is, ladies, gentlemen, that everyone I know now, practically has it their own show, and we just go on each other's shows.

And it's hilarious, I remember once I won't say who it is, but a very famous person asked me to be on his show, and then I went on his show, and then I said, well, come on my show, and he's like, oh, no, I can't do that. I thought the kind of person I like, but the kind of person I like, ladies and gentlemen, is our next guest.

Next up is Leeland Vitter, on whose program I appear regularly, including his recently as last night, and who is graciously accepted the reciprocal obligation, come on next

Sir, welcome in.

Not an obligation, an opportunity of the highest order.

All right, well, I appreciate that. I want to talk about one of your favorite topics, which is to be clear-eyed about the media. If you could put everybody in the media in a time machine and go to a week before the U.S. Iran conflict began, and you know, put them in the Pepsi Center or some big arena. And I said, okay, I've seen the future.

“Here's what I think we've done, we will do poorly, but with this magical intercession, let's”

do better. How would you tell them to the media, collected media about how to cover the war better than we've done? Mark, I will say that journalists make lousy media critics, but with that caveat and disclaimer, what is shocking to me that has been lost in this conversation is anything about Iran,

the evils of Iran, the victories against Iran, the successes of the U.S. military, which have been extraordinarily significant and the long range of facts of changing the Middle East. Donald Trump has single-handedly remade the Middle East between term one and term two with the Abraham Accords, the Middle East is realigned behind Israel and the United States and away from Iran.

And that's because Donald Trump understood the essential truth of the Middle East, which

is that Iran is the root of all evil. The Palestinians and Iranians have propagated this lie that the Palestinians were the root of all problems in the Middle East, solve the Palestinian issue with Israel and somehow there would be figs, dates, olives and happy camels in the Middle East. That was a complete first, and that was meant to distract from the evil that the Iranians

were doing. And the U.S. media deprives itself on being so learned and so understanding of world affairs has boiled this remaking of the Middle East confronting America's single-longest running

“enemy the past 47 years into what is it cost to fill up your car?”

And that's yes, because the American people care about what it cost to fill up our car. But most people care because it is the lead story at 6 p.m. every night on the local news and the national news. I know you throw a clear and say, you wouldn't be good at this, but that was brilliant. I mean, it's just spot on.

Of course, Secretary Rubio made this point in the briefroom the other day and really tried to bring back the focus of the press to at least be part of the conversation to say this is as the president says all the time, this has been the mission of every one of his immediate predecessors to try to deal with this and he may fail, but he's trying to deal with it.

And Iran is not some huge adorable nation with happy camels. It has been the source of murder and slaughter of both its own people and others. And you're absolutely right, that doesn't infuse the coverage. That's one of my two. What my other one is, and I'd literally love your perspective on this, to me the challenge

not just for the media, but for the American government and anyone who wants to be involved in the conversation about this is what's going on in Iran? Like our restaurant's open, how how how disrupted his business and then of course, what's going on inside the government.

“Here's the thing I'm confused about and I'd love your perspective on it.”

Every so often we see the Iranian foreign minister like on CNN or talking to Kristen welcome, every so often there's this one near times reporters interviewing like today's she interviewed like the guy who works for the Iran Chamber of Commerce. It's possible every so often I've been able to interview like an academic, like a pro regime academic from Iran, but these things happen very rarely.

It seems like in the age in which we live, we should be talking to Iranians every night. And I know there's a crackdown on talking to citizens, but why is that episodic and infrequent as opposed to every day? Well, the problem for a lot of Iran is that they're cut off from the world, right? Having a star link or any kind of outside access, sort of like North Korea, is a death sentence

now in the Iranians have cut off the internet basically with a big switch.

Why the Israelis and the Americans did not during the war take out Iran's ability to limit the internet and take out their firewall systems? I don't know, maybe it wasn't possible, but that certainly would help the flow of information out of Iran. And the Iranians are using Russian systems in Chinese systems to find anybody with a star link and kill them. Do your point about why isn't the regime putting more people out?

I don't really know, I think probably one of the biggest problems right now inside of Iran is that there is a power struggle going on, which by the way, another feature not a bug of the US military action. Any time your enemy is fighting with each other, that's better than

So I think your points well made that there's not a lot of information about what's coming out of

“Iran. To that point, I think that should make the American media all the more skeptical”

of the Iranian regime and of what they say and all the more thoughtful about the evils of Iran. I'll just put a little finer point on what you said about killing millions. I think if you added it up, Iran is responsible for the killing of more people in the past 47 years since the Islamic Revolution, then any other country that still exists. And for a media that prides itself on looking after women's rights and gay rights and though in protecting those that are oppressed,

they're awfully uninterested in the people that are being oppressed in Iran and

awfully loving of the oppressors inside Iran, which I think tells you so much about not only the

media, but also so many Democrats who are, I don't want to say rooting for Iran, but certainly are doing anything to help the American cause because they view its bad for Donald Trump. Yeah, I couldn't agree with him more. Again, there's still this question to me of like,

“are you trying to book the Iranian Foreign Minister every night and getting in no?”

We've reached out. It's very opaque of how you get there. I also have, and I spent a lot of time in the Middle East. I've interviewed a lot of terrorists and everything else. I am very suspect of giving the Iranian regime unfettered access to American airways. Insofar as I think that they are no liars, they're known propaganda and they are professionals that not answering the question. Now, sometimes you can say, well, by doing that interview, you're showing America who they

are fine. There's not much the Iranian Foreign Minister that is said that is true. In the past eight weeks, I have a hard time agreeing to often there are ground rules that are required before any kind of interview to be willing to let them just sort of spew whatever it is that they want to spew. Yeah, I want to, that was on my list of things I want to talk to you about because I think I'm sure you and I mostly agree about this, but based on the way you just framed it, I disagree.

I'll put people on next up or on two way who people say you're platforming them. And I've platformed anybody as long as they're interesting and/or they have a following. So, for instance, we had Laura Loomer on two way several months ago and people criticized that.

I put on anybody and the example I always give is bin Laden. When bin Laden was the, you know,

the chief terrorist in the world, I was at ABC John Miller, who has had a bunch of other jobs. It did a bit of interview with bin Laden. I'd put the Iranian Foreign Minister on every night. I'd ask him tough questions, but even if he ignored them, I just think there's again, I'm not trying to have a fight with you. I'm just trying to do it. It's topic. I just, I just think if, you know, the Iranian Foreign Minister, I'd want to hear him every night and I'd ask a

barred questions and if you didn't answer him at the end, I'd say, here's here the questions you didn't answer, but what's the, what's the objection to putting him on every night? Just say it again

“of the argument against it. I think there's a nuance here because when I was at Fox and overseas,”

I interviewed Muhammad Alzawa Harry. I'm an Alzawa Harry's brother who was the leader of the Benghazi attacks and one of the original founders of militant Muslim, the Muslim Brotherhood. And I had no problem putting them on because there were direct questions to ask and in his offuscations made a real point. My bigger issue with the Iranian Foreign Minister is what are the ground rules that they are requiring? Number one, and number two. Sorry, sorry to interrupt,

but before you leave number one, what's an example of a ground rule that they were doing? Well, whatever it is, I don't want to get into the inner discussions that we've had and not necessarily, if you don't want to talk about it, but you can, you can topics of human. Topics may be off limits, or you can't put up video. I've had that, I'm not going to speak to the Iranian Foreign Minister, but I've had discussions where, oh, you can't put up video of acts while

talking to me. Right? These, the most obvious thing to the Iranian Foreign Minister is to put up video of them killing their own people and all of the body bags and say, how can you claim to be the legitimate government of Iran? How many more of your own people are you going to slaughter? Right? There's all these sort of obvious things. Again, I don't want to get into our internal negotiations. That's just an example. But my point being, I don't have a problem with platforming people.

night. At some point, if somebody's just going to sit there and deny that the sky is blue, or tell you what we've agreed to all these things that we haven't. That, that to me, doesn't really serve our viewer in terms of, in terms of enhancing their knowledge, right? Or understanding

“of the situation. I think it's pretty obvious to anybody who knows the Iranians. Number one,”

their line. Number two, they'll tell you kind of whatever you want to hear in the moment and then do something else. I'd a lot rather take a hard look at what the Iranians are doing than what they're saying. Yeah, all very sensible. At some point, if there's going to be a deal under any terms, the Iranians are going to have to acknowledge they have a nuclear weapons program. They may not want

to say they've always had it. But they're going to have to say, this thing that you guys think

is a nuclear weapons program. We're not going to have anymore. And until they say that, I don't think there can be a deal. And every night, I want to hear what they say about that. So I get it, it can be boring. And I get, for some people, it's about platforming. But I just feel like every time I see on X or on the BBC, anytime I see anything any Iranian official says, I'm super interested in it. Even if even if all we're doing is looking for nuance or lack of nuance. In other words, if they say,

yesterday, we said this guy is green. And today, we still think this guy is green. At this point, given the stakes here, I will, I thirst for it as a consumer of news as a citizen of the world. And and I'm just, like I said, sometimes the guys that guy, the foreign ministers available and sometimes he's not. But I just want to, I want unlimited. It's a great point. The only other thing I would say

“and this speaks to, I think, a really big problem, not only for the media, but for the American”

government as well. The other problem with interviewing the Iranians, any Iranian official, is you have no idea who you are talking to vis-a-vis the regime. Is the Iranian foreign minister relevant even in these conversations? Or is he a mouthpiece speaking for a couple of people who may still be in the government and have absolutely no say in any deals? So I think Mark, one of the things about, like, Baghdad Bob or, or when I was interviewing, I'm also here, he's brother, is you,

you knew who they spoke for. You knew who Bin Laden was. The Iranian foreign minister can either be a very meaningful person. And these negotiations are, you can be like, what President Trump describes is talking to the Iranians. And one Mohammed says one thing and the other

Mohammed says, oh, never mind, that guy has absolutely no say in what we do and by the way,

we never talk to you. Yeah. Well said, your fancy anchor now, you almost never leave the air condition studio, but back when you were a Middle East correspondent and you traveled around, if you could, if your safety could be guaranteed, and that's a crazy hypothetical, but if you,

“if you could be in terror on now, would that be a good assignment? And like, what would you do?”

Well, it's a great question. You say if you're safety could be guaranteed. If you say what the regime wants you to say, you're safety's guaranteed. That's fairly fair. I don't, again, I don't know what the value in going would be if you couldn't report freely. And you saw CNN get a lot of flat for just puppeting the regime's talking points and in return for me and allowed to go in. So that I, I would not do no. I think if you were there, obviously you would want to report on

what are the Iranian resistance groups doing? They exist. We know they exist. Why have they not risen up? Is there a resistance or a possible secondary government, government in waiting forming? Is there fractures inside the regime? What of those look like? These are all things that if you were there and had, you know, kind of very godmother like protection, you could go report on. That's not something you could do right now. Yeah, it's interesting. Because again,

the AP, like a few weeks ago, they had some reporters drive from, I think, was north of Tehran, except like miles and miles. And they drove to Tehran. And on the rev, they did reporting just like you're describing. And again, I just don't understand why they were able to do that once, you know, and I understand American organizations not being, but like shouldn't the Dutch be in there? Shouldn't the British be in there? You know, you know, the one thing I learned when I was

in the Middle East. And I was there for the transition between when journalists were a protected

class, right, to when journalists became targets. And it happened very quickly. You know, basically,

you know, from Egypt, the Arab Spring, through Libya, and then into Syria when ISIS started beheading people. That was only about a couple of years. And I think there's a lot of journalists now,

In fact, we're a targeted class. We are now legitimate targets to then be traded or tortured, or held, or anything like that. So it doesn't surprise me, especially with the cruelty of the Iranians, that no one is sending people in the flip side to that is for media organizations, especially Americans, that seem so concerned with defensive democracy, the freedom of the press. Anyone who dares attack their press or criticize them, they are awfully accepting of everything

the Iranians do in the name of brutality and regime survival that they ignore. And it's perplexing immediately. The only obvious answer is anything that could be good for Donald Trump, they won't report on. And that sort of seems to be where we're at. Yeah, last question, if you could have any two bookings on your show tonight or related to the

“Iran War broadly, not counting President Trump, any two bookings, who would you take?”

And into the sense that they would they would tell me what? Is it that they're going to actually question? I can't guarantee that you can have anything, it doesn't have to be Iranians. It could be anybody in the world besides President Trump to talk about the Iran War and you you take what you get, they may not tell you a thing. And the S of Saudi Arabia? Yeah. You either MBS or MBC, MBC of the United Arab Emirates?

Yeah. I think one of those two would be really interesting. I think you'd have to say, and I don't have, you'd have to say like the head of the Iranian

Revolution, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, the IRGC, whoever's the head of that right now,

that would probably be the answer. But you'd have to say that I would put it opaquely, right? Whoever's actually in charge of Iran right now or who speaks for that person, we just don't know who it is. Yeah. God help your book or if that were your instructions. Go, go, don't think Iranians in charge or Iranians in that book. I'll tell you mine, mine would be that person, same thing, and President Xi of China, that'd be a good booking, right? Yeah, that'd be a very good

“booking, especially ahead of the summit. Yeah. Who'd be right now would be a very good booking?”

Yeah. I was thinking of Putin, except we know his answers would be ridiculous, and your show's only an hour, so you'd probably get a couple questions. Well, yeah, and you'd get a long history of the all the ways Russia has been agreed, but she is the same way. I think I think those guys who were so scripted like that, it's a great booking, and it's an uninteresting interview. Yeah, I would I would break she's disciplined. I would I would wear him down

and he'd be confessing to everything and and giving the inside story of his efforts to make peace.

Leeland, thank you, man. Great fall to you for making time. Always fun. Thanks, Mark.

Ladies and gentlemen, if you if you enjoyed this moment, this opportunity, this brief interlude with Leeland, believe it or not, you can catch him every night for a full hour, minus the commercials. 9 PM Eastern Time on News Nation, Leeland Vittor, Bittor Leeland, thank you, man. Great fall to you. All right, up next, or as we say here next up, 8 for 28. Hey, we take a look at your reactions to my

May rankings of the 8 most likely Democratic presidential nominees in 2028. The hate will be on full display right back with that. That's next up. Are you being lied to? They tell you to defer paying your taxes by saving, say in a 401k, or an IRA because you're a tire and a lower tax bracket. But if that were true, why are so many retirees now in the highest tax brackets of their lives? It's time now to get the truth and discover

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Democratic presidential nominees. And as always, people have some strong feelings. Let's look

at the latest rankings for this month. Just to remind everybody. Gavin Newsom won. I moved Harris from further down to number two. Josh Shapiro did from two down to three booted judge. Number four, debuting Bernie Sanders at number five, which I knew we'd cause some controversy. Rama manual six, Andy Beshear at seven and John Osop at eight. First time Osop on the list. Again, the ones I knew would be controversial. Harris has always come to Harris. I was going to

“be controversial. But I knew the Sanders one would and maybe Osop. And sure enough, that's what”

the reaction's been like. Lots of emails and lots of comments on both Instagram and on X. So let's start with the Sanders one. I made my best case. And I still have people both political professionals and some people outside politics. Excuse me. Who are interested? Questioning it. Lots of

people basically just saying I'm nuts. But here's one I liked from Kenny. Kenny wrote this. Kenny said,

Mark, I thought you were crazy to include Bernie Sanders. But I think you made a strong case for him. Stranger things have happened. I appreciate that. Kenny goes on to say that he thinks that both the Bashir and Rama manual should be higher because that conservatives will like them. We'll get back to that theme in a second. But Kenny, I appreciate you listening closely and hearing me out on Sanders. I've heard a few other people say that, but most people still saying I'm nuts.

“Here's another one. And is an issue I raised in the monologue about the rankings. This is from”

on X from MF, Hussie, CFA, CMT. He said, says, you've said it yourself, Mark, there's no way today's Democratic Party will nominated you. So no Bernie, no Ram, no Josh Shapiro. And I should say both all soft as well as a governor of Illinois. He'd say, I'll add that a party just proportionally relying on black support won't nominate a gay man, Pete Buttigieg. And he says, there, fixed it for you and now you're at four. So what he says is if the party's not going to

nominate a gay person or Jew, my list gets cut in half. And of course, we've discussed here before

some people say they won't nominate a woman or a person of color. So if we do all that, we're basically

just down to to Gavin Newsom and Andy Bashir, they can arm wrestle for it. All right, another big theme that came up was this question of adding awesome up to the list. And our friend Andrew Kovat at attorney point USA wrote this on Twitter. He said on X, he says, what has also done for Demin Citer's to mention him? Or is it just a classic Democrat pension to one to find white males to run? Because they know how much they've alienated the larger demo. Andrew, thank you

for that. You know, when I do my reporting on this, it's not just quote unquote Demin Citer's in addition to talking to some Republicans. I'm constantly sampling thanks to two way and next up next to here, grassroots opinion. What justifies also up being on there is first of all, he's on track to win a reelection in a pretty red slash purple state, but state certainly that's more red and then then blue. And he's just demonstrating a lot of the things Demin Citer wants,

grassroots Democrats want, very tough on Trump, but also talking about the real lives of real people and issues that matter to folks. So also has said he's not interested in running, but I'm going to expect if he does win a reelection, handle it in Georgia for Demin Citer. That means a couple points. I suspect he's going to be under a lot of pressure to look at it. He's young, even though he's a senator, he's got the vibes of an outsider. And and a party definitely once

that. Lastly, again, this issue of whether the Democrats will vote for a centrist. And this goes back to one of the these tensions, which we talked about in the monologue. This is an email from William or Billy. Billy says, I enjoy your take on this as a former centrist Democrat now independent. I'm personally pulling for those centrist Democratic candidates like Rama manual and Andy Beshear, he says he's from Kentucky. And for us off, and then he says, what about Jared Polis, he's a governor

“of Colorado? I think he's fantastic. He'd be a great candidate. I'd enjoy hearing your take. So again,”

here's the tension as we talked about in last episode, the party tends to nominate people who are more moderate. But there's also this issue of a of a forl in some ways for electability in the general. But this is not about who can win a general election. And we know that the party is more moderate, more progressive in terms of the grassroots and the influence the grassroots and it's been really in the generations. And so maybe a moderate win that's still my gut. But the progressives like

their moment to try to win. So Jared Polis is interesting governor of Colorado. He certainly would like to be president. There's no doubt about that. But my sense from talking to folks is he's not thinking of running this cycle. But let's see. Somebody like that who can raise a decent amount of money, not as much as others. Let's see if he decides to jump in if some of these other people on the list

now take a pass. Always grateful to get feedback on age for 28. And thank you for whether you

sent an email or went on social media. Love to hear the comments and what people are thinking. It helps

“me work through as I think about the June edition. So thank you for that always like to hear”

when I got wrong and what you agree with. All right. Next up after quick break, I'm a more democratic strategist. And one of the new members of the 28 morning meeting community contributors will be here. I'm a more is next up. All right. So think about the last 30 bucks that you spent. Maybe on a streaming subscription. You don't watch or a lunch. You've already forgotten about that's $30 that's gone or ever. Aker Gold lets you turn that lost money into physical

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All right, next up, and joining me now, I'm a more principled cornerstone government affairs and

a former director in the Office of the Democratic National Committee's chair's office. And this week, joined the two-way family. Officially, he's been a regular in the morning meeting in two-way tonight, but is one of our contributors now on the morning meeting. I'm a welcome back to GetAkerGold. Good to see you. Happy to be a part of the family. Yeah, really happy to have you here in grateful to you for making time. We talked, I talked to my

monologue about Marka Rubio, and now he's having this moment. I remember in 1998, George W. Bush was seen as a big threat to win the White House, successful governor in Texas, a PLT Hispanic voters, black voters, young voters, and the Democratic Party knew you got to slow this

“guy down. We got to slow him down. So you're too young. Do you ever had Tony Moro? You know that is?”

Yeah, dude, actually. All right, so Tony was the person nominated to run against Bush and Al Gore went down to Texas and campaigned with Tony Moro, and they did their best to prop him up, but Bush destroyed him and built up momentum to become the Republican nominee in a formidable general election candidate. Here's my question to you. If you were at the DNC, and you were in charge of the Stop Rubio War Room to say, look guys, if this guy continues unmolested politically and

becomes a Republican nominee in 28, he's going to be hard to beat. And right now, the media is just it's just a slobber love fest. So if you were in charge of that War Room, Oppo, Research, Social Meeting, etc. What would you do to try to slow Marka Rubio down? Well, one Mark, we can't be surprised. I think the DNC, we did this, you know, a few years ago, where you would do sort of the book, you know, on all respective candidates. And so I think they

probably have one of Marka Rubio already, because we've seen this coming from a while. So you start with the book, and then look, Marka Rubio, who's been a senator, has been politics for so long.

“He said so many things. He's made so many policy decisions. And so you go back and you have to”

come through all those things. You either remind people when he was absolutely in opposition to Donald Trump to just sort of draw some distinction between the two of them and sort of kind of play them against each other. And then too, you have to say, you have to make remind people of things that he's done and said they're anathetical to what he's doing right now, what he's saying right now. So so make him seem like he is a flip flopper or someone who's wish

wish washy. And then you look at all his social media. You know, he's said things about Donald Trump in 2016. He said things about other Republicans in 2016. You remind people what those things were. So you're absolutely right about phase one, which is you got to collect all that stuff. And as you suggested, you can make him seem on a peeling to the general election electorate, but you can also drive wedges between him and maga, him and president. But how do you execute that? Because

Do you need a surrogate of who's like, how do you make any get that out in the bloodstream? Start taking and say it's slowing him down. Well, you need all the above. And you know right now, what I imagine. I don't know. I've been heard this because I don't work there anymore. But what I imagine a Democrats are doing is there. All these reporters who you're talking about who are feaning over Mark Rubio, the Democratic machine is sending them apple research, sending them

quotes, and then things to just sprinkle into the coverage of Marco, they're saying, you know,

oh, we love them. But in 2016 he said this. So that's one part. The second thing. Let me stop

you on that one. Because I really want to get in the nitty gritty of this to give people a benefit of your understanding of how this works. Like if a reporter who's writing how great Marco Rubius, if they get a thing that says, oh, remember in 2016, he had this, these weird payments from a college. Yeah. You can see like it was paid up like they're not going to put that in the story. Like it fights the current momentum. I just think if it's sending that stuff out now is not going to work.

That's my judgment as a reporter because the reporters aren't going to, how do you, how do you change the paradigm so that whether they're including it in the stories? Because I went back and look, there hadn't been a negative story about the guy. He's the Secretary of State in the National Curivizer during a war which many people say are going well. That's not even getting in the story.

“So so you got the opo research and reach out to reporters. But how do you get the paradigm change?”

So they're putting that in the stories or writing whole stories about, well, maybe he's not so great. Yeah. Well, the two parts of that. I mean, I come from the old school of feeding the beast. So we're going to, if it's not covered immediately or if the reporters are going to put that in

that story, they'll have some context or future story. So that's one part. The second part,

you know, we're in the world of online influence right now. And so you have to figure out a way to get to the MAGA influencers to get to the super liberal influencers and sort of feed them a message that, you know, you mentioned a second ago on the MAGA side. You know, he's not MAGA enough. He's not a Donald Trump accolite. And so how do we feed that flame? And then the second piece on the liberal side, just to start not healing on the general election, start feeding that, you know,

this is why Marcos, two liberal, I mean, started to conservative. This is why he'll take it too far, too much of a hawk or something like that. So that's a big piece of it. But a lot of this right

“now, you know, you have to sort of ride the wave. You know, Marcos having a moment and I think we knew”

he would have a moment. And so you don't expect to undercut him, you know, at this exact moment, this is going to be something that they're going to build on for months and months to come. And so you'll see some friendly reporters, some liberal reporters who are going to start riding these stories. That sort of, here's the real biography of Marca Rubio from a liberal perspective. And so you'll see those things happen over the next couple months. You want to all happen right now.

What would, let's say, between now and the midterms, what would be, what would be a realistic, but but dream hit where, if you worked in that DNC war room, you say, you know, the national review, attack them or the Wall Street Journal editor, page what, what would be something they could happen this year to slow them down that would be realistic? Well, I think, and then we'll talk about this some point. But look, the Iran war, you know, the, the, the, the, the continued

relationship with Russia or like their, um, and then obviously what happens in China over the next couple weeks, those going to be a big pieces of him telling his story because you got to think about this. One of the things that J.D. Vance is going to have an advantage over Marco, is he'll be in the news all the time during the primary season and during the general election because he can do that. Uh, Secretary of State can't do domestic, uh, politicking. And so, uh,

if the war goes poorly, if the China summit goes poorly, if Russia continues to become aggressive, then we can start drawing a picture around a him being a Warhawk and things just not going well

and not being America first. Uh, but he will get some distance from from the domestic policy

stuff because J.D. will be the face of that over the next couple months. It's going to be tricky, you know, started telling that the, the, the big Marco is in the right guy story right now. That's probably more of a, of a, of a, of a later fall story than it is pre midterm. Um, we talked about your mom and her sensibilities sometimes. Could you see your mom voting for Marco Rubio in a general election against the Democrat? Look, I, I, I, Mark, I'll be honest with you.

I, what I've, I'd said this, you know, six, seven months ago, I said, if you're Republican,

“you ought to be looking at Marco Rubio and you have to give him a really close look because he”

does have to massive pill and he does have an ability as we saw this week, you know, with the levity he brought to the, we haven't had that amount of levity in the, in the, in the, in the, in the press room and quite some time. Yeah. And the way he commended the press and what he commended such a different diverse audience. So I think he will have some appeal to Black Southern women and, you know, who are religious or, and, and he can build from that. Yeah. So if you were at the dinner with

a bunch of your friends who were not professional Democrats, but people who voted for Biden and

dad and, uh, if he's funny and, and, and multicultural, uh, would, would you say to him, what would you say

“to them to keep the, to keep the Rubio, uh, flame from burning brighter? I mean, look, I, I think”

that's the, the only anecdote to that right now is having a, a, a, a viable, uh, Democratic candidate that, that, that Democrats and independents can coalesce around, uh, and, and, so to see some of those same attributes, uh, in that person, uh, but as it stands, you know, there's, there's, there's something to say about, uh, compassion and conservatism as you and I both know, and that was one of Bush's big, uh, big components. And so Mark co can continue to show, uh, that level of compassion and, and, and,

and exude that through social media and through the media, um, I think it's going to be really hard, uh, uh, to, uh, to make a case that he won't be a viable, uh, nominee for the Republicans. Yeah, you know, again, I just think so much about the Bush experience in 98, you've laid out in this conversation, probably more thought things actually been given to it at the DNC, because they're so busy. They were so much to do there. And, and the thought of saying,

we're going to put serious bandwidth. We're going to develop a whole ad campaign and social media campaign and brief surrogates on this when they're trying to win the midterms. It's just, it's just not realistic. It's unfortunate for the parties point of view. If fast forward to January of 20, uh, 29, and Mark or Ruby is taking the oath of office, uh, for president, because, because it's a little bit of a paradox. Uh, they know they need to do it. Yeah. But, but, but they just, they just don't

have the time or the bandwidth or the resources and Ruby, uh, he's not even doing that much. Like, there's such a love affair for him now that he does one stint in the briefing room and all of a sudden, people are just just so gaga for him. And, and again, I'll say, I've heard from so many Democrats this week, either this guy is really going to be a challenge if he's nominee, or hey, I kind of, and again, not professional Democrats, saying, I like this guy. Like, like, what's wrong

“with Ruby? I like why? Why wouldn't I support Ruby if it were, you know, whoever for the Democrat?”

Right. No, you're going to be hearing that a lot more. But look, you know, there's a lot of talk about the DNC right now and about sort of the leadership, and I know Chairman Kim Martin very well. I've worked with him for years. And I think one, and there are two things that I think he's really good at. Uh, he's really good at walking and chewing gum, because, you know, he had to do that when he was a Minnesota Minnesota, as we all know, has just been a mess for, for quite some time,

and he's had to wait through that. But the second piece is he's really good at the elections,

and you seem, and while he can't articulate the story right now, but he's been at the center winning a lot of these Democratic elections over the last couple of months. And so he's looking to our 20, 20, 28, because he understands that, you know, Jefferson Schumer have got to put more stake in the midterms, and he does. And so he does have the ability to do, to look forward a little bit more than the other other committees. Next time you see him ask him what his plan is to slow down

the Rubio Express. No, I, I'm going to text him after this. All right, text me forward the text. Hi, I'm a more grateful to you. Love having you on, and like I said, I knew you'd have such a clear eyed view about how to do this. And every day, I'm just going to be checking, is anybody

“listening to him as advice on how to get this done? That's what I'll be looking for.”

I love that. Let's, let's, let's play that clip. I love it. Yeah. All right, man. Thank you. Good to see you. All right. That's it for today's program. We'll be back on Tuesday. A whole brand new episode. Hope everybody has a great weekend, a reminder. Please share the program around, subscribe yourself on YouTube, and where you get your podcasts, but also tell all your friends

to become next. Thank you. Join us always so you know what's coming next up.