Jill Biden Says She Thought He Had a Stroke. Former Aide Speaks Out w/ Michael LaRosa

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“She was contracting herself in these clips.”

When Jill Biden sat down with CBS news this week, she may have thought she was helping explain one of the most consequential political moments in American modern history. Instead, she may have reopened one of the Democratic Party's deepest wounds heading into the midterm elections. For years, Americans were told not to believe what they were seeing with their own eyes. That Joe Biden was aging, and he was out of sight, and it was unclear how he was doing. Then came the debate, confirming what we all felt and saw.

Then, it came the collapse of Biden's reelection campaign 100 days later.

“And now comes a memoir, an immediate war.”

That many Democrats fear is just raising more questions than it's answering. This is coming at the very moment that the party is trying to convince voters it learned lessons from 2024.

And Jill Biden is essentially forcing Americans to think again about whether they were misled in the first place.

Joining me now is a true Washington insider. Jill Biden's former White House press secretary, Michael Orosa. And believe me, he doesn't hold back. Michael, this is a rough moment for Democrats. The party is fighting over this disputed autopsy report, approval ratings remain weak.

Donors are restless, and now Jill Biden is out, noting a memoir that seems to be reopening old wounds about the 2024 election.

What struck you most about her comments? A lot. But I guess I would start with, I'm a little surprised at how vulnerable I expose. They allowed her to be by kind of painting a different picture for the public of what she felt in the moment, because she was contradicting herself in these clips from CBS.

So I'm anxious to see the rest of the interview, but from what we know now, she is contradicting what she said and what the campaign said in the moments after in the hours after and in the days after the debate. Now, from what I know of Jill Biden, knowing her and knowing about their history, I mean, this is someone, this is a wife who ran a Catholic priest out of his hospital room when they were trying to give by in the last rights. She got in between him and protesters twice. She put herself between protesters and her husband on the 20th campaign.

Yeah. What exactly why would she be sitting there doing nothing if she really did think he was having a stroke? That doesn't strike me as something Jill Biden would do. I don't see that as the same. I don't think saying someone is having a stroke versus not giving them their last rights. I think she didn't want him to get his last rights because she didn't want to believe that he was going to die.

I think my point is that if she ever felt like he was at risk that she would react and she didn't react.

“The reaction was really actually quite different and that's what's so surprising and she like you said she's brought so much criticism on herself.”

Oh, the reaction has been brutal and I feel I feel really bad for because. Why? Well, it's hard to see somebody that you really care about and I do care about Dr. B. I love Dr. B. I know she cared about me at one point for a couple of years, but it's hard to see somebody continue to damage themselves and their credibility. To know what could have been that they continue to make really bad mistakes when it comes to how they communicate to the public when it comes to how her public relations is executed.

To improve her public image, her public, her standing with the public because she suffered such a credibility crisis after the debate.

“But actually, that's what this book is all about.”

Well, how how how do you help your credibility improve your credibility if you're now changing the way you paint the picture of that night. And what took place, but not only that, then she's saying oh, but but they went along with the gas lighting and they went along with the lying and evasiveness. So what is it where they lying then is she lying now, but either way, this is a really bad start to a book tour, which. I don't know, she she should be trying to correct the record, but answer answer for questions that have been left on answered and instead she's creating more questions.

And that that's a huge problem.

“Yeah, I would agree with you, but I think the best PR defenses that true, right?”

Well, of course, but that goes back to something that you and I have talked about many times. These people were allergic to transparency. They were allergic to anything human and normal.

They thought that by I agree with you, Tara had she come out and just said, oh my god, I've never seen them like this.

It scared me to death as his wife. I thought he was having a stroke. She'd come out and said that. She may have gotten some of the benefit of the dad, they may have been able to pull off this was a unique circumstance kind of situation. The problem was Tara, they spent a year hiding him. They spent a year not engaging with the press, not doing press conferences, not taking questions attacking the press, hiding from the press, denying that the polls are bad, denying that the economy was bad, denying that he was in bad health.

Meanwhile, making all these public accommodations for him, the stairs of the plane, his shoes, the way he walks, all of these public accommodations, the debate didn't create concerns about Biden. The debate confirmed the concerns people had had for a year, and you and I were talking about it all of the time, hey, I paid a price for talking about it. They came after me and tried to smear me for saying, what are they doing? These polls are bad pay attention. He's not engaging. He's not doing press, he's running against the most savvy, most accessible opponent and candid in history of presidential candidates.

It comes to the media and he's nowhere. They were trying to run out the clock. You can't run a campaign like that. So people were, the debate was not a moment of inflection. It was a moment of this is over.

“Yeah, and she didn't see that because she went out there saying he was totally fine. That didn't feel like a one night event to me, and I think most people could see that.”

If she thought he was, if she really felt like in that moment that he was not well, that he shouldn't have gone to do a rally right afterwards, he shouldn't have gone to a wafflehouse stop after after. They shouldn't have done a big rally the next day. If your concern was for his health, as I think most people at home were. They got over the whole idea of, oh, my god, that gut feeling I had was actually confirmed right before my very eyes exactly right. That's exactly right. It, it, it affirmed that people are smart. They are not dumb.

They, they, yes, I know, but the buying people always thought that they could play a little too cute by half with it.

It's smart, the American people. They thought that the Trump team does too. Yeah, sure. Which, and sing they can. Are you really sure. But what, what I think the Biden people really never could meet the moment on.

They could just never meet the moment they could never understand how, how and what the public expects of their public leaders.

They can see they knew that he was hiding for a year.

They knew that he was being overmanaged for a year. They knew that something was wrong because he couldn't show and tell. Yeah, he couldn't really walk that well. And that debate, that debate just confirmed everybody and I say, everybody, I mean, at least all of the Democrats worst fears, worst suspicions.

“And that's how he lost support. They continued to lose support because of how they handled this after the debate too.”

And it was just, it was, it was, you know, it was a nightmare that they just did everything wrong. And that's what it also confuses me the same people who got everything wrong in the moment when it mattered. Are advising them now on how to clean it all up again and look at how well it's going.

Yes, this, this little teaser clip in less than 24 hours has been met with hostility, resentment and more skepticism and harmed her credibility,

her lack of credibility probably made that even worse. So I don't get why you keep these same people around who really do not help the Biden's when it comes to improving their outcomes. It is just what is wrong with them. It's just what we're talking about why her spin doctors aren't good enough. You know, it's been, it's not even that. Yeah, why can't you just tell the truth, why can't you just say. I was scared to death forever. Why didn't she say that right away, also who waits two years to tell your story.

The cake is baked. Yeah, well, that's the thing. The story is about Jill and I see it that way because it really raises more questions and answers. She says she was shocked by what she saw, you know, Democrats are saying they were told behind the scenes that concerns about Biden's age where overblown people who are supposed to be close to the White House. I mean, is congressional allies, you know, and there are questions about Jill and how much power and how much you hold she had in the White House all along because we're talking about her husband.

Yeah, and so if you, if you're thinking about this book tour and this rollout and this launch starting with these clips and you know one of the more provocative things she's going to say to read a braver is I thought he was having a stroke. That's the clip they all chose to read on to put out right provocative get people's attention. But it contradicts everything she said at the time and when you wait two years to correct the record and set the record straight, you can't put that toothpaste back in the tube.

The public forms opinions and impressions over time.

“Why the hell did she release a book setting the record straight before Kamala Harris?”

Why didn't she do this a year ago? Why is she doing it in another in an election year? Yeah, I mean, why would someone keep talking about this? You're thinking like a political operative. I think you got somebody who cares about who cared about her legacy, who cared about she's perceived. Know that they made so many mistakes with her in that last year.

Not to mention a third vote cover that you don't do in an election year.

Yeah, like you won the vote vote, right? I didn't was good on the vote vote. He didn't have the, he didn't have the, you know, mom and I will vote. And it's like they had a fun, it's like they totally, tone deaf to the reality of how candidates are perceived and how, how to. I mean, that's happening in the Trump White House to what happens in all white houses.

They fall into this bubble and they're only around the leaps and they forget about people who actually vote for them. But I want to go back to this one thing. Yeah, you know, she says his appearance was so strange. She says he wasn't making sense. It was inexplicable, but we're talking about her husband.

Why wouldn't she just ask him afterward? What happened? It's a great question. I mean, I think she says to him, I think he says to her when they're stepping off the stage. I really effed up and she said, yeah, you did. Okay, but that's not what happened.

I think she goes on in this other clip that was released today to say she still doesn't know they still don't know.

“Look, I think that's why look, the debate damaged by them politically.”

But how they responded to this debate and what happened that night damaged the credibility of a lot of people on that campaign because of what they decided to do. What the strategy they decided to deploy, which was to deny denied denied or to insist that everything was fine.

What did they say? She even wrote this that maybe it was the endion because he wasn't feeling well or maybe it was the, what was the other drug? Like a day quail or something like that? Yeah, a night quail or a night quail. I don't know, something. Yeah. Okay, whatever, but go have a doctor.

Like the doctor will be the president. Will he travel with a doctor all the time? There's a whole medical unit that travels with him wherever he goes.

But the problem is when you decide to gas light and you just, and you double down on this.

Farce because everybody could see it in front of their own eyes, something was not right. But when they double down and try to tell us, don't believe you're lying eyes. And for as long as they did, it insisted that we shouldn't believe what we saw. You know, her credibility was damaged. The campaign's credibility was damaged.

His political career was damaged basically over. But this book should have been an attempt to restore her credibility. Her, find her place in history. Or if you just can't because actually what you did was not honourable. I mean, that should have been the point of this book, which is why she should fire everybody around her.

They just made you hate it all, whatever you did was an honourable unit.

“But like if you're writing a book, Tara, you're trying to, you're trying to write something you've, write it wrong, right?”

You're trying to, I don't know. Listen, I don't think like a politician, you know what I mean? I wouldn't write a book to be dishonest. I totally wouldn't. I mean, I'm trying to give her the benefit of the doubt.

My point is, how could you, I believe her expose by, by changing her story and not expecting the kind of criticism that they're getting. That her situation wouldn't be made worse because it is. It's, it's, she's not doing herself any favors. I, I feel for her. I feel really bad.

And then, then I have to think about, okay, well, you, you listen to the same people that got here in the first place.

So, Dr. B. Come on. And also, this isn't really like that judgment call. I need a whole committee to tell me what the right thing to do is.

“I think I, I think anybody could probably figure out what the right thing to do is.”

You keep the same people around who literally got your husband de-th wrong. I don't think that they, I don't think that they got him to throw him from power. I think that the American people saw what happened and they realized like this person shouldn't run again. I don't blame political operatives for what happened. Well, look, I think the margins, they realized they couldn't win with him as well.

It was finally revealed after much attempt by these political operatives to keep him away. But it was finally revealed who he truly was. Then, yeah, I guess the deep droning happened, but maybe he could have stepped down on his own.

Look, a lot of that we, if you asked before.

And so it's, it's, it's not answerable. It's just, it's, it's all, um, look. And then we get the really horrible news once he leaves office that he has cancer, which is devastating and horrible. Yeah, again. It's also information that I wonder how long they really knew about.

That's the problem. They're not believable. And Democrats don't believe them. They become political pariahs. No Democrats want to be around them.

Nobody wants them coming to this. It doesn't matter because they are the last leaders of the, of the Democratic Party. Like, I know we're talking about political operatives, but like, we need to talk about the faces. The leaders who elect these people. And it's the last people that were in office created a huge credibility crisis.

Yes. That's going to roll over into the next election. And that is why Democrats, despite the fact that President Trump is so unpopular, still have

“been such a low approval rating because people are thinking of themselves, well, why should I trust you now?”

Exactly. And again, it goes back to how they were starting this book tour for her in an attempt to restore some credibility and restore some trust. They're damaging it even further because this is news to everybody else. And, you know, they, they went and attacked people who were trying to help them get out gracefully,

who were trying to help them do the right thing. And for three weeks, they attacked people and told us we were bed wetting and, and all these things. And it's just like how about some humility, how about some humility for what you did to the party, for what you did to the country, for putting the country where it is, by being so selfish that you're going to do this to the vice president, I mean, who had her own issues with tactics, obviously,

I hope we get some of that from him.

“Café in its best form. With Cuba, we will have a café on the street at the moment.”

With the new Cuba-Wan Capsule Machine from Chibu, we will have to find a café from special buildings. Full-Mondic Arômen, thanks to innovative press-brouetechnology and above 17-year-old coffee for every taste. Eléba Premium Café is already in the 19th century. And here is the Cuba-Capsule Machine in your Chibu fiale and on Chibu D.E. Yeah. So, according to reporting in J.G. Tapper and Alex Thompson's book, original sin,

Jill Biden exercised significant influence inside the White House, especially towards the end. Yeah. At the same time, she's written in her book that it's a catch-22 and it's unfair to place responsibility on her

“being because she's a spouse, not a political operative, but she was obviously blocking a lot of people from him, right?”

A tech game? Yeah. And so, which version is true? Was she simply a wife protecting her husband? Or was she one of the most influential people in the administration? Look, no one ever wants to say no to a first lady, ever. Any first lady? Yeah. This first lady had outsized influence when I, when I signed on to join Jill Biden's traveling team in 19, I had, you know, had some idea, but I had no idea the extent to which

she had a seat at the table, usually via her designate, right, her chief of staff. But that level of involvement in strategic and political decisions from the campaign to the White House only only grew and metastasized. And when you operate in a bunker all the time,

you are always looking to be protected and the protectors, these handlers, they're not really advisors,

they're handlers. They, they behaved more like employees, not advisors, or they behaved more like relatives, not advisors. Right. They were not advising the Biden's to do the right thing from the beginning. They were actually helping them to like keep Joe comfortable and great. They were, they were there to make accommodations to punish people with, by putting them on the manifest or taking them on off the manifest and guarding access to him and deciding who gets to talk to him and win on the

“plane or on, or in the office. That's how, and, and schedule, you know, Jill's person was”

extraordinarily, probably unprecedentedly. If you talked to, which I have, members of other administrations, other White House's other first families, way too much control over the resident staff, the secret service, the schedule, the ability to change the schedule, and it was all really to accommodate the Biden's. And, you know, when the first lady's person has so much control,

in power, she has, she, unfortunately, the thing with the Biden's is, they always want it both ways,

and, you know, Jill wants to say, well, I was his spouse. Yes, she was his spouse, and she should have been supportive regardless. However, she used that role to exert enormous influence over the day-to-day operations of the White House through her chief of staff, through his deputy chief of staff. And it was, um, it was their undoing. It was their undoing. This overmanagement, the secrecy, the allergy to transparency, all of it was their undoing. Bad judgment, bad instincts.

It was just, you could see it happening in real time. I used to think, like, oh my god, it is like pulling teeth to get them to be transparent or to get them to, to be cooperative about something stupid, like the White House, or being like, uh, or, uh, the dogs biting somebody, or a grand kid getting sick or not coming on the trip. It's just, uh, these are, this is the dumbest shit. If you are going to be so uncooperative and, and untransparent and fight transparency,

this, but this part about the dumbest, smallest shit can you imagine these people in a crisis and look,

light. What's so like, what makes the memoir so awkward is timing? I don't. Because like,

“Jill is trying to explain what happened. She's a central part of this story and Democrats are”

simultaneously fighting over what went wrong in 2024. The party's autopsy report is under attack. Critics say the biggest issue is that Joe Biden waited too long to leave the race and that Kamala was a weak candidate. And that there is a broader credibility problem that developed with voters and I would say that's partially because of Biden. And, you know, one criticism I've heard over and over again is that this autopsy report isn't really for voters.

It's like an autopsy report for consultants and operatives and donors and even they seem unhappy with it.

Is anyone going to accept this report? Does it? No, no, there are reports of Joe. I mean, the chair is a joke, there are reports of Joe. I was on Fox and Friends a week ago when this happened. I was on with Rain's Previous and, you know, I had to give Rain's credit because, you know, over a decade ago, after Romney lost, they were serious about conducting an autopsy and they did it right away and they released it within four months. And it was 98. It was taken serious.

This party didn't do that. This chair didn't do that. This committee didn't do that. It is crazy. But it shows you this culture of fear, right? They are so scared to death. To offend the Biden's or offend Harris, they're unwilling to go there. They're unwilling to lay blame where it falls. Well, it feels more like they're afraid of the party establishment, which is frankly, they are the no favors. Yeah. Well, the party establishment,

right, the Biden didn't know favors to the party for sure. And, and advice, yes, exactly. But, I mean, like, and the party is afraid of offending the establishment. Sure. The party, the party committees, the people who are so petrified of this, of this document and putting mistakes and errors and judgment to paper, they're scared of offending interest groups. They're scared of offending the Biden's. I mean, it's ridiculous, just be honest with at least our party.

Like, let's just put it out there and get, I mean, it should have been done a year and a half ago. So it's silly now. But one of the things that some of you said in that interview was,

“why did they spend so much money doing a research on and polling on Jill Biden?”

And I said, well, that's easy because we were getting polls back all the time. There was a poll that came back. I scared the death out of them that was really bad for her. I think it came out from CNN in 2022. But the point is, they wanted the research on her and how and where she stood with the public because they knew she was going to be playing an even more expansive role in as a surrogate, as a chief surrogate and messengers for him in terms of the travel and the

stumping. So it made sense that they didn't really care about the vice president. They cared more about how Jill poll because she was going to be doing what we did in 2020, which was travel more than him for sure. But it was going to be even more aggressive. Also, there were just the whispers that she was running the place and this has happened before when. And I technically she really wasn't, but she because she empowered people in her stead. Yeah, it was like the problem with

the West Wing and the rest of the White House was that when you were talking to Jill's people, you didn't know if they were speaking for Jill or they were speaking for themselves. So that and that person, even when they said they were speaking for Jill, you still didn't know. But nobody, everybody just wanted to just get the hell away from them that nobody wanted, you know,

“I think somebody was quoted in a book say, I just wanted to stay as far away from them as possible.”

You know, the first lady staff was for others in the White House and on the campaign, if you ask

anyone, it was not a joy for experience. If you go back to the campaign and ask the other state staffs and ask, you know, sort of, the differences within the West Wing, what it was like to work with the first lady staff, I'm sure everybody will have a story for you because it wasn't a classic play. The football summer is there. Now it's time to meet the fans with you and to play with you. Click on the banner and

half-meter-year-old with Bob, the strongest fan of the Red Tawat all the time and the fact that he has

“the damage, is a fan of the fans. So as the chance of attractive surprise, as soon as he has a fan bonus in the Re-Web,”

just to 18 to 17. Well, I want to go back to the DNC. There was a lot of dissatisfaction with the

chairman Ken Martin, who, by the way, has distance himself from this report. He basically released him.

I was like, I don't believe in a name this, but you guys want me to release something so- bizarre thing. You know, you tell the people at the DNC to get their votes that you're going to conduct a thorough autopsy. It's the one thing tangible thing you can produce and he can't even deliver an administrative task. Yeah, I know a lot of donors feel like they, that they owe it to them. That reigns previous could apparently do in a very fashionable time timely. This guy has taken

now a year and a half, and it was just an amateurish. It's not even worth discussing because it- that

document that they released was something that said we'd take this seriously. I don't think it could

be- it could be applied to almost any losing campaign, trust, infrastructure, messaging, consultants, but like there's no actual specific credibility. Right? Because if you get specific,

“you have to start identifying flaws and failures. And I mean, what happens when you do that,”

you offend people, you get people mad. Oh, Ken Martin's scared of somebody. Who's he scared to make mad? LGBT group, sorry, Hispanic group, so more pandering instead, let's just tell, tell Democrats what we did wrong. Why the hell were we outpaced in voter registration Pennsylvania

for four straight years? How did that happen? Now, does it make it harder for voters to believe

Democrats have actually learned anything, heading into this next election? Voters don't believe Democrats have learned anything. I mean, we're still voting in Congress against laws like easy layups, like the lake and Rileyville, right? Or we're still- Democrats are still unable to answer a question about whether boys should be competing in girls' sports. It's pathetic. Just answer the question, but Democrats can't do it because they're

too scared to offend people. Even though it, like common sense, tells them otherwise, and they know that the majority of voters feel one way, they still won't, they're still going to hesitate. Yeah. To me, the through line of all of this is not necessarily offending people, but that there are questions about who can voters really trust. I mean, it feels bigger than Joe Biden and bigger than Joe Biden's memoir and the party autopsy. You know, voters were told one thing and then

something totally different occurred. And that is the through line in this three things that have happened here. Yeah. I agree with you. I agree with you. There's this back-to-back weeks now. The autopsy this book, by the way, this book hasn't even officially launched yet. This is just teases. And if I were there, I would be thinking about how they approached the next month. I mean, who's going to show up at her events? Are they going to be curious people? Are they going to be

supporters? Are they going to be confrontational? I mean, reaction to this book and to these clips, just these teases has been brutal. Yeah, it's been really, yeah. And most people can just do it's put screen. What she said then, what she's saying now. But staff, the only job of staff, Tara, is to make their principal look better. I don't even think you need staff for this. I would

“know that anybody knows this. If you are going to correct the record, you know, you have to apologize.”

Yeah. Well, they didn't correct that. She didn't correct the record. She confused the record by introducing this new information. Well, just wait, everybody. Doing is correcting the record, but who knows? But there was no, there was no actual admission of guilt or something like that. Oh, sorry. I misled everyone by saying he was fine. No, there's no happens. There's no humility here for what they had a party, what they did to, you know, the country, the decisions that they made that

were incredibly selfish. She's historic. No president has ever done this two weeks, three weeks before the convention before. So, since Trump's election, what vision have Democrats offered voters?

You could water board me. I couldn't tell you. I saw, I saw like third way or cap put some ideas out there

on childcare maybe. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I hear Democrats say the word affordability. I hear them say the word. I don't hear them say how they're going to make things more affordable or solve the affordability crisis because I think they know, if you're being honest with yourself, if president Biden could have made things more affordable, he would have pressed that button. And if president, if president Trump could do it, he would press that button.

“Oh, that's what he's made of things less affordable, frankly.”

That's not, none of this is how it works. So, there is no way to legislate your way as affordability,

but they're not going to say that. Because nobody cared about affordability when we had record high inflation under Biden. We weren't allowed to talk about it. If you were a Democratic surrogate, you had to talk about the macroeconomics statistics that bureau and labor statistics, the job employment numbers. Because if you talked about how people felt about gas prices or inflation, that would be saying the quiet part out. Yeah. But when Trump is elected,

Democrats care about affordability. They didn't care about it. When life became extremely affordable under Biden. Sorry, I mean, that's a whole wide-anomics, like, time-wise,

“exactly. I mean, Trump is doing the exact same thing. I think if you were, there was something,”

there was an allergy in politics in which you cannot ever admit when things are not going right. I feel like this is an allergy that whether you have a D or an R next year name, you seem to have it. Absolutely. You can only do it when the other side is in control. Yeah. No, neither side has clean hands, and neither side operates very differently from each other. They operate with the same incentive structure. How's that? Political survival.

And not actually doing anything to change anything, because when there is no change, they get elected. Okay. I mean, the problem with the change, making changes can also make more problems. But like term limits, ending citizens united, corporate donors. I don't know. Money in politics. Money in politics. Super PACs. Nobody's going to utilize a lot of early disarm. You know, it's funny when it Democrats want to. Some do, but they have an army behind them.

But I don't not even AOC has. I mean, she takes money from corporates. I'm sure, everybody. Even if it's not corporate. If you're taking money from unions, unions are an interest group. That's an interest. Yeah. And they have more power than a singular voter. That's true. Exactly. So when people talk about influence, pedaling, and the access, and influence, world of politics and money, it's not just corporate. It's unions as well who for decades.

There are others too. Sure. Yes. Exactly. Yeah. There's there's the the commerce is right for the various states, even for various industries. I mean, there's so many different interest groups trade groups individual companies, small businesses. There's an interest for everything. And it's not a Republican thing or a Democrat thing. It is how our our system is set up to encourage factions in a way. Yeah. And also money talks,

though, basically what happens. Yeah. And both sides are, are held hostage to money. Yeah.

Okay. That's quite a way of ending it. But I do want to ask you one more thing. If the answer to what Democrats are offering is still unclear. And the next few months.

“Well, also, Tara, I want to point this out because it's important for people to understand that,”

okay, this commerce and president under unified control, they passed one big bill, right? Yes. The president, this president doesn't use Congress as a partner. They govern this way of governance using executive branch power and authority. They don't write that Congress. So, yeah, a change in party in Congress really isn't going to affect much in the way. Because anything

the majority, it depends on margins. But he's not like, he's not going to work with Democrats on

something to give anybody a win, other than himself. And everything he needs to do, he has done and will continue to do at the executive branch level, at the agency level, regulatory stuff, executive actions, executive workers. Could we actually get a veto proof majority for Democrats? There's two schools of thought. I don't know if people keep saying

“it's this way of year. I'm not really seeing that in data, but I could be wrong. I think it's”

likely the Democrats can take back the house. I heard a Republican say they are nervous about the Senate. So, but I don't think there's ever going to be margins that are veto proof or that are like the margins that Barack Obama has had. I think it's month 20, he had 60. The country's two divided at this point. And they've just figured out the primary wars. It's just everybody's got it like. Yeah. And it's they redistricted so much that every district is pretty much

now almost impossible to switch. There are there are so few. There's four hundred and thirty five house seats and there's only 16 toss-ups. Yeah, because of a redistricting. So, it's not going to be a wave. Even 16 seats is not a wave to me. No, it's not. Because now they're down by

“Democrats are down by Jan. So, picking up 16 would only give them a six net margin, right?”

Yeah, it's crazy. But like even under Biden's net midterm, there were 18 Republicans in Biden-held seats. I think there's only three or four Republicans in Harris seats. That the map is just different. The landscape is different. The competitive nature of the map is different. Yeah, there are Republicans like smart to focus on that. Even though it's still. Sure. Very corrupt to me, but. Sure. I mean, but what's funny is since when has Trump been shy

about like driving through norms, he's always trying to -- doing every day through norms.

And just because as much as he can get away with, and it seems like there's no one stopping him. So, yeah, because a lot of the things there's precedent for, right? Like like redistricting early, there's precedent for North Carolina in New York. They've all done it in the district. So, they can make a case that it's been done before. The same way they can make the case on preemptive parties because guess who else did it?

I didn't. I know. Yeah. On our way out the door, we preemptively pardoned all these people. And now Trump's going to blast the door open and do it indiscriminately. And Democrats are going to sit and cry and complain, but look, I'm sorry. Republicans use power as a tool. Democrats use power as a reward. They use them. They use power very differently. Yeah, interesting. Huh, Democrats use power as a reward. As a reward. Yeah. Republicans use it as a tool to accomplish

their policy priorities. Yeah. They just, they just push it through. They mean, you redistricting as an example. They don't care about the norms. It's getting done because it's legal just because it's untraditional. They don't care. Yeah. Michael Ford, much for your time and for

your candor, always appreciate having a true Washington insider on the show. Good. And, and I

even spent some time in the White House, the Biden campaign, you know better than most, so we appreciate your knowledge. Maybe, and maybe you will be granted a interview if you put in any

“requests. Oh, with Jill. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, you should contact their flock. I think his name is TJ”

Doc. Well, you might know them. Stand up. Oh, the guy. Stand up. Stand up. Stand up. I don't think he gave me any of you. And up human being, you know, never embarrassed the Biden's never caused the Biden's bad press, but they fired him for the third time. It's, it's incredible. Okay. All righty then. Let me get up. Can't do this. Get up if you tried. I, I guess what happened to me? It's not, has had very little impact on me. Who knows, maybe he'll feel guilty and you'll get a

guilt interview out of it. Oh, try for a guilt interview. You know, when you've grass and bully reporters, you get rewarded and promoted in Biden world. So. Oh, well. All right. We don't need to make this personal. But thank you. Um, I appreciate your time and we will check back in with you. Sounds good.

Like I always say, real talk on this show. We get down to the heart of it all, especially as we

had in the elections and people decide who they should give their votes to is the party that's asking for power doing enough to show that they deserve it. These are the questions we grapple with all the

“time and the kind of thing that you should think about. And I should think about. And this is what we do.”

I want to thank you all, though, for tuning into this type of independent journalism where we don't

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You can sign up for my newsletter to the red letter. It's where I do my exclusive reporting. As you know, I'm a journalist. And by becoming a paid subscriber, you can break through that free wall,

get those exclusives first, read all of the reporting. And I spent a lot of time doing over using

“the sources that I've built over 17 years of reporting. I want to thank my producer, Dan Shipmocker,”

I want to thank Abby Baker, who booked this interview and put it all together. I want to thank Adam Stewart who does my graphics and Dan Rose and my manager. See you again this week. Hi. I'm Tampson Fidel, journalist and author of How to Manipause and host of the Tampson Show, a weekly podcast with your roadmap to midlife and beyond. We covered all from dating to divorce, aging to ADHD, sleep to sex, brain health, the body fat. And even how parametopause can affect

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