7/31/24: Kamala rally explodes, Trump's lead gone in 7 states

This episode dives into the strategic shifts in the 2024 U.S. presidential campaign, focusing on Kamala Harris's surge in swing states and the potential risks posed by pro-Trump election deniers.

1. Kamala Harris has erased Trump's lead in critical swing states, indicating a potential shift in voter sentiment.
2. Pro-Trump election deniers in key positions could pose significant risks to the integrity of the upcoming election.
3. High voter turnout is crucial to counteract any potential election interference.
4. Republican internal conflicts could advantage the Democratic campaign if they lead to reduced Republican voter turnout.
5. The episode underscores the unpredictable nature of political campaigns and the importance of strategy and public perception.

1: Introduction to the Episode's Themes

Pakman introduces the episode's main topics, focusing on Kamala Harris's rising popularity and concerns about election integrity. David Pakman: "Welcome to a pivotal moment in the 2024 campaign."

2: Analysis of Swing State Dynamics

Discussion of how Harris has managed to overtake Trump in several swing states, analyzing polling data and voter sentiment shifts. David Pakman: "Harris pulls even with Trump among swing state voters."

3: The Impact of Election Deniers

Explores the potential consequences of having pro-Trump election deniers in positions of power and strategies to mitigate their impact. David Pakman: "The risk of election certification refusals could fundamentally impact our democracy."

4: Republican Party Dynamics

Analyzes the internal strife within the Republican Party and its potential effects on the election. David Pakman: "Internal conflicts within the GOP could lead to significant electoral consequences."

5: Concluding Thoughts

Pakman wraps up the discussion, reiterating the importance of strategic voting and staying informed. David Pakman: "Engagement and vigilance are our best tools to protect the integrity of the election."

1. Stay Informed: Keep up-to-date with reliable news sources to understand ongoing political developments.
2. Participate in Voting: Ensure you are registered and know your voting options, emphasizing the importance of every single vote.
3. Spread Awareness: Discuss the importance of election integrity with your community and encourage active participation.
4. Support Transparent Elections: Engage with local election boards to advocate for transparency and fairness.
5. Be Prepared for Misinformation: Learn to identify and counteract misinformation within your networks.

-- On the Show:

-- Tim Miller, Host of the Bulwark Podcast, Never Trump Republican, and former RNC spokesperson, joins David to discuss the latest strategies being employed by the Trump and Harris campaigns, respectively, and much more

-- Election offices nationwide are filled with Trump-supporting election deniers, raising concerns for the upcoming presidential election

-- Donald Trump's lead appears to have completely evaporated in seven critical states

-- Kamala Harris holds a rally in Atlanta, Georgia, in which she challenges Donald Trump to a debate

-- JD Vance holds a rally in Reno, Nevada, glitching badly and delivering a generally incoherent performance

-- Donald Trump reacts very strangely when asked by Fox News' Laura Ingraham what Melania Trump thinks about his survived assassination attempt

-- FBI Deputy Director Paul Abbate testifies that the Trump shooter have antisemitic and anti-immigration views, and espoused political violence on social media

-- On the Bonus Show: Republicans call Kamala Harris a "failed border czar," Project 2025 director steps down, NYC Mayor Eric Adams overrules law limiting solitary confinement in NYC jails, much more...

People

David Pakman, Kamala Harris, Donald Trump

Companies

None

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Content Warnings:

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David Pakman
Welcome to the show, everybody. A sort of red alert moment. Dozens and dozens of you emailing me over the last 24, 48 hours saying, David, you have to talk about the election offices around the country that are increasingly filled with pro Trump election deniers who, if given the opportunity to mess with the election in November, will do so. And could this explain Trump's confidence, despite cratering polls, as well as his recent comment that you're not going to need to vote again as long as you vote for me this time? Rachel Maddow on MSNBC covering this exclusive reporting from Rolling Stone, finds that there are dozens of swing state election officials who are pro Trump election deniers. Now, understand that we are talking not like the secretary of state of Georgia necessarily. We're talking about when you look at the thousands of local election officials at the county, precinct, et cetera, level municipality. In some cases, these are the individuals who will be tasked with certifying election results in their respective jurisdictions. Typically, these are counties. And if you look, as the Rolling Stone report explains in great detail, and we'll link to the story, if you look at swing states, critical battleground states like Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina. Yes, although less likely to be a battleground state, although maybe not. We'll look at new polling. Pennsylvania, Rolling Stone has identified, working with its partners, at least 70 pro Trump election conspiracists who believe that Trump really won 2020 or who believe that it should have been sent back or rejected or whatever.

They are currently working as county election officials.

They've question the validity of elections. They've delayed or refused to certify results.

At some point in the last nearly four years, at least 22 of the 70 straight up refused certifications of elections in recent years. There's a quote from democratic election lawyer Mark Elias, who we're going to try to get on the program to talk about this and discuss exactly what's going on and what can be done. He says, quote, I think we are going to see mass refusals to certify the election.

Everything we are seeing about this election is that the other side is more organized, more ruthless, and more prepared. So the immediate and obvious question to those who call it quaint called me old fashioned, my friends. I think the candidate that wins the election should get to be the president of the United States. I know it's a crazy notion, apparently in 2024. So there are two ways to answer the question, what can we do? On the one hand, we will, and we should do everything possible to prevent these people from pulling it off.

It also is the case, it might be that the only way to stop these people is to vote in numbers so massive that any attempt to overturn these results will be meaningless. And what I mean by that is that sometimes the only way to ensure that this doesn't become an election denying, conspiratorial mess. And I don't mean conspiratorial in fake conspiracy theories. I mean that they are able to conspire to steal the election the way they tried to do in 2020. The only way we might be able to do it is by showing up with everyone voting in numbers so overwhelming that messing around at the margins with some counties is simply not going to be enough. Now, that's not super auspicious as an explanation of what to do. We would be far better served if we had an absence of these hardcore, pro Trump maga, election denying lunatics in positions of power in counties. But on the other hand, I don't want to dismiss the importance of 70 counties that we know of. There may be more, right? Some of these individuals may be quieter, and we just don't know their views. And they're in positions of power in certain counties. But at the end of the day, 70 counties, if they were exactly the right counties, could they flip a state? Yes, it's possible. It's possible.

We have to hope that concurrent with doing everything that can be done legally to restrict the ability of these individuals to flip results unfairly, if we just overwhelm the vote in record numbers, it probably won't even be able to make a difference, because those counties won't be enough to flip the results. Now, I. Neither of these is very satisfying, right? Because, as I say, on the one hand, we need to try to prevent these people from being in this position in the first place. How do we do it? I don't know.

I don't know. And that's why, hopefully we'll. We'll speak to attorney Mark Elias, and he will tell us. But it's not super satisfying for me to say, let's try to get them out of power. What? How? What do we do? I'm not sure.

On the other hand, it's also not super satisfying or optimistic to say, well, they'll probably be able to end up in a position to try to get away with it. But what we could do is just, like, vote in huge numbers, because every time we say, every single election, we say, if we only had record turnout, none of this stuff would matter. And we don't always have record turnout. So I understand that neither side of this is particularly optimistic. They are the options we have over overwhelm the vote and also do everything we can legally to limit the power of these individuals to try to steal counties. But that's what's going on. Rolling Stone is reporting on it. Rachel Maddow is talking about it. We have to keep talking about it and we'll try to get Mark Elias on the show. Speaking of things going wrong for Trump, Donald Trump's lead is gone. It's just, it's gone in seven key swing states, either losing to Kamala Harris or has lost a lead he had. And we are now within the margin of error. Let's talk about it. The Hill reports Harris pulls even with Trump among swing state voters. My, oh my, how quickly these elections can turn. Vice President Harris, this is per the Hill has erased former President Trump's lead in seven key battleground states. Roughly a week after becoming the likely democratic nominee, a Bloomberg News Morning Consult poll showed Harrison Trump in a tight race in all battleground states, with 48% backing Harris and 47% saying that they support Trump. Now, on average, on average, we are talking about that 1.7 percentage point lead for Trump.

We spelled that number out yesterday and it remains that way. But the breakdown is very, very interesting. And this is where we have seen the shift. Tuesday's poll shows Harris opening an eleven point lead on Trump in Michigan. That's huge because that was like 20,000 vote margin or something like that in 2020, a two point lead in Nevada, a two point lead in Arizona, a two point lead in Wisconsin. Now, meanwhile, in these polls, Harris a Trump rather, leads by foreign Pennsylvania, two in North Carolina. We're not even counting on North Carolina. Pennsylvania would be nice, but it's not actually completely necessary. And the candidates are tied in Georgia at 47%. This is not a good sign for Donald Trump, and it is definitely a better feeling now compared to the start of July. I still think we need an additional full week to let all of the polling settle and get better and more representative data. But I also want to anecdotally show you some of the latest polls on real clear politics, just as snapshots in a general election poll that just came out this morning. It is Kamala Harris plus two over Trump. This includes Robert F. Kennedy junior. I am thrilled to see that Kennedy is down to just three. You may recall that at one point in some polls, RFK junior was polling as high as 16 or even 18, which could be a total disaster for the democratic nominee at this point in time. Whoever it is that RFK takes from. It's increasingly irrelevant as his national polling is down to three. And I would bet in the states that will be close, it will be even lower than that.

Jill Stein and Cornel west, fortunately, polling zero. Now, why do I say fortunately? For two reasons. I don't think they're good candidates. And any support that Stein and West have disproportionately would come from those otherwise likely to vote for Kamala Harris. They could ruin this entire thing and put Trump back in power. That's a great poll for Kamala. Couple other anecdotes. New Hampshire, Kamala plus four, and New Hampshire in a multi way race, Kamala plus seven. That's great to see. I mentioned already the Bloomberg poll in Arizona, where it's Harris plus two, tied in Georgia, Harris plus eleven in Michigan, Harris plus eleven in Nevada. Trump still leading in North Carolina and Pennsylvania. We also have a whole bunch of other polling that is more of a mixed bag. But as we go back further and further, we do start to get to polling that does not fully account for this change in who is at the top of the democratic ticket. And then finally, if you look at a different poll, the Hill reports, Harris takes a four point lead in Pennsylvania. This is just a reminder that just because Trump is leading Pennsylvania in the Bloomberg poll doesn't mean that he has the lead in every poll. So a couple different things I think are important to think about as we approach the 2024 election here in November.

There are cracks in the republican party when they are all of a sudden not running against an incredibly weak and unpopular candidate in Joe Biden.

Immediately, the numbers start to crater. JD Vance, and we'll talk about this with Tim Miller upcoming. JD Vance is making boneheaded comment after comment, alienating growing numbers of critical voter demographics.

There are Reagan Republicans saying we're not going to support Trump. This is just absolutely ridiculous. The populists and the authoritarians and the evangelicals, they are going to stick with Trump until the very last moment.

But the infighting, worst case scenario, it doesn't do anything. Best case, the infighting actually makes a bunch of them stay home, which I would completely welcome. And if Donald Trump does lose, it will then be a situation where the more standard swaths of the Republican Party, you know, the capitalists, the pro business libertarians, the military industrialists, they will likely, I believe, say it's over with this MAGA stuff. That's it.

And maybe this will be the inflection point that we've suspected that it might be. Now, if you look, historically, there is this pendulum that swings in the United States between left and right phases.

The difference, or what we might be able to navigate here is some kind of guardrail that was totally overpassed in 2016 when Trump became president. And to some degree, even since he was no longer president, just by the rhetoric and what he's gotten away with. What we might be able to do by defeating Trump in November, if we were able to do it, is not change that the pendulum does swing, but move the guardrails or the Overton window. We might call it a so that that when the pendulum does swing back to the right, it's not lunatic maga trumpism. It's something comparatively more benign. Not something I would vote for, but still something more benign. Romney type conservatism, the late John McCain type conservatism. Not stuff that I go, I love it, but stuff that doesn't make me say, is the next election at risk? Are the democratic guardrails at risk? So this is early polling. Still, it's going in the right direction. It depends on us voting. Maga world sees it. They are panicking, and we'll talk about that after the break.

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Right now we are seeing candidates do whatever it takes to win your vote and how the media chooses to cover certain stories. If at all can completely shape your perspective of those candidates. But our sponsor, ground news, is an awesome resource at a time like this. With their vantage plan, I get access to what's called their blind spot feed that shows me stories that can be easily missed. For instance, I'm looking here at Ground News Summary about Trump distancing himself from Project 2025 amid its rising controversy, something we've been talking about. Ground News provides a great summary of the situation based on over 100 articles that ground news found reporting on it. And ground news shows me that almost no conservative news outlets are covering the story. Not a surprise, ground news shows us that the right wing outlets only report on how Trump is denying involvement with the project, while the center and left outlets are actually giving context on Trump's connections to the movement of Project 2025. Every story comes with this visual breakdown of the political biases and ownership of the reporting news outlets, which is really important to know as well. Go to Ground dot News slash Pacman, or scan my QR code for 40% off the same unlimited access vantage plan that I use. The David Pakman show depends directly on your support. If you're hearing this message, you're not getting the full David Pakman show experience. I encourage you to sign up at join Pakman.com. and quite frankly, the reason that we can do the show and give it away to everybody on every platform is that a tiny little percentage of our audience, we estimate half of 1%, directly subscribe to membership.

And that is our primary revenue source, and it's how we do what we do. If we could get our support from half of 1% to 1%, that alone would make us financially sustainable indefinitely, regardless of what happens with other revenue sources like YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, the vagaries of which have often, uh, reduced revenue by 98% in some cases. And so that's the real critical reason why being supported directly by members is so important. So I invite you to sign up at join pacman.com. you can read about the great member benefits, and if you'd like to request a free subscription, you can go to David Pakman.com freemembership. Do not email me about it, just fill out the form@davidpakman.com. free free membership we know three of the four presidential and vice presidential candidates for November, and all three were out publicly yesterday. And you are going to now look at all three of them. Kamala Harris, JD Vance, and Donald Trump. We don't yet know who the fourth Kamala Harris's vp will be but we will know by, by all reports, by next Tuesday at the latest, they were all out. And I have to tell you, the vibe and the atmosphere at the Kamala Harris rallies is such a welcome change from MAGA ism and Trumpism. Kamala Harris held a rally in Atlanta, Georgia, yesterday, and it absolutely exploded an electric atmosphere. Kamala Harris spoke directly to Donald Trump after learning that Trump is chickening out of debating her in the most pathetic way you can imagine. And she says, say it to my face, pushing back not only against the attacks on her levied by Trump, but also pointing out Trump's unwillingness to actually get on a debate stage with her and win the battle of ideas.

This is, this is much better than the Kamala Harris we saw some years ago out doing rallies and speeches. You love to see this.

Kamala Harris
So the momentum in this race is shifting and there are signs that Donald Trump is feeling it.

You may have noticed, so last week you may have seen he pulled out of the debate in September he had previously agreed to.

So here's the thing, here's the funny thing about that. Here's the funny thing about that. So he won't debate, but he and his running mate sure seem to have a lot to say about me.

And by the way, don't you find some of their stuff to just be plain weird?

Well, Donald, I do hope you'll reconsider to meet me on the debate stage, because as the saying goes, if you, you got something to say.

David Pakman
Oh, man, this is very different than what we have seen. I mean, listen, it's different than what we've seen from Biden by far. The energy, and it's also very different than what we've seen from Trump. And I'm going to give you another example in a moment of a message that is just much more positive. This is absolutely the right thing to go after Trump this way. She's doing it with a smile. She's, she's not using insults. She's doing it with a smile. And it's sending Trump into a tizzy. Trump doesn't know what to do. Now Trump is saying Kamala is old. He said that or implied it in an interview on Fox News last night, which we will look at. One more clip from this event. Kamala Harris wrapping up her speech on a rousing note. And again, it's, there's a lack of paranoia and fear here. She's not motivating the audience with paranoia and fear. And that's very different than the dystopian conspiracy music at Trump rallies while he just talks about how terrible things are.

Kamala Harris
So, Georgia, in the next 98 days, we have our work cut out for us.

And this is not going to be easy.

This is hard work. But we like hard work. Hard work is good work.

So, Georgia, today, today I ask you, are you ready to get to work?

Do we believe in freedom?

Do we believe in opportunity?

Do we believe in the promise of America?

And are we ready to fight for it?

And when we fight, we win the blessing.

David Pakman
So listen, you don't have to like the policy.

You don't have to like Kamala Harris, but she's not in the basement.

She's not on the golf course.

She's not using fear and paranoia to try to motivate voting. And this has totally upended what is happening in this campaign. Now, I want to give you a story of contrasts. That's Kamala Harris in Atlanta speaking clearly and with gusto and with energy and such a welcome change from what was being seen from Biden late in his campaign.

We now go to JD Vance, where it is very, very different.

You know, as I was preparing for today's show and watching videos of Kamala Harris in Atlanta and videos of JD Vance in Reno, Nevada, and remembering that JD Vance was supposed to be the coherent guy on the Trump campaign, JD Vance was supposed to be the guy that would energize young people and all different sorts of voters. And then I saw glitchy, totally uncharismatic JD Vance clapping for himself. At one point. You'll hear it sounds like a banana slapping against the desk, clapping for, relegated to clapping for himself.

It became abundantly clear that this was a disastrous choice, a disastrous choice for Donald Trump. Here's JD Vance glitching and we're supposed to be saying, hey, he is a breath of coherent fresh air from Trump.

JD Vance
Do we want to defund the police?

Do you want to, do you want to ban fracking?

So do we want a dangerous liberal? Liberal?

David Pakman
Like a dangerous liberal? Do you want it? The entire speech was like this. He's terrible at this. He's absolutely terrible at it. He tried to use this. He, you know how in general, elected officials and politicians, they have a generic stump speech where they repeat a lot of the same lines? And one of the reasons is you get really comfortable with those same lines and you deliver them perfectly every time with predictable results. He's been doing this when you fill up your tank at a gas station line, except he gets it wrong almost every single time, saying instead, when you fill up your pump.

JD Vance
So when you fill up your pump when you fill up your tank at the gas station, maybe you should send a bill to Kamala Harris.

David Pakman
Wow. Just such a great line. Such a great line. And delivered so poignantly. Every single one of these planned stump speech lines going wrong. And we were told he would be really crystal clear in how he speaks.

The continued this is just so funny. Usher Vance, JD Vance, his wife seems to want nothing to do with this campaign. She looked like she was there under protest when they did a recent diner stop to get chocolate milk for their kids.

JD Vance references he'll have to sleep on the couch if he tries to bring her up on the stage. He's the last guy who should be talking about couches right now.

JD Vance
I would call her up here to come and speak that. Then I think I'd have to sleep on the couch tonight, so I'll leave her alone.

David Pakman
There you go. And then at another point, the microphone just rebelling against JD Vance. Maybe the sound engineering was being run by antifa, but JD Vance completely inaudible during parts of the speech. Well, which I'll be honest, the most coherent moments he had were when his microphone wasn't working. Listen to this.

JD Vance
Now I have seen the consequences.

David Pakman
Oh, boy, he's still speaking now, tapping the mic. This is the best. Tapping, tapping, tapping, blowing into the mic, tapping, laughing, talking, waving the mic in the air.

And then suddenly the mic is back. And then finally, in a Jeb Bush like moment, amidst a not super enthusiastic crowd, someone had the clap and it was JD Vance clapping for himself.

Oh, man, this guy is completely pathetic. So things going swimmingly for JD Vance? We heard from Kamala Harris. And finally, let's go to the man himself, the man of the hour, or maybe the man of the minute, Donald Trump. Last night, part two of Donald Trump's gong show interview with Fox News propagandist Laura Ingraham aired. And when he was asked about Melania Trump's feelings about the assassination attempt that Trump survived, the answer tells us so much, you almost start to feel bad for the guy. You almost do. Listen to this. What was Melania's reaction, if you don't mind my asking? I know this is very personal. When she learned about what happened on that field in Butler, she was watching. Oh, she was watching in real time.

Donald Trump
She was watching live. It was all over the place. It was.

David Pakman
First of all, does anyone believe that Melania Trump watches Trump's rallies? Does anyone seriously believe that they just renegotiated their relationship, the financial elements of their relationship? And she's nowhere on the campaign trail. Seem to be under protest at the RNC. And we're supposed to believe she just sits at home watching these Castro like, multi hour rallies get. So it's already a lie. But now we get to the critical.

Donald Trump
Part on television, so on your network. But it was all over the place and she was watching. I asked her that. I mean, I wasn't there. I was on the ground. And when the world started, like, you could talk to people, I said, so what was your feeling?

And she was, she can't really even talk about it. Traumatized, which is okay, because that means she likes me or she loves me.

David Pakman
That's good.

Donald Trump
I mean, let's say she could talk about it freely. That wouldn't be. I'm not so sure which is better, but she either likes or loves me.

JD Vance
Me.

Donald Trump
And that's nice.

David Pakman
But, yeah, she, we, it's breaking news. Melania Trump may like Trump. She really likes me or she might love him. But the real reason that Melania Trump doesn't talk to Trump about the assassination attempt is they don't talk. They don't talk to each other, by all reports, leaving, leading completely separate lives that you would think evangelical christians would say, that's not the way you're supposed to live. We're not voting for the guy. Of course, that's a principle that they only care about sometime. And when it's inconvenient, they, they no longer care about that.

We then get to Donald Trump talking about Kamala Harris. And Trump is 20 years older than Kamala Harris. And he starts alluding to, she's kind of old. Like, she's not really that young. She's older than I thought she was. If you're almost 80 and have a fraction of the energy as the woman you're running against who's more than, who's roughly 20 years your junior. I don't know that you want to call attention to age, but that's what Trump does.

Donald Trump
Years old, a lot of people. I didn't realize she was 60. I thought she was a little younger, but she's 60.

She is talking a big game, but her game is pretty bad. I mean, she was the border czar. She's trying to pretend that she wasn't. You know, it's an amazing thing.

David Pakman
Yeah. So, you know, he was surprised that he's running against the 60 year old. He thought that Kamala Harris was younger. Laura Ingraham gives Trump the opportunity to sort of clean up JD Vance's mess about childless cat ladies and women. With no children. And Trump doesn't really seem to clean it up.

Donald Trump
Women out there watching, I think they understand it. No, I think they understand it. The Democrats are good at spinning things differently from what they were. All he said is he does like, I mean, for him, he likes family. I think a lot of people like family. And sometimes it doesn't work out. And you know why? You don't meet the right person or you don't meet any person, but you're just as good, in many cases a lot better than a person that's in a family situation.

David Pakman
There you go. So clearly bringing back all of the women disgusted with what JD Vance said. And then lastly, Trump, employing the I know you are, but what am I approach saying, you know who's weird? Kamala Harris is weird. A week after the Harris campaign has been saying, this dude's weird, this movement's weird. Trump going, I've got nothing better than to just say, she's the weirdest.

Donald Trump
I had a nice seven iron right next to the pin. Biden wouldn't do that. He couldn't hit the ball 15 yards.

David Pakman
What is this? Just playing american families?

Donald Trump
The whole thing is a con job.

Just plain weird. You know who's plain weird? She's plain weird. She's a weird person. Look at her past, look at what she does and look at what she used to say about herself. And I won't get into it. What she used to say and who she was compared to what she said, starting at about 2016.

David Pakman
Is that making sense to anybody? But no, it's now Kamala Harris who's the weird one. So we finally get to the conclusion of this two night event. A Fox News propagandist Laura Ingraham's interview with Donald Trump. And we learned that Trump can't really explain to us what Melania thinks about the assassination attempt because they don't speak. Trump can't really explain to us, based on part one from the previous night, what makes JD Vance a good vp running mate? He can't really explain why those women, and anyone who knows a woman, quite frankly, disgusted by JD Vance, his comment about childless women, why they should vote for Trump, he can't explain any of it. A softball interview meant to help him, which probably did more damage than it helped. Make sure you were subscribed to the YouTube channel. We're trying to do this thing. 2.5 million subscribers. Hit the subscribe button. It's free. It's a beautiful thing. I just saw that last month we had 4 million different viewers who watched clips but didn't subscribe. 4 million. If we can capture just a fraction of those. Wow. So hit the subscribe button on YouTube. We'll take a very quick break and be right back with Tim Miller. Did you know that Americans pay twice as much for their wine as the rest of the world? The reason is because of laws that date back to prohibition that ensure the right of wholesalers to make a big margin. It's actually insane, which is why I love our sponsor naked wines so much. Naked Wines is a subscription service that seamlessly connects you to the finest independent winemakers on the planet, so you get a case of the market's best quality wines, however often you'd like, for a fraction of the price you'd normally pay in stores.

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It's great to welcome back to the program today, Tim Miller, host of the Bulwark podcast, never Trump, Republican, former RNC spokesperson. I have a whole list of possible titles here, but we won't use all of them.

JD Vance
Those are good.

David Pakman
Tim, I've been listening to your podcast, and I want to talk to you directly about two things that are happening right now and the dynamics of this very interesting presidential race. Number one, the early attack lines against Kamala Harris. And number two, what seems to be the growing weird and strange attack line against Trump and JD Vance. Let's start with the former. The initial attacks against Kamala Harris included. Her laugh is like a cackle. She doesn't have biological children.

She was the border czar, or is the border czar, and she failed this, this sort of thing.

Do you think these attacks make sense knowing the way that the republican machine operates? Like, do you understand why these are the attacks they're choosing and do you think that they're effective?

JD Vance
Speaker one yeah, well, I do understand why they're the attacks that the Republicans are choosing. Look, the republican machine is very good. Part of it is very good at identifying perceived weaknesses, identifying things that are maybe a little bit over the line that Democrats wouldn't want to engage in because that gets attention, that gets people talking about it. Sometimes that works. Sometimes it backfires. Sometimes you can go too far over the line. And I think that during the Trump era, there has been this weird conventional wisdom that is congealed that you can't go too far over the line because it worked for Trump, because Trump got elected, everybody said, and then he became president. And so they've used that rationale to justify doing stuff that we wouldn't have done, you know, back in my day, in the Romney Republican days, and I think that these attacks on Kamala, I want to put the immigration one to the side. But the cackle, the attacks on our laugh, the DeI attacks, the attacks about childlessness, I think those are over the line. They're going to backfire. Even Fox News hosts Stuart Varney and Neil Cavuto were making this point yesterday on Fox. I know.

David Pakman
I saw that.

JD Vance
Yeah. And I just, I think that there's a group of people in the middle of this country that maybe have certain complaints about the Biden Harris administration and were maybe open conceivably to a Trump ticket or open to just leaving the top of the ticket blank.

But they live in a society. They have nieces or sisters, or maybe they themselves are childless.

They like the fact that black people and people of color are getting more opportunities in our society now, right? Like, these are good middle class, middle of the road people, and they don't like this kind of schoolyard bully, racist, sexist B's. And I think it's turning them off, and I think it's a big loser for them. The identity based attacks, I think some of the policy ones might be more effective.

David Pakman
Okay, so now that you wanted to put the borders are thing aside, there's been somewhat of a focus on that Trump retruthing, some memes about it. Recently, the counter has been, she's just not the border czar. That's mostly the counter that I've seen. You consider that one to be in a different category?

JD Vance
I do. Just because, like, she did that Lester Holt interview, there's a Trump ad out today that, that talks about the problems of the border. And there's a lot of lies and, you know, it, like, kind of blames Kamala for the fentanyl crisis, which is ridiculous. Fentanyl comes in mostly through points of entry, legal points of ports of entry.

But just as a general, just speaking only as a political matter. Right. This notion that whether or not she was technically the czar, like she was, that was part of our portfolio dealing with root causes of immigration, there are concerns about that among people in the country, some of them legitimate, some of them overblown. And she gave that interview to Lester Holt, really before she kind of had her sea legs in the role of vp. She comes off a little dismissive of it. They use a quote where she talks about how she hasn't been to the border. She's like, I haven't been to Europe either. I don't know. I just, I watched that ad and I could see how that might work with a certain demographic of gettable voters. And I think that in general, her biggest potential vulnerability is just for the less engaged voter. You know, kind of the person that's not watching this YouTube feed, you know, that is only getting politics news via osmosis, just, is this person, is this a California liberal?

Is this an open borders left wing socialist, somebody that's anti capitalism that I can't vote for? I, that's not really, that's not true about Kamala Harris, but that is a dangerous perception for her political prospects that I think she has to aggressively push back against. And I think that is a much bigger potential vulnerability than the identity stuff.

David Pakman
If you were advising the Trump campaign right now, what would you see as the best attack lines, speaker one, that.

JD Vance
This, that she might be trying to put on, you know, a new, new moderate clothes, but underneath this is a far left California liberal that wants to, you know, force you to sell your guns back to the government, that wants to completely decriminalize the border, that wants to, you know, raise taxes on, on the middle class, raise taxes on small businesses, that doesn't want to do anything about inflation, that can't solve inflation because she's just a big tax and spend liberal.

David Pakman
Like the standard stuff.

JD Vance
Yeah, I think that a standard stuff that she's a far left texan spend liberal. More liberal than Joe Biden.

Yeah, I think that that is what I would stick to because the people that they're trying to get, you have to understand, there are people out there that are racist and sexist. They won't vote for because of that they're already not voting for. Right.

David Pakman
Right.

JD Vance
And so that's why I don't think those attacks work. Right. So the people that they need to get, that the Trump people need to get to get over the bump are you, look at Georgia, for example. Let's just use Georgia as a prime example. He lost by whatever it was, 20,000 votes, something like that last time.

David Pakman
Speaker one, wasn't it 11,780?

JD Vance
I was thinking about the rapids burger call in my head, how many? 11,000, 20,000. In another state, 11,000 votes. Right. Those 11,000 votes. And you could cut it a bunch of different ways. Maybe it's turned out. Maybe. But, like, there are a lot in, in the Georgia suburbs and the Atlanta suburbs, there are a lot of traditional conservatives. They voted for Brian Kemp for governor. They wrote Raphael Warnock for Senator because Herschel Walker was too crazy. They voted for Joe Biden for president. Cause Donald Trump got too crazy. And Donald Trump is starting to try to win some of those folks back. And if you're the Harris campaign, you have to stop that. And if you're the Trump campaign, the way to win those folks back is not to be like, this is a childless cat lady. You know, the way to win those folks back is like, this is the California liberal that you guys don't like and why you, Mitt Romney and I, and I think that that kind of softer approach would be their best bet.

David Pakman
Now let's talk about the long, strange, weird and creepy trip that it's been the last few days, the attacks on JD Vance as being weird. Trump is creepy. Pete Buttigieg, Tim Waltz, I mean, they're all on message about it. What are your thoughts?

JD Vance
Been pushing this for a while. It worked on Blake Masters in the midterms. I was on the wilderness, Jon Favreau, I think a year and a half ago where I said that the Democrats should lean into this. It absolutely worked in Arizona. I have a pollster friend in Arizona who was shocked by the number of verbatims. Verbatims are when, when you do a poll, you're like, hey, do you want Mark Kelly or Blake masters? You know, do you think things are going well or poorly? Then at the end they say, you know, why are you from r. Kelly or why are you against Blake Masters? And he said it was insane. How many people said, he's weird, he's creepy. I don't trust him. And it worked. That the Kelly versus there's masters campaign, that line of attack worked. Those same people I was just talking about in the Atlanta suburbs, they are, they're just regular businessmen with families. Um, you know, I say men because most of the women are already vote, most of their wives are already voting for the Democrat. Um, and, and they are not looking for some tech bro weirdo who wants to, you know, uh, uh, determine whether their daughter, you know, is, you know, is allowed to, you know, take, you know, how, get medical treatment for ectopic pregnancy. They're not worried. They do not want some guy that is obsessed with having genital checks at high school, swimming meets. Right. To make sure all that stuff is weird. And it's creepy. I think creepy is really the key word because that is about somebody that wants to have control over other people.

You know, weird might be like, you have weird interests, like, you know, you're into knitting or whatever. You have weird interests. But, like, that's not what we're talking about.

David Pakman
We're talking about is knitting that weird, though?

JD Vance
I guess not. I guess maybe for maybe, you know, maybe in certain demo, knitting might be kind of weird. I guess you're right, though. What would be? What would be a, what would be?

David Pakman
I don't know. I'm not sure.

JD Vance
Being really into bats. I don't know. Like, there are plenty of things, you know, having. Having a pet rat. I had a friend with a pet rat. That's kind of weird. That's not what we're talking about, right. Talking about creepy. We're talking about these, these guys that want to have control over other people, and they have these obsessions. With gender and with, when women are having babies and with whether women can, you know, be in charge in boardrooms and whether you drink your bud light or, you know, what the, what the show, the opening ceremonies at the Olympics were all about. Like, these guys are all just obsessed with weird stuff. They want to pull you, and people don't like that. And I think that's an effective message.

David Pakman
Before we move on to a couple of polling things.

Since the failed assassination attempt on the failed former president, there were these moments where initially it was, was Trump struck by a bullet or was it a piece of glass from the prompter? But the prompter was fine. So it, it was a bullet, at least according to Trump. But then we didn't get a metal medical report. Christopher Wray goes, we are actually still trying to determine it, but then, now it's, it was a bullet. We just don't know if it was like a shot from the bullet or a fragment of the bullet or kind of a careening bullet that was going end over end after striking something else. Listen, I don't know what it was, although the injury seemed quite modest. Is your take that it's not really a great strategy to keep talking about what exactly and how Trump was struck. Like, it's just not useful for the left to really talk about it very much.

JD Vance
Totally. I think it's a loser. It makes people sound crazy themselves and a little conspiratorial. I don't. Reality is a bullet went, went flying past his head, right? Even in the, even in the conspiracy theory version of this, right, where it's a fragment, it's like he was shot at, there's an attempted assassination. A bullet went past his head, he was bleeding at the ear, and then he had the wherewithal to kind of stand up in that moment and have that iconic picture that was, you know, in that moment, it played right into Trump's frame of this campaign. He was making this frame of this campaign that he's strong, Biden's weak, and that really played into his hands. And obviously, and also, he got lucky. Thank God that, that, you know, the bullet wasn't a little bit closer to him or else we'd be having a whole different conversation right now. So I just don't think that talking about that element of this is helpful at all for the left. Here's one thing I do think is worth talking about. If this, if that subject comes up, the fact that this was another troubled young man who had easy access to an assault.

And why was that man, why was he able to get up there? It wasn't about the Secret Service. It wasn't about rhetoric on the David Pakman YouTube page. It was about the fact that he had easy access to a automatic, or to, excuse me, to an assault weapon, and he had easy access. You just walk into Home Depot and get 50 rounds of bullets and walk right out. Despite the fact that he was underage. Right. Like, he couldn't have bought a white claw that day, but he could have bought 50 rounds of bullets. I think that is, again, going back to who this core audience is, these suburban swing voters.

They don't want troubled 20 year olds to be able to get Ars. And I think kind of reframing this conversation about that rather than about, you know, whether there was a second shooter on the grassy knoll would be wise for the left.

David Pakman
Do you think if Trump does end up dead that day, Joe Biden is still in the race today?

JD Vance
No, really, I don't think that Joe Biden. I got in a lot of trouble in my podcast from, from people that are big Biden fans. So, you know, we're maybe into.

I'm trying to let bygones be guy guns on this. Joe Biden couldn't campaign. I. Joe Biden was a very.

Was not capable of doing the basic things necessary to campaign. I'm not saying he couldn't still be the president, but he could not make compelling, coherent arguments. You know, even in his overall office address the other day, he's still talking over his words. He sounds. People say it's a stutter. It wasn't, and he does have a stutter, but he sounded very different than he did four years ago. Just watch the clips of him for eight years ago. I think. I don't know. I think we would have been a very scary time had Trump been assassinated. I don't. I have no idea who the Republicans would have nominated. Like, like, literally, it could have, you could have literally told me. Anybody besides Nikki Haley? It wouldn't have been Nikki Haley, but it would have been somebody. Maga. Um, but that person would have had momentum in the polls. And the kind of rationale for Biden staying in about the threat to democracy may, look, we're, we're in a total counterfactual, but I think that the pressure would have continued to mount on him to step aside because of his inability to do the basic elements of a campaign which require, you know, a certain level of being able to communicate.

David Pakman
So. June 26, the day before the debate, real clear politics polling average is Trump plus 1.5 today, as we record this interview, it's Trump plus 1.7. In the intervening time, you saw maybe the worst debate performance, I guess, since Nixon from Joe Biden. Way worse.

JD Vance
Speaker one.

David Pakman
Yeah, yeah.

You saw Trump survive an assassination attempt, have a week long party celebrating him at the RNC, and finally finish the Veep stakes reality show that lasted months or a year, and select JD Vance. And all of this got him 0.2 percentage points in the national real clear politics polling average. What's going on since? Isn't this supposed to be the peak after all of these successes and victories?

JD Vance
Speaker one he got no bump out of the convention, which I think is very noteworthy. He did get a modest bump out of, to call it a bump, as maybe a little gauche, but his polling did approve for a little while after the failed assassination attempt. But that's come back down to earth after Biden dropped out of the race. And I think right now, what you're seeing in the polls is kind of this reversion to the mean.

His main, Trump's main advantage in the polls all year, really, you know, was that there's certain parts of the democratic coalition, traditional democratic voters, that were unhappy with Joe Biden either because of inflation or age. It was. Or Gaza, it was younger voters, it was black and hispanic men mostly, and then a handful of other voters who had issues related to inflation or age and that were traditionally Democrats. All of those folks, nearly all of them, are already home with the Democrats, with Kamala. And so that now we've reverted back to the mean and we're back on the same ground of which type of voters to compete against that we were in 2020. It is working class white women who are unhappy, who I didn't want the overturn of Roe.

It is college educated men that have been traditionally Republicans but don't like Donald Trump, these swing voters. And then there's a turnout battle that's going to happen. So I think right now, essentially, after the most insane month in a half century in politics, we've really just reverted back to the mean. And I think that Kamala has room to grow. And if you look at these poll numbers, it usually takes about two weeks for stuff to sink in, you know, and, and so I think that probably, uh, we'll see her poll numbers improve over the next few weeks as she chooses a vp and has a convention of her own. How much, I don't think she's going to be up 55 45 that she's not the country we're in, but no I think that she'll improve, at least modestly, in the coming weeks.

David Pakman
So in a sense, it almost seems like, I mean, Trump got 46% of the vote in 2016. He got 46 point something in 2020. He's polling 47.

Is this just the peak of what Trump can garner as far as support in this country?

JD Vance
Yes. This is the other good news. I think that Trump is about a 40, maybe. I think he could get up to 47 because I do think he's improved a little bit with that group of working class men of color.

Again, tiny bit. So if he has 46 point something that, you know, you push up another .5% to 47%, I think that's probably realistic to see that.

But 47% isn't enough to win unless RFK junior gets a big slice of the pie or some of these other third party.

David Pakman
Well, hold on. He won with 46 in 2016.

JD Vance
Right? But why? Because Gary Johnson, Evan McMullen got huge, you know, got huge percentages. I don't have in front of me, but, but got significant percentage of the vote, way more than the third party candidates did in, in 2020. So in 2024, what you didn't want was people that were unhappy with both candidates to have this, you know, off ramp, if you will, an RFK, he has like a handful of superfans. But then, besides that, he was just gobbling up people that were like, I'm sick of these two old guys. I don't want them. I'm going to go for the also old but slightly less old guy instead.

David Pakman
Right.

JD Vance
This is a protest right now that Kamala is there. I think that protest vote number is going to go way, way down and she is going to gobble up all the people that are traditionally Democrats that weren't happy with Biden. I. And then, you know, she's got to fight to get her number up to 50, 49, 50.

Enough to win a close election. I think that's really doable. I think the map is very doable for her. It opens up more states having her on the top of the ticket, but it's going to be a dogfight. Like, it is not. It's not. I don't see a blowout coming, but I think that if you have Trump at 46 or 47 for Kamala, it's about kind of hoovering up as much of the rest of that group as possible and getting the RFK number as low as possible.

David Pakman
Last thing I want to ask you about relates to JD Vance. It seems to me JD Vance doesn't really get Trump any new votes. Tell me if my instinct is wrong. And then also there's rumors that Trump is displeased with the way the JD Vance experiment is going and that maybe there's a change coming. Is that even realistic to think about or no, speaker one?

JD Vance
I wouldn't say the 0% chance. We're living in strange times, but I think it's pretty small. Those rumors, I can say on pretty good authority, is there is a group of people around Trump who are traditional foreign policy hawk Republicans that kind of hope that they can just put their own people in the foreign policy, in the Department of defense and secretary of state, and, you know, kind of get most of what they would want. And they were very unhappy with the JD fance pick because he's more of a nationalist isolationist in the mold of Trump.

David Pakman
Yes.

JD Vance
So I think it's most of the. I think that what you're hearing is, is rumors and gossip mongering dribbling out of that world. Right. Trying to undermine Vance.

Will that work? Probably not, but I think that they're going to try to kneecap Vance people in that traditional foreign policy hawk kind of wing of the Republican Party.

And then as far as Vance is concerned, electorally, he does add nothing. I thought so at the time. I do think they tricked themselves. I think Don Junior tricked his dad at least, into believing that he helped with, like, upper midwest, you know, working class white males. And I just, there's no evidence of that in any of the, you know, in any of the polling or in JD Vance's election performance, which was way worse than the republican governor on the same ticket, Mike DeWine, who doesn't claim to have any ties to Appalachia or the working white working class. So JD Vance is not. He's a. He has negative charisma and his comments about women. I think Trump being weird, I. There's the part of the reason why the weird thing is landing now, just to circle back to that is Trump's weirdness has an appeal to certain people. Not me. Right. It's kind of like a. He's like a avuncular, charming. Like New York. He's weird. But it's like, in a way that makes you laugh. Some people, not me. JD Vance doesn't make anybody laugh.

David Pakman
No.

JD Vance
Like, his weirdness is just. You are creepy.

You want women to stay in marriages, even if they are being abused. You have deep thoughts about when women should bear their children. Like, it is. It is creepy. It is unusual. The way you carry yourself is creepy. And I think that is like splashing up onto Trump in a way that's unhelpful for certain voters.

David Pakman
Not to mention, I don't know if you've seen video of the campaign stops with USA Vance. She does not seem happy to be there. Is the I don't know if I'm reading too much into it, but combining the expressions on her face and her prior comments about Trump, I struggle to believe she's done a 180 and is totally behind this thing.

JD Vance
Yeah, well, you made your bed and you got a lie in it. Major couch and you got a lie in it. You got a lie.

David Pakman
Exactly. Tim Miller, host of the Bulwark podcast always great to talk to you, Tim. Thanks, David.

JD Vance
Thanks for having me on, brother. See you soon.

David Pakman
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Paul Abbate
Something just very recently uncovered that I want to share is a social media account which is believed to be associated with the shooter. In about the 2019 to 2020 timeframe, there were over 700 comments posted from this account.

Some of these comments, if ultimately attributable to the shooter, appear to reflect anti semitic and anti immigration themes to espouse political violence and are described as extreme in nature.

While the investigative team is still working to verify this account to determine if it did in fact belong to the shooter, we believe it important to share and note it today, particularly given the general absence of other information to date from social media and other sources of information that reflect on the shooter's potential motive and mindset.

David Pakman
Now, in hearing this, of course, a whole bunch of mAGa types have come out of the woodwork and they've said, see, we knew it. We knew that this information was going to come out later and they were going to try to pin this on the right when it was obviously a left winger that shot Trump, or it was even some kind of setup or a staged thing, none of which there is any evidence for. And at some point you just kind of have to say, I don't know, Republican shooting Trump, AR 15, Trump loving dad, lawn signs. It's probably a right winger who, for whatever reason, either wanted attention or became disappointed, affected with Trump or Trump wasn't right wing enough or who knows? But there's certainly nothing, nothing pointing to the left. Now, either way, I denounce it. Either way, I don't want can that it's killed or shot. I want to win with votes rather than bullets. But at a certain point, you have to say, oh, it's the thing. It looked like it was. Now a little bonus insanity from this hearing here is Senator John Kennedy, Republican Senator John Kennedy, no relation to the democratic Kennedy family, bringing up to FBI officials Peter Strzok and whatever the other woman's name was. I can't even remember. This relates to the, this was a storyline from 2018 and it doesn't need to be revived. It has nothing to do with what's going on right now, but it's all Kennedy has. So he brings it up in which.

Donald Trump
The FBI agreed to give Peter Strzok $1.2 million and Miss Lisa Page $800,000.

Paul Abbate
It's my understanding, senator, that the Department of Justice was involved in that, not the FBI.

Donald Trump
The FBI had nothing to do with it.

Paul Abbate
There may have been consultation with our general counsel's office, but does the FBI.

Donald Trump
Have to sign off on it?

Paul Abbate
I don't know the answer. I don't believe so. But I would want to confirm that.

Donald Trump
I would like you. This would be the same Lisa page who said speaker one.

JD Vance
Yeah.

David Pakman
Anyway, this is the struck page thing that Trump was obsessed with six years ago. It has nothing whatsoever to do with what's going on right now. And then finally, to cap it off, Josh Hawley's questioning of the active. Sorry. The acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe, turns into a shouting match, as conversations with Josh Hawley tend to do more.

JD Vance
Do you need to investigate to know?

Paul Abbate
Exactly, what more do you need to.

JD Vance
Investigate to know that there were critical enough failures that some individuals ought to be held accountable? I mean, what more do you need to know?

Paul Abbate
What I need to know is exactly what happened and I need my investigators to do their job, and I cannot.

JD Vance
People didn't do their job.

Paul Abbate
Put my thumb on the scale.

Otherwise.

JD Vance
What do you mean, put your thumb.

Paul Abbate
The objective. The objective. You're asking me, senator, to completely make a rush to judgment about somebody failing. I acknowledge this was a failure of the.

JD Vance
Is it not prima facie that somebody has failed a former president was sure.

Paul Abbate
Sir, this could have been our Texas school book depository. I have lost sleep over that for.

David Pakman
The last 17 days.

JD Vance
Just like somebody, I will tell you.

David Pakman
This idiotic grandstanding from Republicans who suddenly find their anger, and they never do after a school shooting. They never do after a mass shooting. At that point, we don't want to politicize and let's not start pointing fingers. All of a sudden, Josh Hawley is angry.

Really despicable stuff. We have a great bonus show for you today. We're going to dive into the Kamala is the border czar story that we talked about a little bit with Tim Miller today. The project 2025 director has stepped down. Why? We will discuss it and so much more when I'm joined on the bonus show by producer Pat. Make sure you're signed up@joinpackman.com. best way to support the work we do and you get access to the bonus show. And we'll be back tomorrow with a new program as well.