Transcript: Election 2024: The Stakes with David Plouffe (2024)

Welcome to Post Live, David.

MR. PLOUFFE: Hey, Michael, great to see you.

MR. SCHERER: Yeah, good to see you. You're in San Francisco, living up to the life I wish I had?

MR. PLOUFFE: In Massachusetts today, but yes. Neither of them swing states, but yes.

[Laughter]

MR. SCHERER: So four years ago, almost to the week, you wrote an op-ed with your old partner in crime, David Axelrod, about what Joe Biden needed to do to beat Donald Trump in the 2020 election. I guess I'd put that question to you right now. What does--I mean, the advice--I'll actually go into that. The advice you gave him then was to get out of the basem*nt, be a little more vigorous, be a little more digital in 2020. That all worked out well. What is your advice now to the Biden campaign and what they need to do to beat Donald Trump a second time?

MR. PLOUFFE: Well, you know, that campaign back in 2020 led by Jen O'Malley Dillon and a great team--and, you know, Joe Biden, unusual campaign--obviously won the presidency. So when a team wins the presidency, I think, generally, I give them the benefit of the doubt, whether it's Republican or Democrat, that they know how to get to 270.

I think where the race stands today--I think this is a very tricky race to poll. We've got a huge, unusually large percentage of voters saying they could switch their mind, getting a healthy share of the vote, at least in some states. We've got two candidates who are underwater in terms of approval rating. This election will probably be determined by people who have a negative view of both candidates and have to make a decision. I think this race right now, you know, is really a jump ball. I think in a lot of polls, Trump has a narrow lead, and some of them, Biden does. But at the end of the day, I look at what's true. What's true is Biden is actually holding on to his support amongst White voters in battleground states, and in fact, there's some evidence that he's grown stronger with seniors over 65, White voters, as well as some college-educated women. And, you know, he had pretty high ceilings for Democrat back in '20. So that's good news.

Trump, at least in polls, is showing some strength with some younger, non-college-educated voters of color.

And so I think the Biden campaign knows this. You know, they obviously want to maximize their support amongst the entire electorate, but you want to minimize that leakage with Hispanic voters and Black voters. And one way you do that is obviously minimize the leakage. The other way you do it is to increase your vote share amongst White voters.

And the economy is the big issue, and that's the one thing, Michael. You know, voters make their own judgment on the economy. They don't do it based on statistics, and so if voters are feeling worse than they are today, when ballots start being cast in October, that's going to make it more difficult for the president. If they're feeling a little bit better, you know, that could be a tailwind. So they seem like they're doing a lot of smart digital things. I mean, this election, with all due respect to The Washington Post, MSNBC, and NBC, where I'm a contributor, you know, this really is a TikTok, Instagram, Facebook first election. That's where most voters are going to get their information, and so you have to craft a strategy in that way.

You know, Donald Trump, I think he used Facebook really well in '16. I think Joe Biden did and continues to do some innovative things in the digital space. But that's really you have to wake up every day and not think about the long speech you're going to give, necessarily, or even the television ads you're going to run. Those are important but secondary to thinking visual first, video first, in those social media feeds.

MR. SCHERER: So no recommendations for the Biden team this time.

Let me ask you about that drop-off that we've seen in polls--and we don't know if it will go away when we get close to an election--among young voters and voters of color, particularly Black and Hispanic voters. If you look at the national polls, at this point four years ago, Biden was consistently up three or four points. Right now, he's down one or two points. It's a very close race, seems very constant. What explains that drop-off to you? Why do you think he has lost ground, at least as measured by these polling, and specifically among young people and Black and Hispanic voters?

MR. PLOUFFE: Right. So, you know--and I don't say this cavalierly. I mean, when I was responsible for presidential campaigns, we did not conduct national polls. We paid no attention to them.

MR. SCHERER: Right.

MR. PLOUFFE: And I know that that's the way the Biden world views, you know, things. I'm sure that Trump--so I only care about it in those seven states that will determine who gets 270 electoral votes.

You know, but in those states, we've seen some movement. So I think younger voters, you know, they're concerned about inflation. They're concerned about--even though unemployment rate is low--a tougher job market, I think, for some of those entrants--housing. So, you know, young voters are no different than people in their forties and fifties in terms of what drives their concerns and their aspirations.

And so I think the good news is, for the Biden campaign, they know this. You know, with younger voters across the board, with younger voters of color, they understand that, at least in these polls, there has been some slippage.

Now, the question is, can you arrest that? And I think you can. Joe Biden's getting less of his 2020 vote than Donald Trump is. Maybe he won't get to 99 percent, but I think he will get higher than he is today. And that's super important. That means the race will move more in Biden's direction.

I think that it's not fully priced into the equation yet, which seems crazy, but most people don't pay attention to politics like you or I do, that Donald Trump could really return, that this is the choice. And when he gives fodder every day for reminding people about some of the things they didn't like, I think Biden can make progress there. But that is really a Manhattan project, I think, for the Biden campaign, is to figure out, how do you get your votes?

So there's three things to think about as it relates to young voters. Your vote share versus Donald Trump, that has to be high enough. You're going to win that. So what's the turnout like? And is it coming from the right places? And then, of course, some of these younger voters are flirting with RFK Jr. and other third-party candidates. So you've got a trifecta of concerns that you have to deal with.

And so every presidential matters. Voters are not monolithic. How you get to the win number in Wisconsin or Arizona is not easy, because it's a bunch of different voters who care about a bunch of different things. But at the end of the day, I would put young voters at the top of that list. That's the most important thing the campaign is going to do.

I think one of the reasons that Biden has showed resiliency with older White voters and college-educated voters, although he can grow some there, those are your sort of prototypical swing voters, and I think a lot of them pay a little bit more attention to politics. And they're very negative toward the prospect of Donald Trump coming back, even those that might not give Joe Biden high marks on things like inflation. So that is at the top of the list, I think, of import and questions.

Then, of course, politics is not a free-throw shooting contest. Donald Trump is going to be in the lane, you know, trying to do what he can do to attract and build on that support.

So I will make--I mean, the point of support that Joe Biden will lose among voters of color, you don't want to lose any of that. Sorry. For every three and a half points he loses amongst voters of color. It just takes one percentage increase amongst White voters to match that. So you want to do both those things. You want to minimize that decrease with everything you've got. You can increase your support levels amongst White voters.

But age is part of it too. You know, I think voters see Joe Biden older than Donald Trump, even though they're within three years of it, and I think young voters generally are expressing dissatisfaction about their choices. So I think what the Biden campaign has to do is meet people where they are, which is, "Hey, we get that this might not be your ideal choice, but this is the choice you have. I want to talk about the things I've done to try and help you and your future, and here's what I'm excited about in my next term. And here's why Donald Trump would be a bad choice for young people." So I think you have to meet people where they are, and I think the president has gotten a little more comfortable about talking about age, about trying to put Donald Trump into a bear hug there.

But I think you have to be even more direct, I think, and say, listen, I get--[audio distortion]--there's a lot of people in this country, because ultimately this is going to be decided by people who are not excited maybe to vote at all or vote for one of these candidates and the candidate that does a better job of landing those votes.

Last thing I'll say, Michael, is Donald Trump is doing exceedingly well now in polling with people who are saying they're either not sure they're going to vote or based on some of the data I'm seeing, voters that you would judge to be not reliable voters. So I think it's going to be really interesting to see. That's a very fragile foundation.

You know, usually, it's the Democrats who have that issue, and Donald Trump is the one still out there kind of criticizing vote by mail and early vote. Trust me from experience. You know, first-time voters, voters who are not reliable voters, that's where early vote comes in. You want to get that check cashed as early as you can because those are the voters you worry about on election day won't turn out.

So I think it's going to be fascinating to see whether he stops committing political malpractice and fully embraces every way that people can vote.

MR. SCHERER: And the early vote keeps coming earlier.

We are kind of losing the connection at times. We're just going to power through it. You mentioned the third-party candidates, and you mentioned that unlike 2008, the race you were running, this is not an election about excitement. This is an election that is sort of defined by a lack of excitement and a disapproval of both the major party candidates. So that does leave a theoretical space for these third-party candidates. The traditional practice here is you ignore third-party candidates. Democrats and Republicans are doing something different there. How do you thread that needle? How do you attack these third-party candidates, discourage Democrats from looking to them, discourage young people from looking to them without actually elevating them into the conversation?

MR. PLOUFFE: It's a great question, Michael, and, of course, we have polls that will tell you the answer you seek. Some say these third-party candidates are hurting Trump, some Biden, some equally.

Of course, we live in a world of very sophisticated data. Both presidential campaigns have sophisticated data. So they're going to have a very good sense of who the voters they're most concerned about in these battleground states who might be deciding between Trump and Kennedy, if you're the Trump campaign, Biden and Kennedy, if you're the Biden campaign. And you want to be communicating to those voters. You want to find out message, messenger, the best way to reach these people in terms of platforms. So I don't think you can ignore them. It could be decisive. I mean, third-party vote share was one of the major reasons that Donald Trump won in 2016. He was able to win battleground states 46 percent, 47 percent.

So now, so far, Kennedy, who's probably the major factor here, is only on the ballot in Michigan, a battleground state. So we'll see where that ends up. But at the end of the day, it's a critical question, and I think it may be a little bit different by state. So you're going to have to be super sophisticated if you're a presidential campaign of saying, okay, who are those third-party voters? Are they deciding between Kennedy and me? Are they deciding between Kennedy and not voting? What's the best messages, messengers, probably most important, quite frankly?

MR. SCHERER: Right.

MR. PLOUFFE: You know, the people saying, hey, I was flirting with RFK Jr., and I decided not to do it for the following reasons. So think about that. Like, I just think you're going to have to be super careful about that.

And I think that comes down to it. I mean, what's clear is the win number is not going to be 50 percent in these battleground states. Maybe if the third-party vote disintegrates, it's 48.5, but I think more likely, we are looking in that 46 to 48 range. And that's a very different race than trying to get to 50 percent.

MR. SCHERER: Yeah. And it's dangerous for Democrats, since in a lot of elections, Trump has shown he really does have a ceiling in the amount of support he can get.

But let's talk about the battleground map. The last couple of states that the President has been to--New Hampshire and Minnesota--were not even on the battleground map at the beginning of this cycle, the seven states that the Biden campaign was talking about. Are you comfortable with where the Biden campaign is right now? I mean, should they be focused on as broad a map as they are, including places like Georgia, including places like Arizona, Nevada, even opening offices in Florida, or should they be learning the lessons of 2016, when Hillary Clinton sort of declined to defend her blue wall in the northern states in those final weeks?

MR. PLOUFFE: Well, I would say this. I mean, it's unlikely--I don't think it's impossible, but it's implausible that Joe Biden would lose New Hampshire and Minnesota and win Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, right? So you have to be very--it doesn't mean you shouldn't go there and you want to help build the organization. And if Donald Trump is going to compete there, you have to be mindful of that. But you've got to be really focused on the states that will tip this over 270 electoral votes or not.

So right now, listen, if you look at just the public data in Nevada, Georgia, Arizona, and North Carolina, you know, Trump has a lead in all of those. But, you know, it's not out of the question that Biden can find himself to a win number. So I think you want to--particularly because Biden has a fundraising advantage right now, he can run ads, he can build organization, because it's really important to have--you want to keep, as long as you responsibly can, multiple pathways to the presidency. So you don't have to run the table. Now, you know, if we get into August and some of those states just don't look winnable, I think the Biden campaign will make the decision to focus on the states that are. And right now, you'd say those blue wall states of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, and then you actually have to add the second congressional district of Nebraska into that, because you have to win that to get the 270 if you win those states, you know, are clearly, you know, dead red, you know, in terms of being--or dead purple in terms of being battlegrounds.

You know, Georgia, Arizona, Nevada, I mean, there was a poll. I think it was a Bloomberg poll yesterday showing Nevada tied.

MR. SCHERER: Right.

MR. PLOUFFE: But I think if you look at them on aggregate, you know, Trump has got a small lead, but there's a bunch of voters there that are undecided. By the way, Senate candidates across the country, including in Nevada, are doing a little bit better than the president. So that's important. That gives you some confidence that maybe you can get some of those voters back, because they're choosing Democrat candidates in other races. So it is the most important decision a presidential campaign makes is, what are our multiple pathways to 270? Which resources are we going to deploy there?

And then, you know, the next most important decision you make is, you know, when it's not doable, you got to pull the plug. I mean, for us, we won North Carolina in 2008.

MR. SCHERER: Mm-hmm.

MR. PLOUFFE: You know, we invested there in 2012, but you know, in the last 45 days, if I recall, we really had to lessen our investment there, because it just looked like it wasn't going to be there.

So listen, the Biden campaign is filled with pros who knows each of these states inside and out, but it's too early, I think, to say those four states in the South and out West are not winnable. I think they are completely winnable. They're just behaving a little bit differently right now than those upper Midwestern states.

And that's where, by the way, if Biden were to strengthen with minority voters in those states, you know, you'd see those states, I think, consistently look more like Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania that are essentially tied.

MR. SCHERER: Yeah, that may be right.

You mentioned that the people who decide this election aren't reading The Washington Post. Maybe this video be clipped onto TikTok. I don't know. You're a student of emerging campaign technology. Go back to 2007. That's when the iPhone was introduced. 2012, you guys used Facebook pretty well, you know, reaching out to voters in the final weeks, but that technology there has nothing to do with the sort of dominant technologies, not only for doing campaigns and reaching people, but for consuming information we have now. Can you just talk about that evolution and what are the technological challenges that the winning campaign will have to master this cycle?

MR. PLOUFFE: Well, Michael, there's sort of the data side, which is being as sophisticated as you can be about the electorate in these battleground states. So with almost an eerie precision, you know, you have a sense of who truly is undecided, who's supporting you but is unlikely to vote, who is thinking about Biden or Kennedy, you know, as their choice. So there's kind of the--that fuels, I think, the campaign, which is then--I've always thought in politics, you know, we should study the private sector, particularly consumer companies, carefully. They're in market every day trying to reach consumers, and, you know, you've got to reach consumers where they are. You've got to reach voters where they are. So, you know, obviously TikTok is incredibly important. You can advertise on that platform, but it's the main way a lot of key voters get information. YouTube is absolutely essential. And that kind of has a larger age range, still skews young, but a lot of people in their forties, fifties, and even sixties get a lot of information from YouTube and spend a lot of time there. Instagram, obviously. Facebook still is where a lot of Americans reside.

So the best way to think about this is, you know, let's say there's--you know, it's probably not more than this. Let's say there's, you know, 300,000 voters you care about in Wisconsin. Some of those are turnout targets. Some of those are swing voters. You know, you want to understand how do they live their lives, how to reach them. Some can be reached by television, some by radio, some, you know, through local newspaper websites. But the prime way to reach them is going to be through social media, and, of course, a lot of those platforms allow advertising. Organic content is more powerful than advertising. And all those platforms are a little bit different in terms of style, certainly in terms of audience, length of video.

So--and that's the thing you've got to remember today. I think whether you're a private-sector company or a, you know, political candidate, I love the long written word, love long presidential speeches. But at the end of the day, you really do have to think visual first, short video, maybe infographic first, as like, how am I communicating this? So whatever it is you want to communicate, I think you've got to start there, and then you can back up to what interviews am I going to give, or, you know, what's the longer speech I'm going to give? So that's challenging, because, of course, it's harder to reach voters, because they're residing in a lot of different places today, you know, during like the Reagan era, or even earlier. You know, where the internet was important, Facebook became important by 2012, but it was a more limited stream in terms of places where millions of Americans are spending the majority of their time getting and sharing information. So you basically just have to understand your audience, how they're living their lives, and meet them where they are.

And you need to have channel-specific strategies. So you can't just say, okay, we've got a great TV ad. How are we cutting this down for YouTube? What's our TikTok play? You really have to think sort of platform first, and that's what's challenging. And, you know, I'm sure both of these campaigns have hired and continue to hire anybody they can who are experts in these various platforms.

MR. SCHERER: What about the organizing side of that technology question? In '08 and '12, it was house parties. It was the snowflake model of getting people to meet people in their neighborhood, then going out and knocking doors. The emphasis now seems to be more on relational organizing, which is basically getting voters to use their own smartphones to contact friends and family and tell them to do certain things and post, you know, memes on TikTok or what have you. Are you a believer in that evolution, or are you hesitant to embrace it?

MR. PLOUFFE: Absolutely, I'm a believer in it. I mean, think about it. That means basically everybody with one of these devices, you know, becomes, you know, kind of their own campaign headquarters.

And, you know, you talked about sharing videos. To me, that's at the very top of the list, which is if you're a voter, let's say you're supporting Joe Biden, and you see a clip that moves you. Share it with your network. If you see an attack that Trump has been leveling against Biden and you see a great response to it, share that with your network. Share good news. Fight back against bad news. It's super important. Obviously, then you can also work your network for are you registered? Do you know how to apply for an absentee ballot? Do you know what time the polling location is open? So it's a blend where campaigns are still going to have a lot of data, and they'll have a lot of insight in terms of like, okay, their volunteers should reach out to these types of voters that those volunteers may not know. Hopefully, they live in the same area. That's still important, but I think relational organizing is a really powerful necessity because, of course, that's what people trust. People trust somebody they know, a family member or friend.

By the way, particularly if that person is not known as a super activist in politics and, you know, they say, "Hey, I've never been involved before, but I just can't abide Donald Trump coming back. So even though I vote Republican sometimes, you know, I'm getting involved," that's, like, amazingly powerful. And so I think it's really important, and of course, some of that can be done offline. A lot of it is done online. And you've got to embrace it all, I think.

I think the best campaigns empower people are not worried about what they're going to say, you know, whether they call her outside the lines. You just want to basically encourage people to take some agency in this, and that can be very powerful, because listen, we got a long way till November. But the odds are at least three of these states, maybe four of these states, maybe five of these states will be decided by a whisker. So when you think about the aggregate effort--so if 10,000 people on a given day in Wisconsin have done something to find a voter who might not have voted for Joe Biden, that's like enormously important, you know, same thing for Donald Trump.

So I've always found that's important for people is to say I know that your contribution can seem minor, when you think about I only talked to two people today," But if you think about there's hundreds of other people doing that, and actually, you guys together, maybe, you know, talk to enough voters to make up the win margin of battleground state. Then that takes on a little bit, I think, of a different flavor for people.

MR. SCHERER: So Trump's trial in New York is expected to wrap up next week. He's got three other felony trials--we don't know when they're going to happen--coming up. I want to go to a question we got from a viewer. John Connolly from Washington State asked, "How do you account for the enduring support of Mr. Trump by the vast majority of Republicans?"

MR. PLOUFFE: Yeah. Well, Michael, it confounds me, and, you know, I grew up in politics, and, you know, you need to know your opponent as well as yourself. So, you know, I knew the Republican Party, I thought, really well, but Trump has commanded. It's his party now. Loyalty above all else.

And, you know, now listen, there could be 10 to 12 percent of Republican voters who choose to vote for Joe Biden, and that could be incredibly important. So let's not say all Republicans, but most Republicans, it doesn't matter what Trump does. You know, that famous comedy made back in '16, that I could shoot somebody on the streets of New York and my supporters would stay, I think, you know, is more true than we'd like.

So I'm not sure what happens with the trial. I mean, if he's convicted, I certainly don't think it's going to help him with swing voters, you know, in the suburbs of Milwaukee and in Maricopa County in Arizona. But I'm sure his supporters will get even more engaged. And by the way, he needs them. For all the talk about Trump's enthusiasm advantage, you know, his campaign is pretty broke. You know, that doesn't show a lot of enthusiasm at the grassroots donor level. And again, I think most experts think Joe Biden, you know, would benefit from, you know, not a massive turnout election. I think there's real questions whether Donald Trump can manifest that.

So, you know--but I think that's just what the Republican Party is. I think our country will be stronger when eventually Donald Trump is defeated, and somebody who's not a Donald Trump mini-me can win the presidency. But listen, let's say Joe Biden wins this election. I'm not sure that will be 2028. It may be that kind of a descendant of Trump is still going to win. That's clearly what is driving Republican primary voters. And so--but if you're the Biden campaign, you say, okay, that's where they are, and I do think it's important to--you know, Donald Trump, I think, exceeded turnout expectations in '16 and '20. I think if you're the Biden campaign, you better assume he's going to do it again. If he doesn't, great, but assume he's going to do it again. But there are a significant pocket of Republican voters who Biden did well with in '20, and my sense is he might be able to do even a little bit better in '24. And so that's where the focus needs to be.

But I think all of us that are waiting for kind of the Republican Party to detach themselves from Trump are going to be waiting for a very, very long time, because clearly, it's his party. But the people that have been most successful in the states, in Congress, for the most part, mimic him. And, you know, I think it puts our democracy at great risk.

MR. SCHERER: I listened to the first episode of your podcast yesterday, enjoyed it. I was surprised by the reaction that both you and Kellyanne got, mostly directed at you, after the podcast was announced, a lot of it from Democrats, a lot of it along the lines of how can David Plouffe do something with the woman known for alternative facts, we're fighting for the future of the country, fascism is on the ballot. I want to give you a chance to respond to that. Why is it important for a Democratic operative like you to be hosting a show with a Republican operative like her, who still has a close relationship with President Trump?

MR. PLOUFFE: Right, Michael. Well, I had a podcast the last two election cycles, which I really enjoyed, you know, talked to political reporters, talked to a lot of Democratic operatives. The Republicans I talked to tend to be in the Never Trump camp. And as I thought about whether I wanted to bring something back for this cycle, what interested me was--because I feel like I have a lot to learn--is somebody who understands, you know, Donald Trump and that world and that electorate, as painful as it may be, I think people will benefit from it.

You know, I've led a presidential campaign, you know, building a Democratic coalition of 270 electoral votes. She's done it on the Republican side. And again, politics is not, you know, shooting free throws. It's contest, and so I think people will benefit from that.

Now, of course, we'll get into it, as we did in the first episode. We won't agree on many issues, but we can also speak as practitioners. So the episode coming out next week, we go deep on early vote. I think there will be some surprising comments from Kellyanne on that. We'll talk about the states, debate preparation, things that I think people will value from because, again, Republicans look at the path to 270, even if we agree on the states a little bit differently, you know, the way they run campaigns. Obviously, Donald Trump is very different than Joe Biden. So, you know, I get it. You know, she's been someone who--now, she did not deny the election--super low bar, I get it--but I wouldn't do anything with anybody who denied the election. But, you know, at the end of the day, the list of people who understand Donald Trump, how to win a presidential campaign, and who believe the winner of the most votes should win, listen, that whole party, for the most part supports him. Therefore, you're supporting someone who, you know, supports election denialism. I get that it's painful, but I'm deep enough in life that I want to do things that are interesting. And I think I will be smarter about this election, if I'm every week talking to someone who understands him and that electorate and how Republicans run races, even though it will be painful sometimes--I get that, but, you know, for me, I think--I don't know. If people don't want to get value from that, they don't have to. There's lots of smart podcasts out there, shows like this, where people can learn.

But I think one of the reasons parties tend to get surprised when they don't win is, you know, they tend to listen to people who say, well, that's a bad poll, don't believe it, or--you know, I remember back in '12, Republicans were shocked when we won, because Fox had spent, you know, the fall saying Mitt Romney was going to win. Obviously, Democrats have been surprised through the years. Republicans were shocked in '20 that Biden won, despite the poll. So, you know, those that listen to this, I think will hear, hopefully, some smart practitioners' commentary on the machinery of presidential campaigns but also, you know, understand that this is the way I see it. I'm always going to look at the world a little bit more through probably rose-colored glasses that relate to Democrats, and she'll do the same for Republicans.

But I think there's value there, and I certainly was hungering for kind of going through this election with someone, again, who I have passionate disagreements with on just about every policy issue and detest the person she helped elect. That's true, but I think there's some value in us listening to folks who might have a little bit different experience, so we have kind of a 360 view of how this really important presidential race is going to unfold.

MR. SCHERER: That leads to my last question. I mean, if I think back to the race you ran against McCain, the race you ran against Romney, those were tough races. They were at times fiercely negative races, but I think there was a lot of respect between the two camps. You were both operating in a system that you both embraced. Something has sort of deteriorated since then, and just like what we're talking about, the idea that a Democrat would appear with a Republican or that someone who's supporting Biden could have a reasoned conversation with someone supporting Trump is now, in some quarters, controversial.

So I'd just like to close with asking you what your concerns are, whether you've seen the same deterioration, and whether you're worried about that going forward. I don't really see a lot of off-ramps here. It seems to be getting worse every cycle. So I'd just like you to sort of reflect on that as someone who's been around a while.

MR. PLOUFFE: No, it's very tribal, Michael. I mean, what's interesting to me is a lot of the Republicans that I faced off with through the years and colleagues of mine faced off through the years are actually involved in anti-Trump efforts, right? I think because, you know, they believe, as fiercely as we fight, that the point is, you know, you're going to lose some races, and you basically concede. You congratulate your opponent. You dust yourself out, and you figure out what went wrong.

And I think for a lot of those Republican operatives who are doing great work in the anti-Trump space, you know, it was offensive to them. First of all, they didn't agree with someone like Donald Trump becoming president. Like, most of us revere the institution, and he clearly does not. And I think then once '20 happened and he kind of led an effort to suggest that the winner of the election shouldn't win the election, I think that intensified that.

But yeah, it's very tribal right now. I think at some point--I don't have much optimism either, but I think it's important that we find ways, because at the end of the day, if you think about a lot of issues, the only way we're going to make progress on, whether it's the deficit, criminal justice, ultimately immigration, a whole bunch of issues, is it's going to take people who might disagree with each other about everything or just about everything to find the one thing they might have common ground on too. So it is true, and I think Trump is the cause of a lot of that. And I think the reason we're not going to have an off-ramp anytime soon is even if he's defeated in '24, which I sincerely hope he is, and he himself goes off the stage, at least as a candidate, it's going to remain a MAGA party. And I think what drives that party, for the most part, is kind of a hatred of Democrats, and the other party's evil, is trying to destroy the country. And I think until that abates a little bit--and, you know, there's a lot of reasons for it. I mean, we see time and time again, when a Democratic or Republican elected official says they're going to cooperate with the Democrat on something or somebody in the other party, they get pounded for that, right? We see this on Capitol Hill all the time.

And we saw that immigration bill. You know, those that worked on that bipartisan border deal, Republican Senators have been absolutely vilified and attacked back home. So it is now--our politics has always been toxic. You know, the 1800s were toxic. The early 1900s were toxic. But I do think this is of a different flavor, and, you know, I don't see it being remedied anytime soon.

I mean, the thing that would make me happiest is, at some point--maybe it's '28, maybe it's '32--you know, the Republican Party is able to nominate someone for president who doesn't carry themself in that way. By the way, that person would probably be a strong candidate and would probably have a better pathway to the White House than a MAGA-like figure, but I think for the country to move forward, that's a requirement in terms of an ingredient.

MR. SCHERER: Okay. Well, unfortunately, we have to leave it there. Thank you, David, for joining us. Good luck on the podcast. We'll be listening.

And thank you to viewers who have been watching this. If you’d like to follow us closer, read our stories, get away from TikTok, WashingtonPost.com/live is where you should go to subscribe. WashingtonPost.com/live.

I'm Michael Scherer. Thank you very much.

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