From D-Day To The Strait Of Hormuz with Max Boot & Nick Mueller

**Al Hunt** (0:10)
Hello and welcome to Politics War Room with James Carville and Al Hunt. This week, our guests are the President and CEO Emeritus of The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, Nick Mueller, and the Senior Fellow for National Security Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and Foreign Affairs, columnist extraordinaire, Max Boot. Now remember, we love taking your questions, so write to politicswarroom.gmail.com for next week's show. We'll get to as many as we can, but don't forget to tell us where you're from. You also can get text updates about what's next for Politicon and Politics War Room by signing up at politicon.com.
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James, I think Tuesday was a good night for the Democrats, with California the least relevant in many ways.
To start in the East in New Jersey in the 7th Congressional District, the Democrats chose a mainstream progressive, Rebecca Bennett, a former Navy helicopter pilot and commander, Mikey Sherrill Jr. with stripes. She's going to beat the absent incumbent Republican Tom Kane.
This will be the first time I've ever been ahead of Dave Wasserman. But New Jersey CD7 put it in the D column. Out in Iowa, Josh Turek, the vigorous former Special Olympian, wins the Senate nomination easily.
He is the strongest Senate candidate they've had out there since Tom Harkin. And the state auditor, Rob Sand, you were the first person to really rave about what a special politician Rob Sand was. He's going to win that governor's race. And I think there's at least a 50-50 chance that he carries Turek in with him. Iowa is a state that has turned deep red in the last 15 years. And I think it's now they have better candidates. They're not latching on to some of the divisive cultural issues. And I think it's turning purple.
Thirdly, Montana, that's the sleeper. Democrats can't win a head-to-head race in Montana. That, you know, two great candidates, John Tester and Steve Bullock lost. But independent Scott Bodner, the former president of the University of Montana, with the best resumations, Thomas Jefferson, can, if it's a two-way contest. Republicans spent a lot of money trying, surreptitiously, which Democrats do also, trying to help the one Democratic candidate who emphatically said she'd stay in. She lost. The winner is a good candidate, but may well be smart enough to do what happened in Nebraska and drop out sometime this summer to clear the way for Scott Bodner. That would really put that state in play, which no one expected beforehand. I don't have much to say about California. Nothing really a surprise. Nothing much will change. They'll elect a dull Democratic governor in November. James, tell me where I'm right or wrong.

**James Carville** (4:22)
I think you're right in everything, but there are three things that I'd like to add on to your observations. I disagree with none of them. First, let's go to Iowd. Josh Turing, the guy that he beat, in stick wise, he was against Schumer. He was against the establishment Democrats in Washington. That was his cache, if you will. That didn't work. But the big news was the Republican gubernatorial primary. Remember, Trump had been on a tear all over the country. He did anything he told Republicans to vote for. As you know, Al, this show has always been of the view that there's a premium for Democrats in foreign states. In other words, if we run five points ahead of expected performance in non-foreign states, we're going to run seven and a half in the foreign states because the anger and the hurt there is so deep. And boy, when the Republicans endorse Trump candidate, but there was a guy who was in Congress, he gets beat, that shows you how deep this runs.