The Cavalry Is Coming With Rebecca Cooke & Paul Rivera

**Albert Hunt** (0:09)
Hello and welcome to Politics War Room with James Carville and Al Hunt. This week, our guests are the Democratic Congressional candidate in the 3rd District of Wisconsin after a big, big win on Tuesday, Rebecca Cooke, and the author of the 2024 presidential election autopsy, Paul Rivera. Remember, we love taking your questions, so write to politicswarroom.gmail.com for next week's show. Now, we're going to get to as many as we can, but don't forget to tell us where you're from. You can also get text updates about what's next for Politicon and Politics War Room by signing up at politicon.com. So tell your friends about us and remind them to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. And please check out the links to our sponsors, Smalls, Aqua True, 3 Day Blinds, and Hers WL in our episode, Show Notes. We thank you for supporting our sponsors because it really helps make this podcast happen.
Hey James, a big primary day this week on balance good for the Democrats. The Trump-Republican narrative that the Democrats are dominated by socialists and communists.
You got to go to a theme park in Cuba to find a communist. Was dealt a blow when the Democratic socialist candidate for governor of Wisconsin was upset by a mainstream moderate. That's good for Wisconsin because they can now potentially win the general election and good for other Democratic candidates. It's going to make it much harder to smear them with a label. But MAGA already is charging, look, leftist won in other races yesterday. Let's just take a look. In Connecticut, longtime Democratic Congressman John Larson, 78 years old, was beaten by 47-year-old Luke Brannan. Brannan is a former mayor of Hartford, a former assistant United States Treasury Secretary who served in Afghanistan. That race was about age, not ideology. In Minnesota, Matt Little won. He's a liberal who had the endorsement of the Democratic Farm Labor Party. Somehow, whatever the establishment is, I don't think he's anti-establishment. APEC poured, the pro-Israeli lobby poured millions into one of the candidates he beat.
APEC is really a pro-Netanyahu Republican lobby, and I think they could be lethal for most Democrats. You don't even want their support. In Minnesota, the Lieutenant Governor, Peggy Flanagan, the more liberal candidate, won the Senate primary. I interviewed Flanagan some years ago. To be sure, she's a liberal. She is not a radical socialist.
These candidates all fall into what I've called the Pelosi progressives, and they're all going to win in November. The idea that the far left is taking over the Democratic Party is just simply not true. Briefly, on the Republican side, Trump's clout may be slipping. He endorsed the crazy pillow guy in Minnesota who got clobbered, and in South Carolina, Lindsey Graham's sister, who is a creature of Trump, your candidacy is a creature of Trump, faces a tough runoff in 12 days, and history suggests she's going to have a hard time.

**James Carville** (3:23)
Al, that was a very good recap. I don't have much to add to it. To me, the thing that struck me again is the giant polling fail. I'm talking about a polling fail, double-digit polling fail in Wisconsin, a double-digit polling fail in Michigan, a double-digit polling fail in the New Jersey governor's race. There are two primaries, but you're not supposed to miss by that much.
Texting back and forth to a couple of people, and does the left come out with all the enthusiasm, and then the more centrist voters that they tend to wake up closer to election day? I don't know, but we've had some massive polling fails here, I mean, really big.

**Albert Hunt** (4:06)
Well, I think you're right. I think that's what happens. I think, just from what I've read, I wasn't in Wisconsin, that closing days when it became apparent that, what's your name, Ms. Hahn was going to win, according to the polls, I think a number of liberal Democrats said, wait a minute, wait a minute, do we really want this? Do we really want probably to lose in November? And it was a great, she was a wonderful candidate to send a message, but not to send a candidate.

**James Carville** (4:36)
Without the Thanksgiving quote, she would have won. I think the Thanksgiving, sometimes it's, you know, the strata broke the camel's back or whatever, the sling, I think the Thanksgiving quote just had legs and it cost her a race.

**Albert Hunt** (4:57)
And her refusal in an interview with Caitlin Collins to revise it, to retract it, to take it back. I mean, she really more or less stuck with it.

**James Carville** (5:08)
She probably ran pretty much as to who she was.