S15 EP136: Hour 1 - What the Pollsters Tell Me

Back early from vacation, Erick pulls back the curtain on what Republican pollsters, focus groupers, strategists, donors, and corporate money men are all telling him: James Talarico is leading Ken Paxton in Texas right now, and the fortune the GOP must spend to rescue Paxton could cost them Georgia, North Carolina, Ohio, and Michigan, where Abdul El-Sayed, Haley Stevens, and Mike Rogers set up a nervous primary night. He argues the one thing saving Republicans is a Democratic Party that has lost its mind, from Wisconsin governor hopeful Francesca Hong wanting to cancel Thanksgiving as colonialism to the socialist surge terrifying the party's own establishment. Then a signature comic monologue on the Washington Post dragging JD Vance for raising backyard chickens, complete with a they/them source in Utah and a hen named Karen. Texas Senate reality check: James Talarico leading Ken Paxton, three nonpartisan pollsters, the Ted Cruz versus Beto O'Rourke comparison, and the "suicide plot" that could hand Democrats the Senate Michigan primary night: Abdul El-Sayed versus Haley Stevens, Bernie Sanders and AOC versus Gretchen Whitmer, Gary Peters retiring, and Mike Rogers hunting a rematch after nearly beating Elissa Slotkin The corruption problem on the right: Democrats now trusted more on the economy, anger at the Trump family getting rich, tariffs, and why Erick says "I told you so" Francesca Hong, Zohran Mamdani, and the socialist meltdown: the deleted "cancel Thanksgiving" tweet, her "proximity to whiteness" CNN interview, and why the far left keeps rescuing Republicans The Washington Post versus JD Vance's chicken coop: Tim Carman, Carolina Coops, a $100,000 donated hen house, a they/them named Danny Bowers in Utah, a chicken named Karen, plus 86 percent of new jobs going to women