Trump's Political Director Maps Out Their Path to 270 49:03

If you're a fan of the inner workings of Hollywood, then check out my podcast, The Town, on the Ringer Podcast Network. My name's Matt Bellany. I'm founding partner at Puck and the writer of the What I'm Hearing newsletter. And with my show, The Town, I bring you the inside conversation about money and power in Hollywood. Every week, we've got three short episodes featuring real Hollywood insiders to tell you what people in town are actually talking about.

We'll cover everything from why your favorite show was canceled overnight, which streamer is on the brink of collapse, and which executive is on the hot seat. Disney, Netflix, who's up, down, and who will never eat lunch in this town again. Follow The Town on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

This episode is brought to you by Amazon Business. We all need more hours in the day, right? Well, Amazon Business gets it. They've got super smart business buying solutions that make the admin stuff a breeze. That means you can spend less time buried in paperwork and more time growing your business. That's pretty smart. Head over to amazonbusiness.com and see what smart business buying is all about.

This episode is brought to you by Vitamin Water. Food, entertainment, sports teams. New York City is one of those places that oozes choice. It's got something for every taste. So it's fitting that Vitamin Water was born there. It's a product of its environment. Colorful, flavorful, anything but boring. Vitamin Water injects a daily dose of vibrancy into a watered-down life. So grab some Vitamin Water today, NYC style. Vitamin Water is a registered trademark of Glasso.

♪ ♪

Hi, I'm Tara Palmieri. I'm Puck's senior political correspondent, and this is Somebody's Gotta Win. It's day two of the Republican National Convention, and I venture down to the inner belly of the Fiserv Stadium to the war room where Trump campaign staffers are working right now to try to get him to 270 electoral college votes. Down there, I met with

the Trump campaign's political director, James Blair, in his windowless office. He laid it all out for me in a long conversation about their strategy, their ground game, their pathway to victory. This conversation is real political inside baseball, but we talk about how the campaign feels about running against Joe Biden since the race has changed so much.

in the past few weeks. I also ask him how the campaign feels about running against another Democrat. Are they even prepared for that? Blair is a relative newcomer to the Trump orbit. He worked for Ron DeSantis as his deputy chief of staff in the governor's office, and that's where he connected with Trump's campaign manager, Susie Wiles. He refers to her as a mentor. She brought him on board. He officially joined the Trump campaign last fall, but we

Before that, he worked on the Trump campaign in Florida in 2020. He also worked for Trump's Save America PAC. Blair has been credited with developing the ground game in Iowa, this whole volunteer program where they were able to basically marshal volunteers who would typically be paid to get out and vote for Donald Trump.

And they were up against a pretty big operation on Ron DeSantis' side. The DeSantis campaign was focused on the first primary state, Iowa, and they had a go-for-broke strategy, spending $160 million. It was a record amount of money between the campaign and outside supporting PACs.

to organize and win Iowa. In the end, they only won 24,000 votes. Blair is really focused on expanding this volunteer program across the battleground states. You'll have to hear more about that in the interview. I think this is a really interesting conversation. I know some of you can't even stomach listening to a Trump advisor, but if you can get through it, I think there's a lot to learn here about the path forward for them and what they're thinking, as much as they're willing to give away, of course. I started the conversation by asking James,

What feels different about this campaign in 2024 as opposed to the last one in 2020? Well, he's not the sitting president, and that is a different style of race. I think strategically, one of the biggest differences is we have two records to compare. The American voters have two records to compare. They have two men for the first time in modern American history who have both held the job, and they're going to compare their records side by side.

And that is an advantageous position for President Trump. When you look at the issue set, overwhelmingly American voters and persuadable voters feel like he is better equipped to handle all of the major issues of the day, be that the economy, the border, national security, the global wars and global security situation. So that is a great opportunity for President Trump. People remember that they were better off four years ago. That's reflected in every poll. It's reflected in

what everyone tells us. And that's a unique situation to be in, usually in a campaign for president, if you're the incumbent. It's a referendum. Yeah. One guy's selling a record and the other guy's selling kind of hopes and dreams and a vision for the future. And this time you have records to compare while comparing the vision for the future. And that's a great benefit to us. I mean, also you were campaigning during COVID at the same time in 2020.

Well, you weren't on the campaign, but it's a different campaign because of that, too. And what about 2016? How would you compare this to 2016? You know, 2016 was a ground shift in American politics with an evolving coalition that President Trump led.

brought and really began to broaden and expand the Republican Party in a way that had not existed before. That was reflected in the numbers and the final result. And in many cases, 24 is like 2016 in that regard, where you're seeing shifting coalitions and realignments of different populations.

that, you know, could last a very long time past this election. And again, that is a great opportunity. It's definitely different. I was on the campaign in 20 in Florida and COVID was obviously different. It was an anomaly that led to a lot of different campaign styles and obviously a lot of things that happened that would not normally happen in a campaign. So,

Again, it's tough to compare 2020 to anything really. But I think the similarities between 16 and 24 are the potential for a significant shift in the coalitions for either party that ultimately elect the president. What do you mean by the shift in coalitions? Explain that. So we're making lots of gains in 2024 with different voting blocs that in some ways have been evolving our way in a long time. Hispanic voters, for instance,

The gains with Hispanic voters for President Trump and Republicans continue to accelerate. That's been an eight-year trend, and they just continue to accelerate and push further and further, which is obviously strengthening our hand across a number of battleground states. And in the national polling numbers, you are seeing the president's working class coalition from 2016-2014

really reconsolidate and strengthen. By including minorities, moving beyond identity politics. Is that what you're trying to do? You know, I would say that we don't really play the identity politics game the way the left does, but... I mean, they're a voting group. We have a working class coalition. I mean, President Trump is the president for the forgotten men and women of America. And that is cutting past cultural and racial lines more than it ever has been.

In many ways, we are seeing eight-year trends just continue to strengthen and culminate in a way that is very advantageous for us at The Ballot Box. You also look at youth voters, youth being a broad term, younger voters. Younger voters are feeling extreme economic pain right now. In fact, when we talk to persuadable voters, a very large number of them are telling us they've had to get a second job to make ends meet.

It's a pretty stunning number. And, you know, they remember that just four years ago, they were better off. And even though younger voters may not have had all of the benefits of the economic gains of the 2016 to 2020 Trump years, they're still better off.

just because they were younger and didn't necessarily have resources where they saw their stock portfolios grow or whatever. You're seeing the things that they touch and feel every day, things like rent prices, the ability to buy a house or mortgage rates, gasoline, groceries, all of these things are having a big impact on people, but particularly younger people who are trying to move through those stages of life.

where they've been working a while, perhaps are moving up in the career ladder, making more money, and still they can't seem to get ahead. And that is why, in many ways, they're moving in our direction, because people's economic interests are at the forefront in this election. And it is very clear that President Trump is the candidate

to choose if you want to have an economic comeback. And that's proven in the records again. What I'm not hearing is suburban women. Suburban women are with us. I mean, honestly, that's a... Really? Yeah. It's a bit of a misunderstanding of the narrative from 2020. How do you explain 2022 midterm elections? Yeah, I'd explain the midterms like this.

There's a whole lot of voters, Republican voters now identifying as Republican voters, that only have turned out now in eight years for President Trump when he's on the ticket in both 2016 and 2020. And I believe in 2024, you'll see record turnout again. In 18 and 22, you had drop-off. And long-term trends of the parties have shifted a little bit since President Trump came into the party. We have...

more lower propensity voters now that have demonstrated that when Trump is on the ticket, they turn out to vote and when he's not on the ticket, maybe they don't. That's why if you look at the polling, voters that vote only in the presidential elections, we've got a very strong lead with. Voters that vote in both, Biden fares a bit better with and that's because

um, the Democrats have in some of the battlegrounds, uh, a bit higher numbers of people that vote in every election. Uh, so you look at Pennsylvania, for instance, in 2022, Dr. Oz, um,

loss, and I can't recall the exact number, but roughly 275,000 votes in Pennsylvania. There is over half a million registered Republicans in the state of Pennsylvania that voted in 2020, but didn't turn out to vote in 2022. So the math is there. The numbers are there.

But they chose not to turn out to the polls. And that was, you saw that in a lot of the battleground states. So voter turnout is obviously a significant piece of the election. So I think it's pretty clear again from 18 and 22 that there is a big group of voters in the Republican Party that President Trump brought into the party or motivated that they want to turn out for him. And ultimately you see him right now voting.

leading in the battleground House races. You see him leading in the battleground Senate races and him really lifting those tickets up. And, you know, obviously we hope all of them are able to close the gap in some of those places so that we can bring strong House and Senate majorities along as well. But he's pulling ahead of everyone everywhere. Yeah. In the Senate too. But 20% of primary voters did not vote for Donald Trump.

How do you get those people back? Well, I think that's a pretty broad statement overall. I mean, in Michigan alone, 20%, and that's an important state. Michigan was an early primary where there was, first of all, it's an open primary in Michigan where anybody of any...

party registration can vote. And we saw in many of the early primaries that there was Democrats or left-leaning independents who came into the Republican primary and those open primaries to cast a protest vote against Donald Trump. I mean, I think what's... They were also casting protest votes against Joe Biden too, but still there was a sizable number of Republicans that did not vote for him in the primary. I think what's important is to look at what the numbers are telling us right now. And that is in any poll you look at, if you look at folks who...

You know, you ask, who do you vote for in 2020? President Trump consistently gets 95 plus percent. So virtually all of anybody who voted for him in 2020 and then some. Biden is lucky to crack 90 in any of those numbers. And then there's, you know, downstream underlying numbers underneath that that also show a huge enthusiasm advantage for President Trump over President Biden. President Trump's voters want to turn out and vote.

Joe Biden's voters aren't that interested in turning out to vote. So the Democrats really have two problems. They have to not only shore up their base and expand their coalition, but they also have to get them out to vote in the face of disinterest and

You can see that also. They know this. This is why they're spending tons of money advertising to what should be their base voters. It'd be a huge story if we were spending the kind of money they are trying to shore up our base. They're doing it everywhere. That's because they have to. Yeah. I mean, they do have a very sophisticated ground operation. They've been spending a lot of money on that. We know that.

what's your ground operation looking like right now? As we know, Donald Trump has said that mail-in ballot voting is rigged. And that's obviously a way for you to see who's voting and go back and knock on doors. I mean, how do you even correct the record when the president has said for so long that's something that actually helps you have a ground operation and take that data? How do you correct that record now, especially in places like Pennsylvania? Yeah.

Where you win by like one percentage point or a half a percentage point that you have the whole race. Throughout this election, President Trump has said to swamp the vote. That's why we have swampthevoteusa.com. And he has said very clearly, it doesn't matter how you vote, just turn out to vote. We need everyone to go cast their ballot. That's after the first communication that went out for a very long time. It's hard to correct the record. I think you'll see him to continue to promote people turning out to vote, however it is that they may be. Look, Pennsylvania is a unique case.

There was not a lot of mail-in voting in Pennsylvania before 2020. In Michigan, we have in-person early voting mandatory for nine days minimum across the state for the first time ever. The first time that was enacted was in the '24 primary. That was out of constitutional amendment in 2022 in Michigan. So things are different than they were in 2020. And in some states like Pennsylvania, mail-in voting is newer generally.

So, you know, it takes some time to get people comfortable with the system. But ultimately, I will say again, President Trump has proven the ability to get voters to the polls. And I'm quite comfortable that we'll get voters to the polls. And as for Joe Biden's ground game, is it a sophisticated ground game because anyone knows that? Or is it because they say it in press releases every day? What do you think? I would tell you this, that when you're

when you're constant line to the press is yes, we're losing in polling. They don't say that, but yes, we're losing in all the polls, not in the popular vote, but, but some, yes, some by like our margin of error, one or two points. I'll take margin of error in the popular vote. Very rarely do Republicans win the popular vote anyway, as we know. Uh, I'll, like I said, I'll take margin of error. If we call that neck and neck and 50, 50 odds are real good in politics. Um, they used to brag about their fundraising. They're not bragging about that anymore. Uh,

These are the measurable things of races. This is how people measure the horse race. This is how you call balls and strikes along the way. Money, endorsements, which only really matter in a presidential race if they're very newsy for some reason, something different, something unexpected. Should we expect an RFK endorsement anytime soon? I don't have any news to offer on RFK.

But on staff and offices, this is the Democrat shiny object. They're trying to convince the media and their donors that they have a cure-all for the fact that they have spent $150 million in advertising and counting and have not moved the needle. In fact, they have moved backwards during that period in all of the battlegrounds. How much have you guys spent in advertising so far? Zero. Zero.

Really? No money in the general election has been spent on advertising. From your campaign? Correct. Okay, so obviously there's outside groups. I think that the only outside group based on public reports that has spent significant money to date is MAGA Inc. in the state of Pennsylvania and a little bit in Georgia. If you look at the ad buy reports, there is recent buys being put up by...

by that group and another group, according to the ad buy trackers over the last couple of weeks. But I mean, that's not my opinion. You can go pull the numbers. They have outspent our side by a factor of many hundreds or thousands of percent, and they are not moving forward. In fact, they are moving backwards. So they need a narrative

to tell their voters that they have a magical cure for the fact that the candidate is fundamentally weak and he is not connecting with the voters and the voters are turning on him. And so that is the shiny object that they are trying to get the media and the donors to chase because they really have nothing else to sell. Yeah, but you didn't answer my question about the field operation because that was something going into this race. You had to take over the RNC's field operation. It was considered anemic, but they had like $9 million in the bank account. What is it like right now?

you've had a few months and I know you moved over to the RNC when that happened. Yeah. We have a different field operation than, um, has been run there a lot the last few cycles. And that's because we have a fundamentally different view of, of how to win this race. Um, then some folks have had in the past. How is it different? Um, we're focused on doing the most important thing really, really well. The thing that is highest impact really, really well. Um, we're not trying to do everything in the field program. Um,

low propensity voters, low propensity Republican voters, those voters I mentioned to you that only vote when Trump is on the ticket or are more spotty in their voting record. So we're going to go out there and knock on their doors out in rural Michigan. Is that what you're doing? Yes, we do. We've got our Trump Force 47 captains, which is really a build on our very successful Iowa program.

which is where we are. We captains sign up to become captains and then we put them through a training and then ultimately we sign them a target list of voters that are in their area, really in their neighborhood for the most part, but they're all in their precinct and we ask them to build a relationship with those voters. It's really a precinct level organizing model, a person to person organizing model that is more in line with how the party is actually set up and how the grassroots infrastructure is set up. I mean, all, but

Both parties are set up in a way that there's a precinct level, a county level, a state level, and a national level. And this is re-empowering the grassroots to really just be the captain of their precinct. Some of those people are volunteers. Some of those people are also our precinct committee men and women, but it's just working within the existing structure and getting them to adopt a certain group of voters that are most critical to turnout and also where a voter...

in-person voter contact is the most important. We'll have paid contacts, obviously, on everyone, but an in-person voter contact is most important to a certain type of voter, voters that are less connected to politics, that are more off the grid. And those are the people that we're really focused on reaching and making sure they turn out to the polls. Okay. And you were the one who came up with this idea in Iowa and now you're expanding it

but you're also bringing it to places like Michigan where they had like a completely decimated GOP when you came in there. How's it going? We think it's going really well. And it's not just me again, it's a good team. And, you know, Chris LaCivita has a lot to do with this. He's a very sophisticated- Are you paying these people, the precinct captains now? We have a paid staff, but our Trump Force 47 captains are volunteers. We have a paid staff that manages our volunteers. Trump Force 47. It sounds like the COVID warp speed. You guys have like this language. It's kind of like-

Star Wars-y. It's funny. Our people like to be a part of something and we want to give them something to be a part of in a good way. It's a very masculine testosterone. Well, people are excited to be part of something and we want to give them something to be a part of. They get like hats and merch, right? They do. As they work their way up, they get different things. They get a patch at the first level and they move up to a t-shirt, a hat. And the hats in Iowa were a hot ticket item. You know, everybody wanted one so much so that by the time we got to

Where was it we first saw it? It was in the bodega stop in New York that we saw bootleg versions of the Iowa caucus captain hat that were being sold. So it's a hot ticket item that you only get if you work your way through the captain's program. This is like a Mary Kay sales rep. You get all your girlfriends over, you start selling things, more incentives. You're basically creating a pyramid scheme.

We like to recognize people and reward them for their work. Like people take time out of their day to help the president and we want to give them something in return for that that's tangible and they're excited to have it. And, you know, look, we're not the only ones that have ever come up with this. I mean, gamification, if you will, of volunteer hours and support is something that the Obama team did that was much written about and talked about.

Um, but ultimately it's really just recognizing our volunteers and rewarding them for their hard work and give them something to belong to. We, our message to everyone is that you can have a big impact on the race with a small time commitment. And that's by becoming a captain and adopting your area and adopting the voters that we ask you to and making sure they have a plan to get to the polls and giving them what they need to get out to the polls. So, um, again, it's not entirely original idea. It has our spin on it. Um,

But it was really something that you picked up from the Obama team and sort of give it its own Trump spin. I mean, I wouldn't say that exclusively. No, but obviously they were smart people as well. I mean, really volunteer organizing is about getting people to do things for free, commit their time for free and get them to actually complete tasks. I mean, that's one of the hard parts. And a lot of what the field program had become is, you know, we talked about volunteers, but it really become just a bunch of paid staff, parachuted in staff,

knocking on doors. It's completely different when you have someone in your neighborhood working the neighborhood saying, hey, I'm one of you. I'm from here. I live here. And getting those folks to turn out the polls, it's a different, more valuable touch. So we're really focused on the quality of touch, on the right people, over the quantity. And I will say, the quantity is there too. That's one of the things that

I think it's probably underreported. There's obviously new rules that give us a framework to work with outside groups on paid canvassing or volunteer canvassing, just canvassing of the doors in general. And you've seen groups starting to do a lot of work in that. There's some that have been written about that we're working with. There's a new one yesterday that news broke about Elon Musk's sizable contribution to America PAC. They have been canvassing on the ground. I think the New York Times wrote about. So we...

very much are benefiting from allies that are smart and doing good work that we're able to work with in a way that's a little bit more direct now that can handle some of the more volume-based approaches that have happened in the past. But what we're focused on from the campaign front is that person-to-person, neighbor-to-neighbor organizing model. Again, that focuses on quantity over quality and making sure that the right people are touched

that the contact is the most impactful for. Politics aside, is there a Democratic strategist that you admire? Yeah. I mean, they have lots of smart people, certainly. All the Obama guys were very smart. Axelrod and Plouffe, I don't even know if you say that right. Plouffe. Plouffe, yeah. Remember what the Plouffe? They were obviously very smart guys. James Carville's a smart guy. I read his book many years ago. Yeah.

And I think he's pulling his non-existent hair out right now. I will say James also has no hair. That's true. He's also bald. That's true. We share that in common. Inspired. I think I last saw him on an Alaskan cruise a few days ago on TV. Right. Calling on Biden to step down. Yes. And...

I mean, his famous phrase, it's the economy, stupid. And he's been railing on Twitter about the idea, you know, they're selling Bidenomics and he's basically saying Bidenomics isn't working. So what the hell are you doing? He's been saying this for a long time. We had him on the show. He was losing it. But yeah, he's,

Definitely one of the more candid Democrats because he's like, I don't give a fuck. At the end of my career, I don't need access to the White House. I don't have to go to parties anymore. And as we know in Washington, that's a big part of the game. But that's interesting to hear that. Back to the campaign. What do you think J.D. Vance brings to the ticket? Oh, J.D. J.D. is such a great compliment to the ticket. We're really excited to have him. For one, he's got a great story and he has a great...

for all of the reasons you already know. I don't need to articulate them. But he's got a lot of connections to, at least in profile, to the blue wall states, the working class states, the union states in many cases. And I think that you will see him spend a lot of time working there. I also think that he brings...

a new generation of Republican, his ties to Silicon Valley and these folks you've obviously seen increased conversations out there. Elon Musk, David Sachs, all of these kind of big tech billionaires, Peter Thiel coming along and getting behind Trump.

I think Peter Thiel said about a few years ago, fuck no, I won't give any more money to Trump, but I guess that's changed thanks to JD. I probably will not. He hasn't made a commitment yet or has he? I don't think I'll speak about donors and contributions, but I do. I'll say JD has done a great job at raising money. I think he'll raise a lot more.

He's got a great story to tell. And he is a very articulate defender and advocate for the president's vision. And he's young and he has a chance to show that this movement can continue on for a long time. So did you really not know until the last minute who he was going to choose? I read about it on Truth. Really? Absolutely. Come on. Absolutely. Okay.

Right. I do believe, though, that up until at least the last few days, he was... We all know how long he was toying with Burgum and J.D. Vance. I don't think Marco was real. I think Marco is too much of a neocon. That's my take on it. Should we look at J.D. Vance as a sign that Trump is going to have more isolationist America first approach or just see him as taking whatever orders Trump decides? I mean, what do we think? Is he going to take the lead on foreign policy since he feels so passionate about that?

I certainly will not put words in the president's mouth for what portfolio he will ask the vice president to focus on. I think you should take it as J.D. is the person that he feels comfortable with as somebody that can be a great partner in the administration.

and is capable of leading the country, that was an important consideration for him. That's not to say the others couldn't. He obviously made the decision that he felt was best, which is his prerogative as a former president. He knows exactly what the job of the vice president is. He's been through it, which is, again, a unique situation to be in.

and he felt J.D. was a great complement, obviously. And that's not taking anything away from any of the others. The Republicans have a great bench, and we've got lots of great leaders out there. So he really had plenty of options to choose from. But clearly, he felt that J.D. was the right guy to step into that role. So we're grateful for that, and we're excited about it. We think he's a great pairing. And how did he do it? Took two years? Because...

In 2022, Trump was reluctant to endorse him in the primary in the Senate race in Ohio. He was number three in the polls. He was down on his luck, running out of cash. He wouldn't have won the primary. He wouldn't be in the Senate if not for Trump. It took a lot of lobbying just to get him there. So to get him to choose him as a vice presidential candidate, because he knew about his past comments, what he had called him in the past, how he called him America's Hitler. How did J.D. do it?

Again, the president has built a relationship with J.D., and he certainly knows all there is to know about J.D., and he was around for that. So it's not like that was a surprise to him. So clearly, he felt that...

J.D. was really the right partner for him in this administration. The president, he understands clearly by his actions that politics is about addition, not subtraction. And I think he has shown a remarkable ability always to, even if you've said something about him in the past, that he still welcomes you into the fold and gets you in the boat in a row. So I think...

A lot of people have said things over the years that were less than favorable, but nonetheless, he values those voices. And obviously in JD's case, he really values his voice and was happy to welcome him to the ticket. So we're going to see Ron DeSantis' buddy maybe into the administration or cabinet role or something like that? Yeah.

I don't think I'm in a position to speak about any of the president's thoughts or decisions about who will lead the country in his cabinet. Fine, fine, fine. I mean, he does have a few more years left as governor, but it would be a nice little off ramp for him. All right. Let's talk about Project 2025.

It's got a lot of very extreme stances. Obviously, it was written by the Heritage Foundation, federal ban on abortion, mass deportation, ending the Mifepristone abortion pill, gutting the government. They're actually collecting resumes right now for the transition, asking for loyalty tests to Donald Trump. What should voters think of this?

What should they think of Project 2025? Well, look, Democrats are lying. I mean, Democrats, the Biden campaign, because they have nothing else, they don't have a record to sell. So they're lying. They are lying and saying that the product of a Washington think tank is the president's product, which is not. He's made that very clear, both specifically. Does he agree with any of those things, though, that I just stated? No, I don't.

don't even remember the whole list that you stated, but I'm pretty sure that many of the things that you just stated, he has made very clear public statements that are different than those. Mass deportation, federal ban on abortion.

Mipha Pristone done gutting the government of all civil servants. Yeah, like I said, I mean, he's spoken against a lot of those things. I mean, you know, look at the platform. First of all, the platform this week that passed, which you can see at 2024GOPplatform.com, addresses many of those issues very specifically, and those are not the positions he holds. So it must be difficult to deal with this then. Right.

look, it would be preferable to not have so-called allies putting out policy plans that are their wishes and what they think when we're running a campaign. And many of those are adverse to what the president has said to the American people very clearly. Depends on the day because sometimes Trump goes back and forth on these things and the crowd. I don't think that's accurate, to be honest with you. I think you would be hard pressed to show me where he's...

changed his policy positions. I mean, he's at times praised the overturning of Roe v. Wade and then distanced himself from it. For example, even in the lineup in the RNC, I mean, they've really not leaned into pro-life programming. Yeah, but you're representing that as an inconsistent position, but it's not. He has praised the overturning of Roe v. Wade and Roe v. Wade returned it to the states, which is what he always said should happen. That's what, frankly, much of the movement said should happen for

50 years, basically. And his position is that it should be left to the states, which is what Roe v. Wade did. That's a very ideologically consistent position. And that's also what's reflected in the Republican platform. It should be left to the states. And as the president has said publicly very clearly,

The states are deciding. There's been a number of referendums on this issue since Roe v. Wade was overturned across a lot of states. There's many more coming this fall. There's obviously the ability of states to exercise voters exercise their judgment through their state legislatures. And so the president's position is leave it to the states.

he thinks voters should have the last word on that through the ways that they can exercise it. Would he sign the bill, though, if it went through Congress? If there was a bill, you know, submitted in Congress, passed in the House, Senate, it's on his desk, federal ban on abortion, would he sign that? The president has said clearly that he would not sign a federal ban on abortion.

This episode is brought to you by Vitamin Water. So much of what the world is obsessed with starts out in New York City. It's a place full of style and character that has something for everyone. With a range of flavors to meet any kind of taste, it's no wonder Vitamin Water was born there. Colorful, flavorful, anything but boring, Vitamin Water injects a daily dose of vibrancy into a watered-down life. Grab a Vitamin Water today. Vitamin Water is a registered trademark of Glasso.

How do you get to 270? What's your strategy? How do we get there? You get enough votes and enough states together.

It's a joke. It's a joke. Yeah, yeah. Well, fortunately, we have a lot of paths to 270, many more than the Democrats. The Democrats really just have one path, and that is reflected in not only what they say, but what they do. Their path is the blue wall plus Nebraska too. That gets them to 270. The blue wall meaning? Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania. Okay. Obviously, they say North Carolina's in play. They say Georgia's in play. They say Arizona's...

in play and all of these sorts of things. And we take none of those for granted. We're campaigning full speed in all of those States. Um, but they have many less paths and this is, you know, you can check this by all of the, the public writings out there, the New York times at a piece not long ago about how many more paths the Republicans have in them. And we're opening up new paths because the map is expanding for us while it's shrinking for them. Um,

they are seriously on defense in states like Virginia and states like Minnesota. There's others that we're looking at as well, which I will not break news on here too. But again- I think earlier today, your pollster, Tony Fabrizio said, you're even looking at New Jersey, Virginia, New Hampshire, New Mexico. Yep. That's true. That's true. Okay. That's true. That's true. As a Jersey girl. We will make New Jersey great again for you. Though I did grow up in a red district when I was a kid, but now it's Mikey Sherrill's.

You know that district, right? Yep. The numbers suggest very much that New Jersey is in play. I think a public poll came out, I don't know if it was yesterday or today, I can't remember, that had us ahead in Virginia. But are you actually going to put money into those states? Absolutely.

You're going to actually build a ground game there. Absolutely. Already are. Really? In Minnesota, in Virginia, which is all we've said publicly, which I will keep it to for now. We're building full staff. How many people do you have right now? I'm not going to answer the specifics. Why not? Because we don't do that. That's our practice. It's not going to be like breaking news. Come on. It might be, um,

We don't like to give away our game. Again, we've got a lot of measurables that people can measure to know the race is going well. So we're not in the business of laying out our roadmap for our opposition, who I'm sure will listen to this podcast as well. Keep going. I want to hear more about the path to 270. We have lots of opportunities. I mean, we have more than two dozen paths to 270 right now. And...

And if you look at the RCP average, I mean, we're pulling a 300 plus electoral votes. More than two dozen paths, 24 paths. You heard that right. Okay, great.

Give me some of them. Okay. Well, the shortest path would be Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia. Okay. But obviously, if we win Georgia, Arizona, Nevada, that opens up a lot of options looking at states like Minnesota, Virginia, any of the blue wall states. And certainly when you start looking at places like New Jersey, New Hampshire, again, there's lots of different iterations that go into this. But we have...

lots of different combinations, as I just laid out within all of those, not only the core seven, but really those expansion stage two, that opens up a lot of extra opportunities for us. And again, the Democrats really just have one path at this current juncture. If you take the public polling,

at face value, and I won't break news on internals, but if they lose Georgia, if they lose Arizona, if they lose North Carolina, whether or not they win Nevada, they really have to retain all of the blue wall plus Nebraska too to get there. Is this before the debate, these 24 different options that you had? Yeah.

270? Yes. Before the debate, you felt this way. And I'm not breaking news here. We've said this publicly. So in your ideal scenario, how many electoral college votes do you get? My ideal scenario is 270. Whatever gets us to 270, I'm happy with. Chris LaCivita has said 320. I mean, that seems a little...

out there? You never know. Anything could happen. We could be looking at a historic election. But whether we do or not, look, I mean, we campaign like we're 10 points down everywhere. We are not complacent. The president is not complacent. We take nothing for granted. We know politics can shift quickly. Four months is a long time. Absolutely. It's a lifetime. I mean, look how much has happened in just the last two and a half weeks, right? So four months is a long time. So we take...

our job every day very seriously, not take any plays off. But again, my ideal number is 270. 270 gets us to victory and that's good enough for me. Have you seen any internal polling since the attempted assassination? And what does it look like? I won't break news on internal polling, but I'll say awareness of the event is like nothing I've ever seen before in politics. Everybody knows what happened.

And did almost immediately. And that, you know, usually it takes time for any major news to spread and to break, but it is universally known what happened in this country. And that is not something I've ever seen before. It's not something that you typically see.

you know, within 24 hours. How has that impacted independence? I think I'll probably withhold comment on what we're analyzing from within those numbers in terms of how it moves voters. But I will say, I'll just speak to our side. Again, I talked earlier about how people that voted for him before are back with him. I mean, that is just like doubled down. It's a real galvanizing event. We've had a few galvanizing events throughout this election where

But then that drives things like volunteer recruitment. We saw a big volunteer recruitment spike, drives things like fundraising. It expedites people's timeline to get involved. You know, maybe donors or volunteers that were thinking about getting involved, they say, no, I'm just going to do it now. So it's definitely had a galvanizing effect.

on people in our coalition to really say enough is enough. We've got to, we've got to get in the game and fight alongside him here. Okay. So is there a feeling that, you know, you don't really need to focus as much on your base on getting out those voters and perhaps you can even go broader. And that's why he's has this more magnanimous sort of appeal and toning down the language for now. Is that something that you're considering? I, I think,

We have really two focuses. One is ensuring turnout is what it needs to be, but particularly with those lower propensity voters that are less likely to vote that are our people, but we have to make sure they get to the polls. That is certainly critical mission number one. And critical mission two or 1A is...

expanding. Well, I guess I should say within that 1A is expanding the electorate. So these are things like voter registration, getting new voters that feel our way that would vote for President Trump. Were they on the rolls getting them registered in the battleground states and everywhere of import? And then persuading voters. Absolutely. I mean, in politics, you...

a good campaign tries to push gravity in the direction it's already going and push it further. And we have an opportunity now. Voters, there's not, I mean, as you know, it's a very polarized electorate, very polarized country. There's not that many persuadable voters in terms of a percentage of the whole. But,

um, making sure that they have a clear contrast between the candidates and a clear understanding of what four more years of Trump versus four more years of Biden, what that will mean for their lives and connecting that to their daily lives. That is paramount important to us. So it's really making sure, um, people that are less likely to vote, but, but our people turn out to vote. And then to, um, solidifying, uh,

persuasion that is already happening and pushing it further to strengthen our numbers and expand the coalition. So you're feeling more optimistic with independence? Yeah, absolutely. There's lots of, you know, optimism and independence is, we're feeling more optimistic with lots of groups of voters. I mean, it's not just independence. You know, we think of them differently. I'll call them swing voters. It is true that there are a lot of independents that make up the swing voters, but we think of swing voters in a way that is

you know, not just purely independent. Some of those are across class lines, socioeconomic lines, racial lines, educational lines, all of those sorts of things. And you put all of these populations together where you're seeing opportunities for marginal or significant gain sort of into a bucket of persuadable voters. And then we stratify them out along the issue sets that are important to them and the things that are making a difference

to how their vote may swing. And then you drive message forward and, you know, show them the clear contrast on the issues that they care about. Okay. So General Malley Dillon, she's a campaign chairwoman for the Biden campaign. She said to my colleague, John Heilman, that she believes that this race comes down to 6% of persuadable voters in six battleground states.

Do you agree with her on that? Yes, I've heard the six and six. Are you thinking like that? Yeah, I'm not going to tell you how many we think there are, but there is what...

I think the point that she's making, I'll agree with the sentiment, which is ultimately all of this money and energy will be spent to move a relatively small group of voters across a relatively small group of states and counties even. The battleground is...

very set in large sense. And it's a big war for inches in the middle. And that's why everything we do matters ultimately. That's why we campaign. How do you target these persuadables? You're saying now African-American men, Latino men, how do you target them as Republicans?

Is your question, how do we reach out to them? Yeah. Yeah. How are you reaching them? What kind of advertising? Or I know you're not spending money on advertising, but you're obviously spending money on something to reach them. Yeah. Through paid communications, paid advertising, through all of the tactics that are available. And you haven't even started that yet? That is true. Yeah.

But we have very robust plans that you will see come online very soon. TikTok? TikTok is a significant tool, absolutely. I mean, the president did, I think, a quarter of a billion views in his first two posts. That is, and I think you'll see a lot more activity there as the election unfolds. There are lots of voters there. I mean, the president said it's very simple. There's voters there, and we're going to go where the people are. You know, persuadable voters...

Something that overlays with them is that they get information differently than a lot of other groups of voters, be that social media or different things. And so we have done a lot of research into how people receive their information and we align our investments and our organic outreach along those lines. So we're talking to the voters where they are. Okay. So this is all predicated on the fact that you will run against Joe Biden.

Who is the candidate that you want to be running against? We'll take any of them. We're very comfortable putting President Trump's record up against anyone that they would put up.

We're prepared for anyone that they put up a good campaign prepares for all possible outcomes so that it can pivot and adjust as needed. I think that all the evidence indicates right now that Joe Biden will be the candidate. But if that changes, we'll certainly be prepared. You know, I think the bigger question is, what do they do if the candidate changes?

What is the game theory on that? All of their campaign is predicated around Joe Biden being the candidate. What happens if it's someone else? The idea that they're just going to magically solve all of their problems as Democrats and build some great coalition in a matter of three months around someone untested on the national stage is...

that's, that's a, that's a big bet to make. There's no one that you're worried about. I mean, Gretchen Whitmer, Michigan, it's going to make Michigan more difficult, right? Not worried about it. Josh Shapiro, Pennsylvania. No, I'm worried about it. We could go through any of them and show you their weaknesses and they all have significant vulnerabilities. Not the least of which is they've not been on the national stage before. What about Harris? Kamala Harris, would you rather run against her or Joe Biden? Again, it doesn't matter who we run against. I mean, the president has prepared to beat any of them. I mean, we feel very strongly about that. I'm not playing coy. Um,

the president has a record that people remember and that's what's driving people, uh, to him. They remember that his leadership of the country, his stewardship of the country was something that was beneficial for their lives. Um,

It's hard to see how the Democrats would jump the sitting vice president and go to someone else. And I think if they did that, they would have an enormous amount of challenges to sort through on top of the existing challenges. But again, anyone they would go to, there's no magical solutions for all of this. At the end of the day, gas prices are what they are. Great.

grocery prices are what they are. The wars across the country are what they are. The border is open. And by the way, are you hearing any of those guys say we should close the border? We should stop spending all of this money that is driving inflation. We shouldn't be running the green new scam that is driving inflation. None of those candidates are saying that. So how are they fundamentally different than Joe Biden? Okay. How much have you prepared for a candidate other than Joe Biden? Very significantly. Okay.

Really? Absolutely. Have you even like practiced doing debate prep with different candidates? I won't get into the specifics, but I can tell you that we are very prepared for anyone who will emerge. Obviously Harris though, right? Of course. Is she the one you're most prepared for? I think that we are plenty prepared for any of them. Absolutely. Again, a good campaign is,

plans for all possible outcomes. And I think what you've seen, hopefully, from this campaign is that we think ahead. We try to look down the road and be prepared for potential outcomes. And you've seen that in our operations and throughout the primaries this week. We are very focused on making sure that we can deal any pitch that's thrown at us. Is Joe Biden a gift? I believe that's been said. Yeah.

I believe that's been said. That's true. Susie Wiles did say that. How are you feeling right now? I'm optimistic. Absolutely. Certainly optimistic, but I'm feeling like there's a lot of work to be done that we cannot take anything for granted. We can't take any plays off again, like I said earlier.

campaigns move quick, the world turns quickly. So we're going to keep running this race like we're 10 points down no matter what, no matter who it is. And I think if we do that, we will be successful. Okay, James, thank you so much for your time. This was fascinating. Thank you for having me. Really enjoyed it. And we'll talk to you again. Yeah, for sure. Thanks.

That was another episode of Somebody's Got to Win. I'm your host, Tara Palmieri. I want to thank my producers, Christopher Sutton and Connor Nevins. If you like this show, please subscribe, rate it, share it with your friends. If you like my reporting, please go to puck.news.tara.palmeri and sign up for my newsletter, The Best and the Brightest. You can use the discount code Tara20. I'll be back soon with another update from the Republican National Convention.