Welcome back to the deep dive. So tomorrow is
a major election day, but our focus today isn't
really on those obvious top of the ticket races
you're hearing about everywhere. No, it's not
at all. We're actually looking at these, you
know, scattered state, local institutional battles,
the ones that, well, they rarely grab the national
headlines. Right. But we're treating them as
a series of, let's say, seismic indicators. They're
not just about tomorrow. They're kind of a forecast
for 2026, maybe even 2028. That's exactly the
mission today. Look, we know you follow the big
picture, but the real... volatility in American
governance right now, it's revealed when we start
connecting the dots. Dots between things that
seem totally unrelated. Totally unrelated. I
mean, we're analyzing everything from judicial
retention elections over in Pennsylvania to the
sudden SNAP benefit disruption hitting, what,
42 million people? And even digging into why
someone apparently paid Jeffrey Epstein $158
million fee for, quote, tax planning. OK, so
our deep dive today is all about pulling these
signals together. We want to understand the polarization,
what these sort of early moves mean for the national
political landscape. Let's start with tomorrow's
elections as these national barometers. OK. So
the central question that our sources keep wrestling
with is this. Are those marginal Trump voters
actually becoming Republicans? You mean that
unexpected 2024 coalition? The young black and
Latino men may be drawn by high prices or his
quote, tough style. Exactly. Are they transferring
their loyalty to the generic Republican Party
brand, or was it just about Trump? And we're
seeing the best test cases for this in places
like New Jersey and Virginia, right? Precisely.
So in New Jersey, you've got Democrat Makey Sherrill.
She's a former Navy helicopter pilot, pretty
moderate profile. And she's up against Seattle,
who's really welcomed this. huge infusion of
Trump attention, Trump money. Right. And even
in a blue state like Jersey, Cheryl's only up
what, 51 % to 43 %? That's surprisingly close.
It tells you something. And then Virginia. Virginia,
you have Abigail Spanberger. Again, a moderate
Democrat, national security background, former
CIA. She's leading by maybe 10 or 11 points in
the recent polls against Winsome Earl Sears.
OK, so what's the takeaway then, if they win
big? Well, if Democrats get landslides with candidates
like Spanberger and Sheryl, these moderate women
with security cred, it kind of suggests the answer
is no. Meaning the Trump voters aren't automatically
becoming GOP voters. Exactly. Their loyalty isn't
transferring to the brand. But if these candidates
just, you know, squeak by, then maybe we are
seeing a much broader, more fundamental political
realignment. That's the uncertainty. OK, let's
shift gears a bit. Let's look past the candidates
themselves and focus on these institutional power
battles hidden inside some state elections. Pennsylvania
seems like the big one here. Oh, absolutely.
It's fascinating. You've got three Democratic
Supreme Court justices, Donahue, Daugherty, and
Wecht, all up for retention votes. And for folks
who don't follow state courts that closely, a
retention vote is just a yes -no on keeping the
judge right, no opponent. Correct. Simple yes
-no. But Republicans are pouring serious money
into trying to get voters to vote no on all three.
Why? What's the calculation? It's huge. If all
three get fired, the court flips from a Democratic
majority to a 2 -2 tie. Governor Shapiro, a Democrat,
would try to appoint replacements, obviously.
But the Republican State Senate would block them?
Almost certainly. They'd likely block appointments
until the next judicial election cycle in 2027.
So you essentially paralyze the state's highest
court. Giving the GOP enormous leverage, especially
heading towards 2028. Wow. That's the play. It's
all about institutional control. OK. And while
Pennsylvania is fighting over its courts, California
is looking at its congressional map. Proposition
50. Yeah, Prop 50. It's a constitutional amendment,
aims to override the Independent Commission's
map. The goal is pretty clearly to flip about
five Republican House seats to Democrats. That
is leading. It is 56 to 43 percent. But interestingly,
some Democrats are apparently a bit uncomfortable,
you know, with gerrymandering, even when it helps
their side. So that might be dampening the support
slightly. And then there's this weird election
monitoring thing happening out there, too. Oh,
yeah. This is really something. So you have Trump
sending his own election monitors to California.
OK. And Governor Newsom responds very publicly
by sending his own state monitors to watch the
federal ones. And he's even threatening arrests
if they violate state elections. laws. Wow that
sounds like a dry run for something bigger like
2026 maybe. It really feels like it this state
challenging federal authority over the vote itself
that's a really dangerous institutional tension
to watch. Okay so we've seen how these you know
seemingly low -key local races carry huge institutional
weight but that kind of paralysis it takes on
a much more painful dimension when we look at
Washington right now. The shutdown fallout. Right.
Over the weekend, two major things converged.
You had SNFP benefits food stamps rejected for
42 million people. 42 million. And this happened
right as the Affordable Care Act. The ACA enrollment
period opened up. So EBT cards just stopped working.
Just stopped working. Now, two federal judges.
Obama appointees actually McConnell in Rhode
Island and Talwani in Massachusetts. They ruled
pretty quickly They said the administration must
use the USDA's contingency fund about five billion
dollars to pay the benefits Okay, but the administration's
saying it's not that simple. Yeah, right the
stated reason is technical difficulties Yeah,
the official line is the complexity chaining
software for, you know, 42 million EBT accounts
across 50 states, multiple private vendors involved.
It requires really careful programming testing.
It takes time. That's the argument. But what's
the political calculation here? Is this timing
just random? Well, our sources suggest the timing
itself hitting low income folks right when they're
being pushed to sign up for government health
care might be a lucky accident, let's say, for
Republicans. With the impact. Oh, with the impact.
The sources say the cruelty is fully intentional.
Look, the long term plan, especially outlined
in things like Project 2025, is to slash both
SNAPI and ACA subsidies pretty drastically. Right.
And the irony here, which you really have to
understand, is this sort of urban legend Republicans
seem to operate under. They think cutting these
programs mainly hurts, you know, poor black people
in blue cities. When in reality? In reality,
the data shows it hits poor white people in rural
red states, their own base, the hardest. It's
a fundamental misreading of who relies on these
programs. OK, so if it's hitting their constituents
and the crisis is real, why not just pass a quick
standalone bill to fund SNP? I heard Senator
Hawley propose one. He did propose a sesente
only bill, yeah. There's also a Democratic bill
that includes WIC. But the Republicans aren't
really pushing Hawley's bill hard at all. Why
not? What's the holdup? Because the real obstacle,
according to these sources, isn't really about
feeding hungry kids right now. It's about institutional
power in the House. Oh, so. OK, follow this.
Passing any bill, even a simple SNF P fix, requires
Speaker Johnson to call the House back into session.
Right. If he does that, Representative -elect
Grigalva from Arizona, a Democrat, gets sworn
in. And Grigalva is the key number. She would
immediately become the 218th signature on a discharge
petition. That's the magic number. A discharge
petition that forces a vote on the floor bypasses
the speaker. Exactly. And the discharge petition
currently waiting with 217 signatures is the
one to force a vote on releasing the full unredacted
Epstein files. Wait, so the claim is... They're
holding up food aid. to block a vote on the Eckstein
file. That's what the sources are suggesting.
The political calculation being described is,
essentially, children go hungry in order to protect
pedophiles. It's a truly unbelievable cost -benefit
analysis, if true. That's quite a claim. Meanwhile,
Democrats must be seeing an opening here. Oh,
absolutely. They're launching what they call
a nationwide blitz focused on healthcare and
this crisis. They're using very sophisticated
micro -targeting, like Google search ads for
ACA plans. And boots on the ground, too. Yep.
400 canvassing events, press conferences. They're
really testing the message. Republicans are causing
your health care premiums to soar. Republicans
are responsible for this food insecurity. They're
trying to make that link stick. OK, let's pivot
a bit ideologically. Let's talk about socialism.
When we use that term classically, we usually
mean government ownership of the means of production,
right? Yeah, that's the standard definition.
And you often hear complaints about, you know,
socialism creeping into America. Maybe someone
points to, like, that New York City mayoral candidate,
Mom Donnie. Right, the guy with the plan for
maybe a city commissioner of groceries running
a few supermarkets. Exactly. Which frankly is
peanuts. It's tiny compared to what's actually
been happening at the federal level, particularly
under the Trump administration, believe it or
not. Wait, you're saying the biggest moves towards
government ownership are federal, not local.
Under Trump. That's what the evidence suggests.
Look, the government already effectively secured
a 10 % stake in Intel through the cheap PSECT
funding. Okay, I remember that. But now look
at this new case study our sources highlight.
The federal government is giving Westinghouse
electric $80 billion to build nuclear reactors.
$80 billion? That's huge. It is. And in return,
the government gets 20 percent of Westinghouse's
shares by 2029. So we're talking federal government
ownership stakes in two absolutely critical industries,
microchips and energy. But hang on, is this really
classic socialism or is it more like, you know,
industrial policy like wartime efforts or just
taking equity stakes for national security, securing
supply chains? Is socialism just being used for
shock value here? That's a fair question. The
danger highlighted isn't necessarily purely ideological
socialism. It's more pragmatic. It's about control.
How so? When the government owns a significant
stake, the president can potentially leverage
that ownership. They could pressure a company
like Westinghouse into making really bad business
decisions purely for political reasons, like
building a factory where it makes no sense. Exactly.
Imagine ordering them to build a reactor in,
say, Times Square or some key swing district,
just as political payback or to curry favor,
even if it's commercially disastrous. A purely
private company wouldn't waste billions like
that. A company partially owned by the government
they might feel compelled to. That's the potential.
distortion. OK, interesting. Let's look at another
institutional piece, the Senate Syllabuster.
When Trump suggested ending the shutdown by nuking
the filibuster, there was immediate pushback,
even from within the GOP. Oh, yes, swift pushback.
Senate Majority Leader Thune's spokesperson came
out right away, said the leaders position on
the filibuster is unchanged. Even House Speaker
Johnson defended it as an important safeguard.
Which seems odd because Republicans often complain
about the filibuster when they're in power and
Democrats use it. Why protect it now? It's the
long game. They're thinking ahead, way past the
current shutdown, probably to 2028 and beyond.
How does that work? They fear that if they abolish
the filibuster now, what happens if Democrats
eventually win a trifecta White House Senate,
say, after 2028? Then the Democrats could pass
everything on their wish list with just 51 votes.
Exactly. D .C. and Puerto Rico statehood may
be overhauling the courts, codifying abortion
rights nationally, major voting rights acts,
everything the GOP opposes. So by keeping the
filibuster now, even though it's currently inconvenient
for ending the shutdown, They maintain the moral
high ground, or at least the procedural argument,
to fight against Democrats using the nuclear
option later on, whenever the tables turn. It's
about preserving that institutional check for
the future when they might be in the minority.
Right. And this focus on preserving institutional
barriers is happening against a backdrop of,
well, a really pessimistic national mood, isn't
it? Extremely pessimistic, that recent Politico
Public First poll. Wow, nearly half of Americans,
49%, think the country's best times are already
in the past. And the polarization within that
pessimism is stark. Incredibly stark. Look at
this. 51 % of Harris voters say the U .S. is
not a functioning democracy, but 52 % of Trump
voters say it is. Complete opposites. And the
American dream. 46 % of all Americans think it's
dead. That jumps to 55 % among 18 - to 24 -year
-olds. Think about that. And the desire for change.
Not small tweaks people want? No, not at all.
This is crucial. 52 % of adults want radical
change, not incremental adjustments, radical.
And among those 18 to 24 year olds, it soars
to 64%. So the institutions are trying to hold
the line, preserve safeguards like the filibuster,
but the public is basically screaming for fundamental
upheaval. That's the tension. a massive disconnect
between the institutional desire for stability
and the public's craving for radical transformation.
Okay, let's bring this back to institutional
leverage, specifically subpoena power. Let's
talk about those unsealed documents involving
Jeffrey Epstein and JPMorgan Chase. The SARS,
right. suspicious activity reports. Right. Banks
have to file these SARs when they see weird transactions.
And Chase filed them on a staggering $1 .2 billion
going in and out of Epstein's accounts just between
2003 and his death. $1 .2 billion. And the reports
flagged things. Oh, yeah. Sources call it a treasure
trove of clues, including huge transactions involving
two major Russian banks, Alpha Bank and Spurbank.
But apparently the FBI didn't act on this for
years. Now a judge, Judge Rakoff, has unsealed
hundreds of pages. Yes, naming prominent people
like Leon Black, Glenn Dubin, Alan Dorshowitz,
Leslie Wexner. This is exactly why control of
the House and its subpoena power becomes so incredibly
critical. OK, give us the smoking gun example.
Why does House control ma— matters so much here.
Look at Leon Black. The unsealed documents show
he paid Epstein $158 million. For what? For tax
and estate planning. $158 million for tax advice
from Jeffrey Epstein. I mean, the sources call
it completely absurd. Epstein had zero qualifications
for that kind of high -level work. A top -tier
law firm might charge maybe $1 million for the
most complex plan imaginable. This was literally
over 100 times that standard rate. So if Democrats
win the House majority, what changes? Supina
power. Simple as that. They could force JPMorgan
Chase to release all 20 years of Epstein's transaction
records, not just the summaries, the actual flow
of money. And they can call people in? Crucially,
yes. They could subpoena someone like Leon Black,
put him under oath, remind him about perjury
laws, and force him to explain, why did you pay
a known felon $158 million for services he wasn't
qualified or even legally allowed to provide?
That power to compel testimony under oath. That's
the final missing link to potentially untangling
Epstein's entire financial network. Okay. So
pulling all these threads together, the state
races, the SNAP crisis, the filibuster fight,
the Epstein files, what's the big picture? It
really points to one overwhelming reality, I
think. All politics is now national, completely
nationalized. And there's data backing that up.
Staggering data. In 2024, the correlation between
how a state voted for president and how it voted
in its Senate race reached 0 .91. That's an incredibly
high correlation. Meaning? Meaning in 30 out
of 33 Senate races last cycle, the same party
won both the presidential vote in that state
and the Senate seat. The national brand, the
top of the ticket, is just overwhelming almost
everything else. Local factors, candidate quality,
they matter much less than they used to. Even
with things like gerrymandering happening? Even
with aggressive gerrymandering, like in Ohio.
You mentioned Representative Landsman's district.
It went from D plus three to R plus five on the
map, a significant shift. But the latest national
NBC House generic ballot poll has Democrats up
by eight points nationally. If that holds or
anything close to it, that national mood puts
potentially 59 Republican incumbents in districts
rated R plus seven or even bluer at risk. The
national wave can overcome even pretty strong
map distortions. But there's still that Democratic
brand problem, right? Especially with certain
groups. Oh, absolutely. It's a huge challenge.
When you pull working class voters, they consistently
describe Democrats using words like woke. weak,
out of touch. So how does a Democrat even win
in a red state, then? The only path seems to
be staking out positions that are, frankly, almost
anathema to the national party base, you know,
being vocally pro -life or pro -coal or pro -gun,
basically running against a national brand just
to survive locally. But then how does that help
the party nationally? Well, the argument is,
look, even a pro filibuster Democrat from a red
state who maybe votes against the party line
sometimes, they still vote with the Democratic
majority, maybe 90, 95 percent of the time on
crucial organizing votes, committee assignments,
leadership. Which is still better for the majority
than a Republican who votes with them zero percent
of the time. Exactly. So this deep conflict,
the National Party image versus what it takes
for a candidate to survive locally in a tough
state that's just going to keep driving polarization
and honestly, electoral chaos. OK. So let's recap.
We've seen the high stakes gamble around. Essent
Mink funding is directly tied to the fight for
subpoena power over the Epstein files. We've
seen how the biggest steps toward something resembling
socialism, these huge federal equity stakes,
are happening quietly at the federal level. And
we see a public demanding radical change while
institutions try to hang on to old safeguards
like the filibuster. That really covers the key
connections we've traced today. So here's the
final thought we want to leave you with, especially
as you watch the results come in tomorrow night.
Given this intense nationalization of politics,
remember that .91 correlation between president
and Senate votes does focusing on hyperlocal
races still tell us much? Think about those races
we mentioned, like the District Attorney or Sheriff
race in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Are they
still meaningful barometers for 2026? Or is the
power of the national brand, the national mood,
just so overwhelming now that those local results
are simply reflecting the bigger picture anyway?
Are they just a function of that generalized
national feeling? Exactly. It's something to
really ponder. We encourage you. track some of
those really local outcomes on Wednesday, see
how closely they seem to mirror the broader national
swings, or if they show any local deviation,
it might tell you a lot about where politics
is heading. Definitely something to think about.
We'll leave it there for this deep dive. We'll
talk to you next time.