Speaker 1: The coming question is who won the election, and we're
Speaker 1: about thirty five days out. I hate making predictions, but
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make one. I think that the race is
Speaker 1: going to break in Harris's direction right in the next
Speaker 1: twenty days or so, and that on election Night we're
Speaker 1: gonna have a pretty clear picture of who's gonna win
Speaker 1: the election by midnight. I don't think it will be
Speaker 1: a be a late night. That's how it feels to me.
Speaker 1: I could be wrong. Later in October than today. I
Speaker 1: said that Hillary Clinton looked like she was trending to
Speaker 1: four hundred electoral votes, and in that.
Speaker 2: Moment, she was.
Speaker 1: That being said Harris, except for one thing, and we'll
Speaker 1: talk about that. Seems to me to be on a
Speaker 1: good trajectory visioning that which seems to me much more
Speaker 1: likely than the moment that we remember from twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: and I was on set for it. I think that
Speaker 1: it's more likely that she wins the race. And in
Speaker 1: that instant you'll start with the conspiracy of lies, and
Speaker 1: in advance you know all of the people who will
Speaker 1: be involved in it, because there are all the people
Speaker 1: on it, all the people who have been involved in it,
Speaker 1: who are asked every week whether they'll disavow this or
Speaker 1: that that Trump did or said up to and including
Speaker 1: the overthrower of the government, and the answer never changes.
Speaker 2: Do you get frustrated when you watch that?
Speaker 1: When you see that, when you see the tediousness of
Speaker 1: the questioning in the corporate media about event that at
Speaker 1: this point have the rhythmic quality of the rising of
Speaker 1: the sun in the east every in the morning. I mean,
Speaker 1: how do you seem process all of that?
Speaker 3: I do share the frustration. I just am less convinced.
Speaker 3: You know, you started by saying, of course they don't
Speaker 3: disavow it, because of course they agree with it. I
Speaker 3: actually think it's worse. I think it's of course they
Speaker 3: don't disavow it because even though they obviously personally disagree
Speaker 3: with it, in many cases, they've decided that in their
Speaker 3: public facing characters, they will not wrong or cross Donald Trump.
Speaker 3: So I think it's worse. Like, on one hand, it's
Speaker 3: people who have been convinced by Trump and love all
Speaker 3: of it, including she's mentally disabled, so of course they
Speaker 3: don't disavow it. Concurrent with that, you have this guy's
Speaker 3: despicable and terrible. He's lost everything or forced us to
Speaker 3: underperform everywhere since twenty eighteen. But for as long as
Speaker 3: he can controls the Republican Party, even if I'm part
Speaker 3: of why he controls it, I am not going to
Speaker 3: publicly cross him. So I actually don't believe that McCarthy
Speaker 3: and Tom Emmer you mentioned. Also, Lindsey Graham was interviewed
Speaker 3: about the same thing, and he said, well, I prefer
Speaker 3: to talk about issues, weakest response you could have. I
Speaker 3: actually think they don't agree with it, but they realize
Speaker 3: until he doesn't, he has control of the Republican Party,
Speaker 3: and if they don't want to be on the outs
Speaker 3: with Democrats and on the outs with Trump, they kind
Speaker 3: of have to just go along with it. Now, I
Speaker 3: want to say one other thing about the election night
Speaker 3: scenario you mentioned. I do think the most likely scenario
Speaker 3: is a modest win by Kamala Harris when it comes
Speaker 3: to the electoral College, but one that will be pretty
Speaker 3: clear by midnight Eastern or at the latest by that morning.
Speaker 3: I do think that's the most likely scenario. I do
Speaker 3: think that the people immediately around Trump will do exactly
Speaker 3: what you said, which is they'll come to defend him
Speaker 3: with their irregularities and all of the different stuff. But
Speaker 3: I do think it's becoming increasingly clear to most Republicans
Speaker 3: that if Trump doesn't win, it's over for him. I
Speaker 3: know there's debate will he run again in twenty twenty eight,
Speaker 3: will he not run again if he loses. I don't
Speaker 3: think he's running again, And I think it'll be a
Speaker 3: self fulfilling prophecy where by the early morning of November sixth,
Speaker 3: every sane Republican defines sane however you want. But even
Speaker 3: these guys who kind of recognize the damage that Trump
Speaker 3: has done to the party, I think they'll realize that
Speaker 3: Trump has lost the power and they will start abandoning him.
Speaker 3: They won't denounce him, but I think that by the
Speaker 3: end of November sixth, if Trump loses, you are going
Speaker 3: to have a large cadre of Republicans. They won't be
Speaker 3: praising Kamala Harris, but they're going to be ready for
Speaker 3: a completely non Trump midterm and certainly twenty twenty eight.
Speaker 3: I think it's over for Trump. If he loses, he'll
Speaker 3: say he won. Some people will try to push some
Speaker 3: kind of scheme, but I think Republicans will start dropping
Speaker 3: within twelve hours of the election.
Speaker 2: Results.
Speaker 1: Okay, a lot too unpacked there. I totally see how
Speaker 1: that scenario plays out, that it's like pushing a car
Speaker 1: uphill and all of a sudden, the momentum is over forward,
Speaker 1: progress is done, and it's just gonna start rolling back hill,
Speaker 1: back down the hill. Right, It's just you know, it's
Speaker 1: not it's not going to not going to go up
Speaker 1: one more inch.
Speaker 2: But I'm gonna come back to that. So I was
Speaker 2: on I was on.
Speaker 1: Script's Morning Rush a month month or so ago, and
Speaker 1: the subject came up about Trump in twenty twenty eight,
Speaker 1: and so I'm with you because I like to view
Speaker 1: myself as.
Speaker 2: The sane person.
Speaker 1: Right, So, of course, right, the idea that he would
Speaker 1: run again, there's only been one person in all of
Speaker 1: American history who's ever been a four time nominee. FDR
Speaker 1: Trump is one of three that's done it, including him, right,
Speaker 1: that's done it three times. But when I was on
Speaker 1: television and I answered the question, is everybody going to
Speaker 1: go to more Lago seeking his support?
Speaker 2: And the answer is going to be yet.
Speaker 1: Will he be restrained enough to say, I don't know.
Speaker 1: We'll have to wait and see, because he doesn't have
Speaker 1: to run for president.
Speaker 2: He just has to.
Speaker 1: Freeze the race with a weight and see. And my
Speaker 1: question about Trump twenty eight, imagining your laws and stipulating
Speaker 1: to how completely insane it sounds, is if you could
Speaker 1: get to Trump twenty twenty four, right, if by twenty
Speaker 1: twenty four, this will we're in if he didn't cross
Speaker 1: the line between twenty and twenty four of no return,
Speaker 1: meaning that if he didn't do things by the time
Speaker 1: we get to this year they did inhibit your ability
Speaker 1: to support him or more precisely, to say no to him, like.
Speaker 2: No, you shouldn't run again.
Speaker 1: Then what's going to happen that's different this time than
Speaker 1: what happened last time. With regard to someone like Lindsey Graham,
Speaker 1: you know who I spent a year in my life
Speaker 1: with traveling around America on a presidential you know, campaign airplane.
Speaker 1: I just I think it's the great question, right, how
Speaker 1: the fever breaks? Because and I write about this obviously,
Speaker 1: and I talk about it all the time, but you
Speaker 1: just said it perfectly on a couple minutes ago. None
Speaker 1: of these people believe right that Kamala Harris is mentally disabled,
Speaker 1: but none of them will repudiate it because they're cynics,
Speaker 1: And so what you have with Trump in this coalition,
Speaker 1: a coalition of believers and senics, true believers, right, true
Speaker 1: MAGA fanatics, and and people that think those people are crazy.
Speaker 1: But nevertheless, you know, are all sitting around the table
Speaker 1: with each other trying to get political power in the country.
Speaker 1: So I think it's the I think it's the great
Speaker 1: question at hand is where what happens to Trump?
Speaker 2: Right? What? Where?
Speaker 1: Where does he go? What does he do? You know
Speaker 1: in the aftermath of this, if you proved to be right,
Speaker 1: and I'm with you, I I think that that more
Speaker 1: likely than not that that's what's going to happen. Right,
Speaker 1: They'll there'll be an exhaustion that sets in. But then
Speaker 1: again maybe not, because his hold on them has been
Speaker 1: has been pretty pretty strong. And you know, the reality
Speaker 1: is to take an avalanche, right, It's like, if enough
Speaker 1: momentum gates downhill, right, it's people get on board with
Speaker 1: this craziness. You know, if it stalls out at all early, right,
Speaker 1: you may have a break in the avalanche.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 3: I think the question about the fever breaking is reasonable,
Speaker 3: and if you kind of step back, it's not unreasonable
Speaker 3: to say, well, hold on. He lost twenty twenty and
Speaker 3: said we're going to take it back and held the
Speaker 3: party in limbo and then said I am running. And
Speaker 3: he still had the vast majority of the support and
Speaker 3: they're not abandoning him. Why wouldn't the exact same scenario
Speaker 3: play out over the next four years that did the
Speaker 3: last four years. But I think there are differences. One is,
Speaker 3: in twenty twenty there were more people than I expect
Speaker 3: there will be this time who went with the it
Speaker 3: was stolen and we need lass suits and we need
Speaker 3: this in that Trump will try it, but with the
Speaker 3: experience that it failed in twenty twenty, I think he's
Speaker 3: going to get less momentum with that. That'll be one difference.
Speaker 3: Number Two, there's a difference between a two time loser
Speaker 3: and a one time loser, which maybe he didn't even
Speaker 3: really lose. It's going to start feeling different. It's going
Speaker 3: to be an accumulation. And then Trump will also, you know,
Speaker 3: he'd be eighty two at the time of the next one.
Speaker 3: And I think in the same way that some people
Speaker 3: felt many people felt that Joe Biden is too old
Speaker 3: to do four or more years. You'll have a slice
Speaker 3: that thinks the same about Trump. So I just don't
Speaker 3: believe the momentum will get going on November sixth the
Speaker 3: way it did in twenty twenty, despite anything Trump can do.
Speaker 1: Or say, what do you think that Harris has to
Speaker 1: do to close this out and put this away?
Speaker 3: I mean, to a degree, it's like it seems if
Speaker 3: she doesn't make mistakes, she'll have a narrow electoral victory.
Speaker 3: I don't know if I look at it quantitatively. First,
Speaker 3: it's like it's looking like Trump might be able to
Speaker 3: flip Arizona and Georgia, but also maybe not, and even
Speaker 3: if he does, he still loses. So in a sense,
Speaker 3: it's almost like if nothing changes and no major mistake
Speaker 3: takes place, she probably wins with between two seventy eight
Speaker 3: and three oh six, which I believe. I don't remember
Speaker 3: if it's three oh three or three oh six, which
Speaker 3: is what it would be this year if she had
Speaker 3: the same states. And I know there's been a slight
Speaker 3: realignment of the electoral votes, but it seems the most
Speaker 3: likely outcome is a Harris victory with between two seventy
Speaker 3: eight and the low threes, with a couple states maybe flipping.
Speaker 3: So that's my instinct, which is, I don't think she
Speaker 3: really needs to do anything other than keep doing rallies
Speaker 3: with the crowd sizes that she's getting, don't make any
Speaker 3: major mistakes. But I also am not so naive as
Speaker 3: to think that nothing will happen over the next thirty
Speaker 3: days that will require something of her that will be
Speaker 3: a departure from what she's been doing, and I just
Speaker 3: don't know what that is.
Speaker 1: I think that the Haitians eating pet story is of
Speaker 1: monumental importance because if I can convince anybody that that's true,
Speaker 1: I can convince them of anything right. That's that's a
Speaker 1: lie of authority. It's also while ludicrous and I certainly
Speaker 1: laughed out loud, and if someone was recording me, I
Speaker 1: don't know what my facial reaction would have been. But
Speaker 1: you know, I Kamala Harris spoke for the world, right,
Speaker 1: for the for the country, you know when she encountered it.
Speaker 1: That being said, it is a malicious racist lie, as
Speaker 1: absolutely vicious as anything that came out of the mouth
Speaker 1: of a striker or at Goebels.
Speaker 2: It is the humanizing.
Speaker 1: He would not have been talking about Scandinavians like this.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: The picture is hordes of tribal blacks descending on this
Speaker 1: white town of Springfield, Ohio and snatching the golden Retrievers
Speaker 1: out of the backyard for some voodoo ceremony, eating them.
Speaker 1: And he won't stop. When he finds out the hospitals
Speaker 1: are lockdown, that the schools are locked down, he won't stop.
Speaker 1: He's doubling down. He is repeatedly talking about locking up
Speaker 1: political opponents, shutting down mediate organizations, revenge violence, prepping the
Speaker 1: country for the election.
Speaker 2: Is going to get at stolen.
Speaker 1: And so I've analogized many times the race to a river,
Speaker 1: and the current only takes the water in one direction,
Speaker 1: so there's never ever going back. And I started a
Speaker 1: couple of weeks ago talking about how incendiary, how crazy,
Speaker 1: how the rhetoric is going to increase, And it's increased
Speaker 1: in that direction substantially in the last two weeks. October
Speaker 1: is here. What do you see it had? I have
Speaker 1: a lot of worry about about this month. Is that
Speaker 1: is going to be a chaotic month in American life,
Speaker 1: in American and American politics. I'm Steve Schmidt. This is
Speaker 1: the warning, and I invite you to join subscribe on
Speaker 1: our substack, on our YouTube channel, follow us, Welcome to
Speaker 1: the community,