Speaker 1: And we are back with another edition of the Federalist
Radio Hour. I'm Matt Kittle, senior Elections correspondent at The
Federalist and your experienced Shirpa on today's quest for Knowledge.
As always, you can email the show at radio at
the Federalist dot com, follow us on x at FDR LST,
make sure to subscribe wherever you download your podcast, and
of course to the premium version of our website as well.
Our guest today is legendary polster John McLaughlin, Trump's polster.
He's CEO and partner with the New York based McLaughlin
and Associates. Let's take a look at the latest numbers
and the state of play moving into the midterms, and
there's no better polster to talk to about that than
John McLaughlin. Good afternoon, sir, Thank you so much for
joining us on this edition of the Federalist Radio Hour.
Speaker 2: Matt, great to be with you again.
Speaker 1: Well, it's been a while since we chatted, and boy,
some things have happened since then. Over the last eight
months or so, it's kind of been like drinking from
a fire house for those in the reporting business, and
I'm sure those in the polling business too. Let's start
with the numbers. You have some very interesting numbers in
your latest poll, and I want to start where Americans
feel about where we stand. At least the latest numbers
in the McLaughlan Associate's poll. I find this interesting. Forty
nine percent say the country is on the wrong track,
forty four percent say the country is heading in the
right direction. But then you have fifty two percent approving
of Trump and Is policies. There's seems to be a
disconnect there. Possibly, I don't know.
Speaker 2: Can you explain, well, it's a lag because by the way,
as far as our right direction number, that's the best
we've had since, you know, since since right after COVID,
when we were coming out of COVID, but after four
years of Biden, when it turned upside down and people
thought the country was had on the wrong track, which
enabled the Trump campaign to win in President Trump to
get re elected again or elected again maybe for the
third time, but four years we survived four years of
Joe Biden. By the way, Biden is a forty approved
and fifty seven disapprove in the News currevey and President
Trump's fifty two to forty five job approval and this
is space and it's posted. We posted on our website,
McLaughlan online dot com posted it this week, a survey
that was completed last week just before the Labor Day weekend.
People like his policies, and we generally ask the like
his policies or his personality like we did in the campaign,
because we use his policies to raise their favorable views
of him. And it's not positive and he's moving forward,
and it's not as high as it was on election
day because we had the whole campaign moving then and
we had whether it was Joe Biden or Campbell Harris
to pivot against. You know, we're now in charge, and
that forty four percent right direction is probably the highest
that we've had since before COVID. And you've also got
fifty eight percent saying the economy is not in recession,
the economy is the top issue with inflation, and that's
the highest it's been since before COVID. And you got
forty one percent saying the economy is getting better, not worse,
and again that's the highest we've had since coming out
of COVID. So organically, people's own situations, in spite of
what they see here on the left of center media,
the legacy media. Those people that certainly that you know,
listen to conservative told me like your Federalists podcast here
or you know Newsmax or seeing it Fox News, not
seeing n They're more optimistic because again the facts, but
people in their own daily lives are seeing inflation being
kept in check, some prices going down. They feel that.
By the way, we had a survey for the Job
Creators Network where we asked them about to Trump tax
cuts and when you told them about provisions, they supported
like sixty eight twenty and they support the President's tax
cuts fifty four to thirty seven. But also small business
owners and that's four hundred four hundred small business owners
and employers that we do for the Job Greiders Network.
They think things are getting better. So things are organically
getting better in the country at the grassroots level. It's
and it's part relating because you know, after four years
of Biden, inflation, open borders, endless wars going on between
you know, Ukraine and Russia, and with the Gaza terrorist
attacks from Hamas, et cetera, people are feeling America is
getting strong again, and America is getting more secure and
crime is going down, the borders are secure. People are
starting to feel better about things. And you know, for
President Trump, he hasn't even been in office a year.
It's been like seven seven months, and and and people
are people are starting to feel better. And that's after
four years of Biden and Harris. That's a good thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no doubt. I mean, the numbers are where they
are at right now. I suspect and wanted to get
your take on this. My hunch is that they could
be and probably are better, would be better if we
had an honest corporate media. We do not how much
of the impact of just the daily onslaught. You've seen
it before. I know, the good folks at NewsBusters are
fabulous at covering. Yes, the you know, just the absolute
pounding of negative coverage on the Trump administration, the president
in general, you know, and it's it's it would be
laughable if it wasn't. Really they want to talk about
threats to democracy. This sort of you know, accomplice media
is an absolute threat to democracy. How much do you
think that's having an impact on the numbers that you're seeing.
Speaker 2: It's very significant. We wrote about it last month and
we put it up on our website. But thirty seven
percent of these likely voters for the midterms watch right
of center media whether or box News, Newsmax, Box Business,
you know, and and thirty six watching left of center news,
whether it's CNNMS NOW, Bloomberg, CNBC, et cetera, and the other.
By the way, the other thirty percent don't watch any
that they want to be entertained. But knowing that it's
significant because Trump's job approval in the right of center
media is seventy four to twenty two, well, he's a
net negative with the left of center media forty one
to fifty six. And if they don't watch any news
and they're in that entertainment cell, it's forty four to
forty nine. So we're slightly in net negative. But the
writer of center media gets it and they're getting good facts,
and it's going to affect the midterm votes because in
this survey you saw that the generic ballot for Republicans
we were head forty seven to forty five. So it's close.
We're still under fifty, but it's going to help Republicans
get re elected. But if they're in the left of
center echo chamber, the Democrats will winning two to one
sixty one thirty. If they're in the right of center
echo chamber, we're winning seventy two to nineteen. Keeping that
you know, in effect the generic goes Republican, and if
they're in that entertainment group, which is not getting left
or right news, it's thirty eight to forty six. So
unlike the two thousand and two midterms, where we kind
of bucked history and had a good economy. Bush tax
cuts were working, the economy was growing, there was a
sense of, you know, America's rebounding from the nine to
eleven attack, and you know, we picked up two Senate
seats and eight House seats then. And we had a
plan that we targeted Bush two thousand voters and brought
them out in the two thousand and two midterms, and
we had certain techniques and certain messages to get to
those voters, and it worked up two sentence seats, picked
up eight House seats, and George W. Bush went on
to re election in two thousand and four. We were
working for then Speaker Hassert, the chairman of the n RCC,
Tom Davis, the RNC chair Jim Gilmour, and then the
Bush campaign in two thousand and four, So it can
be done, but we've got a lot of work ahead
of us to do. I mean, we were fortunate the
President Trump's policies are working. He's secured the border, he's
reducing crime in America, he's you know, doing peace deals.
Forget about the UN. I think they ought to just
cancel the United Nations General Assembly so they don't mess
up traffic in New York. They should just go to
the Trump White House and he'll do a peace deal,
whether it's India, Pakistan, whether it's you know, whether it's
Russia and Ukraine, whether it's you know, making peace in Gaza.
I mean, get the hostages back, the Israeli hostages that
the Hamas Terras have been holding. I mean, Armenia and
Azerbrajahine did a peace deal with the Trump White House.
We should just let Donald Trump do the peace deals
and save ourselves the money that we're wasting the UN,
and you know, let him be the peace president.
Speaker 1: Or at least put the International House of Pancakes in
charge where the UN is in charge. I think I
think that would go a long way in making us
feel a lot better, at least better fed, that's for sure.
You know, you talk about the issues and the policies
that are working. You can tell that one of the
biggest concerns that Americans faced in twenty twenty four. You
can tell that the policies are working because one of
the biggest concerns was border security. The border immigration. Now
that's still a concern at six percent, but that is
significantly lower than it was, you know, going into the
twenty four election. And that's because when Trump got into office,
he dealt with that immediately. In America knows.
Speaker 2: That, and it was easy to deal with. I mean,
all he had to do was in frosional laws. And
by the way, he had a mandate because seventy five
percent of all voters support supporting criminal legal immigrants. Only
the Democrat Party members of Congress if they were keeping
criminal legal immigrants in the United States out of touch
as yes. And you know, next year has to be
a contrast election because every Democrat in the House and
Senate voted against its cuts that are saving the average
person money, reviving the economy, helping us grow again, and
instead they voted for what would have been the largest
tax increase in the history of the United States, would
have been a four point five trillion dollar tax increase.
So instead of the average person and getting two thousand
dollars more as a benefit from lower taxes, which they'll
see on their you know, tax taxes next year for
working Americans. We're talking about the no tax on tips,
no tax on overtime, no tax on social security. Working
Americans are going to get a benefit next year. The
Democrats would have had tax increases that would have gone
up two thousand dollars more for every working taxpayer. And
you know, so it's going to be a clear contrast
next year that we have to remind these voters. You know,
the Democrats are so out of touch. Whether it's the
cultural issues having met in girls locker rooms and bathrooms,
whether it's having illegal immigrants on our streets committing primes,
whether it's taking more money from you. I mean, the
Democrats are really out of touch.
Speaker 3: Are more people learning how to gain the system?
Speaker 4: The watched Out on Wall Street podcast with Chris Markowski.
Every day, Chris helps unpack the connection between politics and
the economy and how it.
Speaker 3: Affects your wallet. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reveal one
point one million Americans have become disabled in the last
three months over two hundred thousand alone in July. Is
America really is disabled?
Speaker 4: As the data shows, whether it's happening in DC or
down on Wall Street, it's affecting you financially.
Speaker 1: Be informed.
Speaker 4: Check out the Watchdout on Wall Street podcast with Chris
Markowski on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: But no doubt about it. And so a contrast election
could be too, certainly should be to the benefit of
conservatives Republicans in this country to President Trump's agenda. But
there's no Trump on the ballot, and that always is
a problem, you know. And I have seen this play out,
for instance, five months barely five months after the twenty
four election, at a Wisconsin state Supreme Court election, you know,
And that was seen somewhat and I think in a
smaller universe as kind of a first test of where
things stand. You know, It's an election held in April,
so it doesn't get the same kind of stuff. But
you did not have a lot of conservatives, as particularly
low propensity voters who come out when Trump is on
the ballot. They didn't come out for a critical Supreme
Court election, which ultimately meant that leftist will be in
power of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, a swing state for
several years. So where do you see twenty six going
based on these numbers and the issues of the day.
Speaker 2: By the way, you bring up a very important point.
I was, you know, I really missed the Trump campaign.
I mean, we have very talented people. Susie Walla's the
manager with co manager with Chris Losovita. You know, during
the primary, we were firing up people. Jason Miller. We
when you think about it, I mean, Joe Biden was
trying to put us in jail, was trying to drop
us off the ballot. You know, they were, they were.
I mean, it was just unbelievable the persecution that Donald
Trump had to face in that election that you and
I talked about multiple times.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you folks had a few obstacles, that's for sure.
Speaker 2: And certainly they were They went after members of the campaign,
they went after they went after average people. They were
ruthless and uh, you know, and American people can see
that now. But but so I missed that campaign. But
you know, it's your point about Trump voters getting fat, dumb,
and happy and complacent. Absolutely in Wisconsin on April first,
Donald Trump last November got one point seven million votes.
In Wisconsin, the conservative candidate for judge that's going to
affect the next election, going to affect the daily lives
of people only got a million votes. Seven hundred thousand
Trump voters stayed home. And you saw it in the
congressionals in Florida. Though the Republicans won those congression races
by about twenty points in Florida one, Florida six, that
was less than the two thirds of the vote. That
maybe over one hundred thousand Trump voters didn't vote, no
specials and you know, and granted the Republican has won
by twenty points, but they didn't win by the two
to one margins they had unless November. So so Trump
voters need to get a really important message, need to
be identified, get really important messages, and be made to
go out and vote, because that's what we did in
two thousand and two to win the midterms. Those years
and next year's midterms are going to be even more
critical to the future of this country. I mean, when
you think about the issues that we face, and how
deranged the Democrat Party has become, and how derange the
you know, the anti Trump media has become, and they've
lost a lot of credibility just I mean, MSNBC has
changed its name to ms NOW and NBC doesn't want
anything to do with them anymore. Their ratings have just plummeted,
and that should.
Speaker 1: Help, of course the name change. You know, we saw
how effective that was for cracker Barrel, so that should
be good for whatever MS is deciding it wants to
identify as these days.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but we're going to have to go out and
defend what we want again. You know, just because we
won the presidential race and we kept the House and
the Senate by thin margins, we have to go out
and win again because you know, they just democracy, it
just requires it that we if you want to have
voter id because the thirty five states that President trumb Wong,
we've got voter idea in those states, Georgia, et cetera,
you have to go out and win elections because you know,
it's it's it's one of those things where freedom, you know,
requires us to be vigil in every election and defend
our democracy and our rights. And you know, now you're
finding out the Democrats say they're running on democracy, but
now we're finding out that you know, people like John
Brennan and Clapper at the CIA and the D and
I they were conspiring to undermine President Trump even before
he took office. Tulca Gabbert has put out lots of
documents that aren't getting you know, getting exposure in the
mainstream media, but you know, we've put out They put
out these documents that basically they were manufacturing the Russian
collusion story that you know, people want to pull the
surprises on that were totally fake, didn't happen, and they
were told to manufacture to delegitimize. I legitimately elected Donald
Trump back in twenty sixteen, going into the inaugural in
twenty seventeen, and we can never let that happen again.
I mean, those of us were old enough to remember Watergate,
you know, like by the way, Donald Trump went to
Fordham University for the first two years of college before
we went to Penn and Fordham University when I was
attending in the seventies, had major ethics symposium because John
Mitchell went there and g. Gordon Liddy went there and
there was you know, concerns about Watergate and the post Watergate,
you know, lessons that had to be learned. Well, John
Brannan went to Fordham University when I was there, and
it's like they just didn't learn anything, and then here
they are. You know, we were finding out that they
were the ones actually undermining democracy, and now they're trying
to do it again with this redistricting. I mean, Kathy
Olkle in New York State redistricted last year because she
didn't like the court ruling in two thousand and two
said they were Gerremanic in the elections and Republicans won
eleven seats from the lines of judge troop. She redrew them.
Last year, we lost four of those seats that we'd
won the previous year simply because they jiggered the state
courts and they you know, they could and they wouldn't.
They did it. Now they don't like Republicans doing it,
but it's exactly what they did to try to undermine
our majority in the House last year.
Speaker 1: Well, John, it's got to tell you something when you
have Democrats moaning and complaining about Texas redistricting, you know,
mid mid decade, and they flee to get out of
a vote. Where to the most jerry mastered states in
the country. It's certainly Illinois is not your example of
fair maps, as they like to say it, and obviously
to the victor go the spoils. But the Democrats have
been jerry mandering for a very long time. And I
think all of this that you're talking about gets back to,
you know, with Brennan and with Clapper and Kney and
the deep State pushing out this absolutely reprehensible, politically driven
and I think the word soft coup is not overstated
at all. But they pushed out this phony Russian assessment,
this intelligence community assessment that was, you know, the predicate
for the Russia collusion hoax. And if we had an
honest media, the people of the United States, the significantly
more would be would be up in arms, but we don't,
and so that is one of the big hurdles as
you look forward to the next couple of elections, the
midterm and twenty twenty eight, that's going to you know,
still play a significant role. Our guest today is legendary
pollster John McLaughlin, drums Bolster, CEO and partner with New
York based McLaughlin and Associates. They have a very interesting
deep dive poll that just came out a few days ago,
and it is revealing on many fronts. Let's take a
look at twenty twenty eight if we could. It seems
surprisingly not surprisingly at the same time, but Kamala Harris
has a forty eight percent favorable rating. Forty nine percent
do not have a favorable rating of Kamala Harris, and
she seems to be still even after a very significant
loss in November, seems to be the front runner so
far according to your poll. What's going on there?
Speaker 2: Well for the demcrat by the way, nationally that's forty
eight to forty nine feral time fer Well, that's an
improvement for because we certainly, yeah, in the campaign last year,
certainly on election day was she was not quite that popular.
Speaker 1: Now that's why I'm that's why I'm really surprised here
based on what the election results were, Based on who
Kamala Harris is, I would have thought that she would
be well underwater. I mean, this is it's kind of
startling to me. But the what's the X explanation behind
it all?
Speaker 2: Well, the Democrats still like her eighty six to eleven,
Independence are split, Liberals like her seventy three twenty three,
but she's she was kind of the good loser and
kind of you know, it's Joe Biden that they don't like.
Joe Biden's a forty fable, sixty seven unbearable, so they
hold he was more culpable. There was there was a
reason he stepped down. But when you look at the
actual Democrat primary, the one who's moving is Newsom, Aham Newsom,
because Newsom in the last month and by the way
he's you know, he's he's his favorables where he's thirty
two Fairble, thirty nine unfavorable nationwide, so Democrats are less
favorable to him, but he's at fifty eight and thirteen,
so he's got some potential there. Republicans don't like him.
He's eleven faruell sixty four unfavable, and an independancy split
but thirty one farerual thirty seven unfairule and on the
West coast he's a net posit of forty seven.
Speaker 1: Thirty six amazing mostly California, I am amazing.
Speaker 2: He's the one moving. Some people have said AOC might
be the one to move, but AOC are favorables to
thirty percent favorable, forty four unfavorable. Chuck Schumer is a
twenty seven favorable forty four, unfairable.
Speaker 1: We love him as a leader, and thanks again New York.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, but when you ask those voters who and
again this is a thousand likely voters across the country.
But then we ask them if they think they're going
to vote in the Democrat primer, which includes some independence
and certainly Democrats. Harris was at twenty five last month,
and that's a drop from December last year, where she
was at thirty five. She's now down to twenty seven.
Newsom's gone from seven in December last year to eighteen.
Now he's gone from nine to eighteen in this month.
And I think he's gotten a lot of partisan press
because he's going to redistrict in California. I used to
work for Ronald Schwarzenegger. Arnold took it out of jeremyandering,
out of the hands of politicians, created an independent commission,
which hasn't gone well for Bubblicans by the way. Sure,
but now you know Newsom's is just to one total
partisan where he's trying to pick up the you know,
those voters who don't like Donald Trump with disaprove of
the job he's doing. And Buddha Judge is at nine,
and AOC's at four, and the rest are in three
or less. And Stephen A. Smith gets won.
Speaker 1: I saw that right, Yeah, that machine is picking up.
Speaker 2: Huh, well he peaked. He peaked at two at some
point back in January. But the uh uh but football
season is coming up, so he may get higher. So
but but but Newsom, do you think do you.
Speaker 1: Think Buddha judge that beard knocked him down or up?
Speaker 2: I think he just you know, he was he was
kind of known, and you know, he ran for president.
He was like out there. But he's he's I think
he's vulnerable to people like Newsom and and AOC. Who
but AOC went down and Newsom seems to be the
one who picked up because he was getting the most deranged.
I mean, look, you know, thanks to Gavin Newsom. Uh,
California is you know, still you know, attracting illegal immigrants.
But Trumps closed the border. But when you think about
a crime was up, the city nearly burned down in
Los Angeles. I mean it's just if you're an anti Trump,
deranged democrat. California's high taxes, open borders. Uh, you know,
wildfires that have almost caused like I said, Los Angeles
to burn down. You're attracted to that kind of derangement.
Speaker 1: That's a recipe for success to the average Trump deranged Democrat,
which is fascinating that we're at that point in American history.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and could create an opportunity for JD. Vance or
some other Republican to win the twenty eight elections, but
that's a long way off. We've got to get through
twenty twenty six and keep our majorities in the House
and the Senate. Otherwise, you know, twenty the bamporters when
we lost in twenty eighteen, when they didn't pass the
tax cuts until twenty seventeen, and you didn't have the
economic growth that we needed until twenty nineteen going into
twenty twenty, before the COVID pandemic, when we had that
kind of endemic. There was one point where I was
I had been in Europe, and I called back. I
was delivering polls in Europe to clients. Called back for
a meeting at the White House. The campaign. We walked in,
Jared Kushner, Brad Parscal, other people in the campaign. We
walked into the Oval Office and President Trump got up
from behind the resolute distances. I think I have to
shut travel down to Europe, and we had all the
battleground stay pauling in front of us, and I was like,
I just took the big computer books that I said, well,
we could throw these out because they said you were
going to win, and we were ahead at that point.
But it was it was kind of that was just
a bad turn of events that that took our growing
economy and turned us into what turned out to be
a shutdown that shouldn't have happened.
Speaker 1: Probably bad turn of events and opportunities. Remember that's that
was the the Rama manual idea, and he didn't come
up with it, but he certainly drove it home during
the Obama administration has never let a good crisis go
to way and that's exactly what they did.
Speaker 3: And our.
Speaker 1: Editor in chief at The Federalist, Molly Hemingway, wrote an
excellent book about the mechanics the mechanizations of the twenty
twenty rig election, And we'll never get a full accounting
of the numbers, but we know the systems that were
put in place, the leftist nonprofits, the Zuckerbucks, all of
that stuff. People are right to still have questions and
be suspicious about the outcome of that election not to
be labor on twenty twenty eight, but here I am
be laboring on twenty twenty eight. Just a quick note,
you mentioned JD. Vance possibly being in a very good
position with the wave the left is running itself the
way the Democratic Party is running itself in America today.
He is the solid front runner at the moment. He's
the vice president, but he is He's not a Kamala
Kamala Harris vice president. He has I think, really shown
himself to be a credible number two and certainly a
credible candidate for president in twenty twenty eight. And his
number show it, don't they.
Speaker 2: Yes, And in fact, he's actually gone up from last
December where he was at twenty five. And we've been
asking about Donald Trump Junior because there was always some
speculation about that he has the brand name. But JD's
gone from twenty five to thirty six when you look
at this month, and John Donald Trump Junior one from
twenty one to sixteen. But Ron DeSantis also hit double
digits at ten. So yeah, there's a lot. I think
a lot depends upon what happens in the midterms, because
keeping the House and keeping the Senate or Paramount right
now and President Trump putting together the policies that that
could happen. And that's the most important thing right now
is that we that we make sure that the economy
is growing, we make sure that America is stronger. I mean,
the Trump brand is about peace and prosperity, and the
economic policies are in place that you know, we certainly need.
You know, what's interesting is that that business all I
mentioned to you, from job creators to network when you
ask these small businesses, you ask them about, even though
they're more optimistic and they're very supportive of the Trump
tax cuts, how difficult it is for them to raise
capital and this interest in interest rate environment. Sixty nine
percent of small business owners and employers say it's difficult.
And if they do, they support the Federal Reserve cutting
interest rates. Is it's next meeting lower credit courts? Seventy
four percent support that. That goes across the board, whether
you know whether the size of business or your political
I mean your politics. They want the interest rates to
be cut. They want to see the economy continue to grow.
And you know that's you know, it's it's really important
that the Trump tax cuts that you know, ironically began
in the first term because going back to the twenty
sixteen election, I remember sitting in President Trump's office in
twenty six floor Trump Tower, and it was right after
you know, they were battling. It was battling Ted Cruz
and crew'ses one ioway, he won Wisconsin and we were
going to the New York primaries and President Trump says
to me, do you think we need a tax cut?
I said, of course. You know you're out there on
trade and immigration, but you're running in a Republican primary.
And he says, where I go. And I said, you
just talked to Larry Cudlow, and just you know, Larry,
I said, Cale, Larry helped put together a great player
for you, and he did with Steve Moore and Steve
Forbes and bar Laffer and they and Trump got it passed.
When he got it passed, it was growing the economy.
And now you've got Trump two point zero, the Trump
tax cuts that you know, they're growing the economy again.
Markets are up for one k's are up, you know,
small businesses or nine out of ten of those businesses,
and that in that job carriers network, Pole said they
are going to grow their businesses. They're going to take
advantage of the Trump tax cuts, the deductions, the you know,
expensing for equipment, expensive drant restucts, and expensive research. They're
going to take advantage of that. And nine out of
ten of them and tell us they're going to do
things like almost have said they're going to raise their
employees' wages and benefits. They're going to expand their operations,
they're going to hire more people. One in five said
they'll hire more people. And uh so there's a lot
of good benefits that you could just see. It's in
place that we we we can have a growing economy
like Ronald Reagan did going into the eighty four elections,
or like Donald Trump did certainly going into the twenty
twenty elections until COVID hit, and uh, you know, like
w Bush had going into the economy twenty two thousand
and two midterms. That kind of a growing economy is
really important at keeping the House and keeping the Senate
and keeping the overall economy growing and not allowing the
Gavin Newsan's of the world to say California's high tax
rates are good for everybody. No, yeah, absolutely not.
Speaker 1: Well, you hope that the derangement like COVID doesn't spread.
But you know, the usual suspects in the accomplished media
are helping as much as they possibly can. You talk
about the importance. Clearly, it is critical that if Republicans
and Donald Trump hope to continue on with the agenda
Trump has set the ambitious agenda, they're going to need
to hold on to the reigns of power in Congress.
A lot of folks have talked, understandably so about Republicans
the challenges of holding the House with a very narrow
majority right now. What doesn't get the same kind of
conversation though, is I know you've looked at these numbers.
Republicans have their own share of challenges in holding the
Senate as successful as they were in twenty four in
regaining the Senate, what are the numbers look like there?
Speaker 2: Well, I think a lot of people are more optimistic
about the Senate races because it's fewer. But you've just
had Joni Ernst decide to retire in Iowa, and you
had Tom Tillis in North Carolina, but having pulled for
Donald Trump three times, he won North Carolina, and certainly
Burt Jones running for governor. Well, it's the center race
against USO in Georgia is going to be a key race.
So you when you look at the when you look
at this the Senate races, they're less vulnerable to say,
a generic wave of Trump voters stay home. Where I mean,
if you have Trump voters stay home, we got to
really worry about the House and they'll be like forty
to fifty seats in play in the House. However, if
we can motivate the Trump voters to come out, we
should be able to hold the House. But in the
center races, when you look at you know, toss ups,
you allow Michigan where you have Mike Rodgers, who came
close last time running again, and we had worked for
Dave McCormick in Pennsylvania. My brother Jim was doing his
bowling and he was able to win that close race.
But when you've got toss up races in Michigan, in
North Carolina, and as Off, he's polling in the mid
forties in Georgia, which is a bad sign for an incumbent,
so it means he's vulnerable. And again we had polled
for President Trump in the in all three races for
him in Georgia. And the only reason I think we
barely lost Georgia in twenty twenty was because of the
drop boxes. Well, when Georgia fixed their election law requiring
voter I D for early in person vorroing, voter I
D for mail in ballots and voter I D on
election day, I think that's strained now a lot of
the races that we won handily, decisively and uh in
last November. Uh. And then you've got, you know, a
close center race in Maine. You'll have Susan Collins and
she'll be in a close center race New Hampshire or
Shaheen or retiring. Donald Trump came close to winning New Hampshire.
And I think that you know, you've got candidates like
Dan Innes up there who could who could give give
a good race to Papas and the Democrats. And you've
got uh, You've got to Ohio. We should be able
to hold share. Brown is going to run again, but
Houston should be able to hold that, and we could
give them a race in Minnesota. We should be able
to hold Iowa. You know, those of us who were
called the des Moines Register of the You and I
have spoken about before. I would you know. I mean
President Trump won that decisively and it wasn't in play,
and we should be able to hold that race. And uh,
you know Cornying or Paxton should win in Texas, so
you know, so the Senate, the Senate's in play, but
a lot's going to depend upon you know, like Michael
Wattley North Carolina, he's running to replace Tom Tillis. A
lot's going to depend upon the strength of those individual
candidates and President Trump's support for them to get out
the Trump voters again, particularly in states like Georgia and
North Carolina and Michigan which we won and uh, you know,
King close in New Hampshire. But uh, you know, we
should be able to win these races and hold the Senate.
Speaker 1: And Selzer sees a blowout for the Democrat Senate candidate
in Iowa.
Speaker 2: So I don't think he's retired.
Speaker 1: Yeah, one thing you won't see coming up in the
midterms is an Selzer polling at all.
Speaker 2: I think before that she was very professional, but I
think the Des Moines Register editorial board took advantage of her.
Speaker 1: It would see it would seem that way. I would
like to see some of the communications and memos behind
that that I don't know if we will. There's good
news from this poll. There's a lot of good news
from this poll for conservatives and for conservative principles. But
I think it is important to note that the McLaughlin
poll finds raving support still for capitalism at about sixty
five percent, what socialism or John around fourteen percent, Although
I will say this, a new Rasmussen poll is out
and they suggest that a majority of people eighteen to
thirty nine support democratic socialist on the on the ballot.
You know, your your New York communist running over there.
Maybe maybe they've got some some solidarity behind him, but
your your polling suggests that we are still steeped in
the principles of free markets and free people.
Speaker 2: Well, the big differences, it's the contrast and the way
Scott ward is question is different than we pulled for
Nuke Ingrich and his American New Majority project, where we
call it big government socialism and you know, and that's fair.
And the reason is, you think about this, a lot
of the voters in the United States today were not
born until after the Berlin Wall came down in the
Iron Curtain King, so you don't really understand communism and socialism.
You know, them haven't been to China, and most of
them have not been to you know, certainly Russia where
they they you know, may not be capital it may
not be capitalism, but it's certainly not and it may
not be communism, but it's not real capitalism.
Speaker 1: I don't think most of them have seeing the movie
stripes either with Bill Murray.
Speaker 2: Right, but the idea of when you have big government
socialism that changes everything. These younger voters, they don't know
when you test just if you think socialism is fair,
et cetera. They're they're getting this, you know, in particularly
the university educated, they're getting a different perspective. But but
that four to one margin exists for when you test
pre market capitalism as Larry Cudlo my caull it versus
big government socialism as New Kingridge defines it. And you know,
but there's other issues like when we say how serious
rising crime is in the United States is nationwide eighty
eight percent of Wall voters say this is a serious problem,
fifty two very serious. That's on our website at McLachlan
online dot com this month's pole. And when you ask
them about by the way, This is hopeful for Republicans.
I may not agree with everything that Donald Trump and
Magiz stands for, but I think they're right about putting
America first. In the American people first, they agree sixty
six to twenty nine. That's higher than fourteen points higher
than the president's Java pool in this survey. And now
the difference is too we're talking about defining the Trump
you know, Trump's big beautiful bill. When you ask voters
if they think it's more of a spending bill and
more of a tax cut, forty two to thirty seven,
they say more of a tax cut, but twenty one
don't know. So leaving it up to the left of
center media to define it doesn't work. And when we
ask voters if they're familiar with it, only sixty two
are familiar. Only eighteen very familiar. And you know, do
you support or oppose President Trump's tax cut bill that
recently passed into law. It's stead even fourty three forty three.
So you know, there's things that we still have to
tell the voters and define with a contrast versus these
these big government socialists. One other thing too, that's unique,
coming up to nine to eleven, uh for those of
us for New York. Should every school in America be
required to teach students that September eleventh, two thousand and one,
the United States was attacked by radical Islamic terrorists. Sixty
percent said yes, but twenty three percent are saying yes,
but don't mention religion. That's you know, I mean, that's
kind of interesting when you consider it was radical Islamic
terrorists who attacked us. Do you think the United States
should be would be attacked again by radical or will
will be attacked again by radical Islamic terrorists? Forty seven
percent of all voters said likely, Forty one percent said
not likely. You know, so you've got you've got voters
who in effect aren't sure that this is going to
happen again, but the plurality voters think it might happen again.
So we've got to be on in a watch.
Speaker 1: Who are the voters by the way, that said don't
mention religion? Are these cure starmer Labor Party democrats in America?
I mean, that's the sort of stuff that we are
seeing under that regime, and the censoring and the silencing
of speech is amazing. I know you've polled for folks
across the pond, across the world. That's an interesting twisting
turn of events too, and something to watch here in
the country. But I would suggest that for all of
the young socialists, as you say, born after the Berlin
Wall fell, why don't we get them a double feature
of Stripes with Bill Murray and Harold Ramis and Red
Dawn with Patrick Swayze, uh cee Thomas how I think
they might change their perspective.
Speaker 2: John. It's younger voters who are more secular, and it's
like they're maybe university educated, so it's like they're they're
just they're they're just not being you know, they're I mean,
they're not being taught about, you know, basic facts of
the historic facts. So uh so it's it's you know,
they're being taught uh a more secularized, a more uh
you know. I I would think it's it's just a
less a less realistic, uh set of facts about what
really happened on one eleven. So for those of us
who lowis friends and people that we knew, I mean
they because I'm from New York, so I friends who
were fireman friend, you know, father Michael Judge was, he
was the fire de bar and Chaplain. He was a
personal friend, so those of us. Neil Levin, he was
the head of the Port Authorio, used to work for
Center al Demonto in government Patucky. Uh. For the those
of us have lost friends. You know, you can't you
can't lose perspective on what really happened that day. So
uh And since then, a lot of these younger a
lot of the younger voters who are now voters, a
lot of them had friends and family who actually responded
and volunteered to serve after that, whether it's a you know,
in Afghanistan or Iraq or some other place where they've
been at. We still have to protect our country from uh,
these terrorists. That's it's an important it's an important aspect
that that needs to be taught. But your your point
is it's younger, it's more secular, they don't, you know,
they they just they don't have the religious values that
they understood what was going on at the time. And
at the same time, they're more likely to be college educated.
Where you want to what kind of education they're getting,
So yeah, no doubt.
Speaker 1: I think that university and doctrination certainly plays a role.
I have a final quest question for you. I mentioned
before you have been doing this game for what forty
years now plus over forty years?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, we'll do professionally. I used to work for
the Finkelstein, who was one of Reagan's polsters back in
eighty two. I started working for him and worked in
his reelection campaign as an assistant to author.
Speaker 1: And you got a photo of Dutch in your office,
I say, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, But by the way, it was a long time ago,
in this twentieth century.
Speaker 1: So look at that lush black hair.
Speaker 2: Oh jeez. Yeah, well that was more of the lighting then. Oh,
but it's still there. So sure enough. He was a
great president and he was a friend to Donald Trump too,
So there's a lot of us. There was a lot
of us, all Reaganites that have have but Susie Wilds
worked in the Reagan White House.
Speaker 1: You've been, You've been.
Speaker 2: She's Trump's chief of staff. And there were other people
like Tony Donald was a speech trier for both Ronald
Reagan and for Donald Trump. And Tony passed away after
the election. So there's a there's there's a strong Reagan
connection between Donald Trump.
Speaker 1: And all Reagan In the third grade, Matt kittle Gott
got a letter rub it in from the Resident Ronald Reagan.
I sent him a letter talking about, you know, my
brother was in the army in Germany and the you know,
the Bay Route bombings had occurred, and I was concerned,
and I wrote him a letter and I still have that.
Took that to show and tell many times. But this
is what I have to ask you as we close
out our conversation. You have done polling for a lot
of famous politician Steve Forbes, Fred Thompson, you mentioned Schwarzenhager,
Florida Governor Jeb Bush, you know, and you've internationally polled
for the likes Prime Minister of Benjamin Nett Yahoo, the
Conservative Party in the United Kingdom. How about that? In
the turn of events, who's the and and we bring
it up again, president Trump's pollster. Who was the best
to pull for? For whatever reason that might be? What
was the best campaign you worked on?
Speaker 2: It was definitely Donald Trump's last campaign use and it
was because Donald Trump we had a personal relationship. He's
although he grew up in Queens, I grew up in
the Bronx and then moved to Rockland County. But and
like I mentioned, that I stayed a ford him, but
he transferred after two years, went to University of Pennsylvania.
But he was the best candidate to work for in
the last campaign because he didn't want to lose again.
And we saw someone who no matter what they threw
at him, whether they tried to take away his wealth,
they tried to put him in jail, they tried to
knock him off the bat, they didn't give him enough
Secret Service protection where his life was at risk, and
he endured that all because he's very patriotic and he
did what needed to be done because he didn't want
to lose. He knew too much was at stake for
our country and they were dismantling all the good things
he put in place during his first term, and he
knew he could do a much better job this term. Well,
he was a faint phenomenal candidate to work for because
when you asked him to do something and he understood
it and he believed it, he would do the right things.
And whether it was during the primaries or during the
general election, he was on a mission. And at the
end of the campaign when he was asking and we've
been through this before, because after you know, after Biden
was declared the winner in twenty twenty one, and had
to meet with him in his February tent and I
said to him, you realized two thirds of the Republicans
want you to run again. And I told him, I said,
when Biden fails, you will win. Just like Jimmy Carter
failed against Ronald Reagan. You know, people would want they
had buyer's remorse. They wanted Reagan to run again, and
he won decisively in a landslide. I said, you will
beat Joe Biden in the next election because he's going
to fail, and when he failed, you'll be elected. People
will have buyer's remorse. You'll be elected. Well, he stayed
on that cour course where he just he understood that
he could beat Joe Biden, and we were ahead in
the polls ever since Biden surrendered Afghanistan, triggering inflation. In
my polls unlikely voters, Donald Trump was ahead of Joe Biden,
stayed ahead of Kamala Harris. And in the end of
the last week before the after the rally and the garden,
he called me and says, so, what's going to happen?
I said, just make your putts. I mean, you know,
Romney was head of Barack Obama eight days out and
then he blew over New York and New Jersey that
get hit by Hurricane Sandy. I said, you know, he
looked like he was out of touch, and he lost
the election. I said, you just need to make your
putts stay on message and keep doing what you've got
to do in these battleground states. And Donald Trump said
to me, you know, I'm not Mitt Romney, and he said, no,
he is not. He was fantastic. I mean, he was unbelievable.
It's like totally he rewrote history. He was a phenomenal candidate.
He's a historic figure, was a great political and now
he's having great policy wins and he's making America really
truly great again. And his brand for America is absolute
peace and prosperity. And that's what he's that's what his
mission is. To make America more prosperous, so that every
person benefits, whether they're and whether they're working working class,
or whether they're you know, a little better off. That's fine.
He wants him to be prosperous, and he wants America
to be a piece. He doesn't want I have to
put us into any of these wars. There endless wars.
He wants the people to if you don't respect America,
you shoe at least fears and you should just let us,
let us exist in peace and let us our friends
and allies exist in peace. So that's a great legacy.
Speaker 1: He definitely spoke his language at the end of the campaign.
Make your putts. That's something Donald Trump knows all about
and the importance therein And I will say three one word,
three times, fight, fight, fight. Yes, that absolutely represents Donald Trump,
and not just Donald Trump, but his mission to make
America great again. He continues to fight for that every day.
Thanks to my guest today, John McLaughlan, CEO partner with
New York based McLachlan and Associates, Trump's polster, you've been
listening to another edition of The Federalist Radio Hour. I'm
Matt Kittle, Senior Elections correspondent at the Federalist. We'll be
back soon with more. Until then, stay lovers of freedom
and anxious for the fray.
Speaker 2: I heard the fame voice the reason
Speaker 3: And then it faded away.