11/4/26: Trump and MAGA Self Implode After Major Losses, Data Centers Crushed At Ballot Box

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So head over, breakingpoints.com. You can sign up for the newsletter at the top for free today. What are we moving to next? Is this GOP meltdown?

Yes.

Is that what we've got next?

Okay.

Can't get to that soon enough.

Let's go ahead, guys. Let's cue up Trump on the Democrats.

So Trump, predictably took a bunch of calls from reporters, including Fox News, where he spent a lot of his time.

Should we call him? Oh, you want to? Let's call him.

All right, let's call him up.

If he doesn't answer.

Ryan and I have Trump's number. We've been saving it for moments like this. Let's see. We're going to do it live. If he doesn't answer, then we'll just blast off his other clips. So we're going to hold the clip here. Ryan's queuing it up. Let's see what we got.

Who's he know better?

Yeah, I can.

Sir, this is Sagar and Jenny.

Sager.

All right.

That's enough. Cell phone this. Leave a voicemail.

All right.

Send him a text.

Leave a voicemail.

Send him a text.

Yeah.

Didn't pick up. It doesn't have the number saved.

Ryan Gribb.

But yeah, I mean, shockingly, Trump accepted the election results. immediately, is saying that, and didn't do all that much on the day of. There were election monitors sent out and whatever in the Alaska lawsuit. But by and large, there wasn't ice at the polls and National Guard at the polls are the things that many of us feared. He accepted the results. And he has said, I mean, he tweeted out a hat that says veto on it. But then he also went on Politico Live and said, I don't want to just be vetoing things. I want to work with Democrats on whatever they bring to the table.

So I don't really believe that. But that's the that's the tone that he's striking right now. And I guess there's a theoretical possibility that he feels like, OK, well, my legacy is kind of not looking so great right now. If I become the guy that works across the aisle, maybe that's something that I can hold on to.

So with that, let's take a listen to Trump on Fox News.

Mr.

President, you have a final message tonight that you take from tonight and a message to the American people.

Well, I say this. Congratulations to the Democrats. They did a good job. They've been looking for this one for 11 years and they finally got it. But I don't view it as a hit on me. I think we've done a we've had the greatest two years in the history of the presidency in terms of the economy, in terms of all the things that we've done. Look at the border. The border was an open sieve. And within two months, it was totally closed. You know, 17 months now with zero people coming in through the you report the results, zero people coming in through the southern border.

That's a big deal. I ran on that. But that's peanuts compared to what we've done, because we have all this money all over the world. They're coming here. And you look at Europe, it's dying. You look at what's going on in France and what's going on in Italy and all these other countries. I mean, they're going through a terrible time. They may not even survive, frankly. And we are thriving and we want to keep it that way.

But I say congratulations to the Democrats. They worked very hard and long.

They worked very hard.

By the way, on Iran, this still remains the looming question and in a very bad sign for the world. Trump actually did say that the people still agree with him on Iran. Let's take a listen to that as well.

Clearly, that's a message in some of the polls that we see in these exit polls.

I don't think it's the war, though, Brad. I think it's the gasoline price. People agree with what I'm doing on Iran, but they really probably weren't willing to do the short-term consequence of paying more for gasoline. I understand that. I don't agree with it. I would say to people, it's a short-term problem, but for long-term gain... But, you know, is it too bad? Hey, look, bottom line is they were not able in many cases to get the votes.

And I think the Democrats did a good job. I really do. I think they did a good job. They fought hard. They were, you know, they've been fighting for a long time. They've been fighting me for a long time. This fight's been going on for ages. You know, I started and really, if you look at it, I've been doing it for years. 12 years with them. And I've come up on top all the time. And this is, I don't say, you know, I don't like to consider it a defeat for me. I was on the ballot.

If you're on the ballot, it's different than if you're not on the ballot.

People agree with me on Iran. So that's where Trump was.

I don't know if we have, I don't think we do put Trump was on with Politico yesterday.

Yeah.

And he immediately says like, Oh, maybe I will vote with the Democrats.

By the way, you know, he's all over the place because this is conciliatory tone. An hour later, he's on with Politico and he's like, well, I wasn't on the ballot. And the reporter is like, sir, you told people to vote like you were on the ballot.

He goes, yeah, but I wasn't on the ballot.

I was lying about that.

I wasn't actually on the ballot.

I lied a little bit. So, I mean, who knows?

I mean, she asked him, she's like, would you work on with immigration bill?

He's like, yeah, maybe. Like you said, he said that. Veto hat.

There's precedent for that from Trump.

It's possible.

After 2018, he was trying to work with Pelosi.

He is going to grasp, and this is the ultimate question for him, and even for the caucus, and especially who he's going to listen to. Who he listens to and how he understands the selection is more important.

Than anything else.

What happens to Susie is a huge question.

Yeah.

So you saw there that he's taking, he's ingesting a lot of Fox. We're not going to play this clip because we don't have the time. Where he's like bitching about Fox News polls. Like he watches it so laser.

Texting Greg Gutfeld last night.

Texting Gutfeld.

Complaining about Jessica Tarloff.

Complaining about Jessica Tarloff. He's watching Bill. He's like, why is Bill de Blasio on Fox News covered? Literally, that's something he said last night.

He's very dumb.

Midnight.

The question and the Murdoch's, from what I understand, they've spoken. The journal line now is going to be this was all tariffs. This was not Iran. Trump understands gas prices thing. But I think that obviously makes it very dangerous for the world is that if he doesn't hear enough over and over and over again. that actually started, this was about your disastrous war that you just launched. Oh, another thing, he did not say and would not commit to any changes in the cabinet. They asked him, will we see any cabinet changes as a result of that? He said, no, I don't think so. Obviously, I mean, even Bush fired Rumsfeld in the aftermath of 2006. You got to give the people something, you know?

Especially since some of them may be facing impeachment.

Oh my God.

If the Democrats don't impeach Hegseth, What are they even doing at this point?

I can't even think of anyone more deserving.

The, let's put Mark Levin up. We've got him last in this element list, Mac, when you grab that. But there's a full crash out with like the Israel first, you know, neocon hawk wing between him and Laura Loomer and whatever. And yeah, a lot of spin about like, oh, it's not really about the Iran war. I mean, this is an Ackman- We got an Ackman post. I'm watching all the back and forth on this site. Much of it is nasty, petulant, dishonest, and vile. Oh, what's new?

Among the worst of it are posts from Washington politicians, self-aggrandizing podcasters, website writers, et cetera. To write that and yourself be a self-aggrandizing podcaster is kind of incredible.

Anyway.

And a website writer.

He goes on to say the woke Reich should be patting itself on the back. They're all celebrating. They sought the defeat of the Republican Party and want to remake it into some kind of socialist, light, isolationist, regressive political entity. In other words, they seek to undermine this country and the MAGA movement. The president works on every day. Here we go. The midterms were not lost over a single issue, meaning like it wasn't all Iran. And anybody with a functioning brain knows that the party not in the White House traditionally wins. Some of our candidates were weak and the messaging was confusing. Despite a robust economy, affordability remained an issue. Health care, housing, energy, et cetera, and prolonging

the defeat of the Iranian terrorist regime all contributed to the results, as did the woke Reich. There needs to be a thoughtful and honest evaluation of events. We'll do that. We'll not be dragged into some ideologically driven agenda based on fringe operators, Jerry Springer-like performers, and shock jock loudmouths.

While those people will never support a strong pro-America first agenda or a unified opposition to the radical Democrats and their Marxist-Islamist agenda, including their war on the Constitution and capitalism, we will do what we have to do to save this country in spite of them. A lot of cope there around basically what he's saying is that the problem isn't we did the war. The problem is we didn't do the war hard enough.

Oh, yeah.

That's the message.

Crystal, we were talking about this last night, and I was going to say, like, I think we predicted this is exactly what was going to happen from them. And the audacity of that man to go on Fox News every single week over the course of this war, before the war, convinced the president that the people would have his back to say, as he did on his show, people would not be voting on the Iran war when we now have hard data in exit polls, as if you needed it, as if you needed it, when every single poll over and over and over again was showing the same thing, that the American public did not like the war. as if you needed that the audacity of him to then go blame people and continue smearing them as the woke right just because just because they were

against the war and that is exactly what mark levin did are there actual people that would belong in a category called like quote unquote woke right of course there are actual people that would belong in that category unfortunately for mark levin the category is every single damn person who said the war was a bad idea regardless of whether they are genuine bigots and anti-Semites. So the audacity of him to come out this morning with a post like that is astounding and tells you everything you need to know about his character and his political acumen.

Thank you.

Let's put Laura Loomer up here on the screen. Here's what we've got from Loomer. America certainly got loomered last night. Here's what she says. I hate to say it, but America is over.

The communists and jihadists are going to open our border, replace our votes with votes from illegal aliens. We now have reps who openly speak about their hatred of America, their love of communism and their support for Sharia law. We won't be able to undo the damage they caused in our country. America 250 was a funeral. The American dream is dead. What's funny, too, is people who talk like this have been going after Emily and me and Tucker and all these other people and accusing us of running something called a demoralization campaign. by pointing out how the, we're like, hey, the war is bad.

Just saying, you know, the war is bad.

If you said it was good, if you convinced the American people it was good, then none of this would happen.

I mean, I can relate to this.

They call us the retard right.

Because during the Biden administration, there was some of the same, like, you know, like, don't talk about the economy being bad.

Yeah, that was Will Stancilism. He said, you guys are all talking down the economy. The economy, if you look at the numbers, he's like, it's great.

That's true.

It's been so long that people, I remember people who would come after you and you're like, how can, you know, you're creating problems.

You're saying Biden's doing genocide. And you're like, yeah, that's just what I believe.

But he's doing it.

It's like, what am I supposed to do?

The economy's not great.

We're supposed to deny the... Reality. Look, I mean, that's a breaking points problem always that exists. But beyond that, being honest.

That's our fatal flaw.

Saying what we are. Sorry, folks.

The big the big the big thing here is that, you know, so Emily literally just sent me this op ed from Wall Street Journal.

And I look at the quote and they go this time.

Trump insisted on imposing universal tariffs willy nilly that have raised prices, damaging Iowa, Kansas and the farm belt. It's senseless trade war with Canada. hurt Republicans in Michigan, Maine, and even Texas. The word Iran does not appear in their big picture takeaway.

The first thing they mention is tariffs.

The very first thing that they take away there is tariffs.

I mean, this is, you know, obviously, look, so much of this is going to be about our country, but we do have a looming catastrophe on the other side of the world.

And I do think... At least one. Yeah, right.

I mean, we didn't cover it this week, but there's crazy shit going on in Ukraine right now. These tortured dungeons of children being revealed. Azov battalion tortured dungeons and riots. I mean, it's really... There's a lot that's going on in the world right now that feels like it's getting to a tipping point. I wanted to play this Caroline Sunshine...

clip from Fox News of her trying to inject some reality into coverage that was often disconnected from it. If we can go ahead, Mac, and pull that one up and play this.

President Trump didn't win.

No.

President Trump's message won. Unfortunately, he wasn't the messenger. His staff and his team allowed his winning message in 2024 to.

Be co-opted by his opposition.

All of the candidates on the Dem side that won tonight, we were spending time talking about Hassan Piker and Al Sayed. Hassan Piker and Al Sayed were spending time talking to voters about how, hey, you know what, maybe you don't want to send all your money to overseas wars and have it come back home and work hard for you here. Hey, we want to take on corruption. Hey, we want to make the economy work for you. That's President Trump's message.

That is the Trump doctrine. And Republicans tonight allowed that message to get co-opted by insincere actors.

Now, I love her delusion here that Trump had nothing to do with this. And it's just that they abandoned his message when he's out there talking about John Husted's ass and Hassan Piker, by the way, and Abdul, who he insisted on calling Mohammed and doing his whole race.

Jihadist.

He called him a jihadist.

After, by the way, he said Zohra Mamdani was not a jihadist a year ago when I asked him in the Oval Office.

Yeah, that's what I remember that.

Yeah, that's right.

Keep looked on that.

So, I mean, it's yeah.

So she does her whole like, oh, it's not Trump. It's the advisers.

It's never him. I'm going to give Caroline a break because she's trying to talk to him.

But yeah. Yeah.

But in any case, the message there about we were talking about Hassan Piker, who they tried desperately to make the main character and villain of the election. And meanwhile, Democrats were out there saying gas prices are too high. Grocery prices are too high. This war is a disaster. Trump is corrupt. That is really true. That is really true.

And I don't know why anyone thought that trying to make Hassan the main character of this election was going to be a smart play when they literally tried that same play with Andrew Cuomo. And guess who was not mayor of New York City?

Andrew Cuomo.

Zoran had nothing going for him except a compelling message and a whole lot of political talent. But he started at one percent and he clawed his way up because his message resonated so much and because some people were so disgusted. with the reign of the Cuomos of the world. They tried the Hassan Baikra playbook and decided to roll it out once again, thinking for some reason this time it would be different. Complete insanity. And they, you know, they even like stepped on their own, like, oh, their socialist message. Not that I think that would have worked particularly well either, but complete insanity to think that this was going to be a successful playbook at a time of deep economic discontent.

Wow, breaking news. Mike Johnson will not run for minority leader.

Good for Mike Johnson.

He's like, no one's saying that he was going to run.

Well, it is.

And on the political level, Jim Jordan will be somebody that Republicans feel has always been strongest in opposition to the Democratic establishment.

That's his only use, to be honest.

The politics of it aren't insane for Republicans. They were much less comfortable when Jim Jordan was in a position of more power. People felt like he was surrounded by lobbyists. And those complaints started to rack up against Jim Jordan, tech lobbyists in particular.

So the politics of it aren't a disaster for Republicans.

But who'd want that job? All right. You did the honorable thing. You need to resign.

You need to go back to Louisiana. You need to get a ritual sword and slit your belt.

All right. I'll serve as your second and I will cut the last in use.

I need to talk about war funding for a second. Yeah, go ahead.

So let's put up the one that's labeled. This is D-13 2027 fiscal year funding. So this was a very interesting little scoop from Punchbowl last night. They say news top house. So it's coming in to, you know, right in the middle of Election Day. Top House and Senate Republican and Democratic appropriators are planning to meet early next week to discuss FY 2027 funding. Government funding runs out on December 11th. This Four Corners meeting will kick off lame duck spending talks. So immediately the kind of war uniparty on Election Day is like, okay, funding is running out December 11th. That can be the major fight over control of the war and Trump's ability to wage this war.

The day before that, Chris Van Hollen with David Sirota. Do we have this? This is the one labeled Van Hollen.

It would be Donald Trump who would be shutting down the government because he wants to continue an illegal war. That's what he would be doing. If you're asking me whether I will vote for one penny to continue this illegal, senseless war, absolutely not. And Democrats should use their power to make sure we bring this war to an end.

In fact, I would go further.

One of the big votes we may have when we get back is on the National Defense Authorization Bill. My view is we cannot advance that bill, which is essentially a big authorization bill for the Defense Department, if that effectively allows the Iran war to continue. Remember, Donald Trump told us he was going to keep our country out of war. And instead, he and Prime Minister Netanyahu started an illegal war. So If Donald Trump wants to take the position that he wants to shut down the government in order to keep his illegal war going and put more American soldiers at risk and kill innocent civilians in the region and keep prices going up, he will tell the American people that his priority is to break the

promise that he made in the campaign.

So that's the line in the sand right there. December 11th, are Democrats going to continue funding for the war?

Chris Murphy. Do we have the Chris Murphy side? All right, cool. So Chris Murphy.

Yeah, let's let's roll him. This is before he had a stroke. Understand they caught it pretty quickly. Hopefully he's going to make a full recovery. This is Chris Murphy talking about the intelligence that he's seen about the Trump war plans.

In one of these briefings, we did get the chance to have a fairly detailed conversation about what the war plan would be if we restarted. Military operations. You've heard a preview that it would be a short duration plan. I will just say this. Their plan is insane. It won't, it won't, it will lead to devastating escalation and the likely destruction of our commitment to the rule of law.

Can you say more?

I mean, there's been open reporting as to, you know, what we may be planning and the civilian infrastructure that we may be targeting. I think the plan, the plan that they have, they've been asked by the president to develop a plan, whether they believe it, it will work or not, I do not know. But the plan that they have developed will lead, in my view, to a prolongment and an escalation of this war that will be devastating for our security interests.

And so then he followed that by saying, in December, we're going to pass a CR, which funds all of this insanity. And then we're going to fight this out in January or February.

And it's like.

Why would you do that?

Hold on.

You just said this is complete insanity.

Yeah, complete insanity and absolutely devastating. Let's go ahead and fund it in December.

Let's think through.

So, I mean, not to get too nerdy on it, but let's think through this. Schumer is almost certainly going to be majority leader.

Okay.

We'll see.

Well, I mean, from what I've seen right now, or at least the way he's acting, others, not enough of these people are on the record against him.

One thing I saw floated is that he may agree to resign, to basically step down after his term is up in two years.

Pass the baton.

Right.

And that may be his play is to say basically like, eh, let me do this for two years.

Because if AOC runs, it's not like they're coming back anyway.

Okay, so let's tease it. Schumer is, I mean, he's actually retired.

I wouldn't say he's pro-Iran war, but, you know, pro-Israel, probably secretly pro-Iran war in the way that Dan Osborne was secretly.

He would have been pro another Iran war.

Yeah, that's right.

Not this kind, but a different kind. So, I mean, is he really going to lead?

Like, this gets to our conversation yesterday about Pelosi not wanting to defund the war in Iraq.

I mean, this is going to be a titanic struggle. Yeah, he's going to have to work hard. Who are these.

Other establishment Dems I'm thinking of? Like the Minnesota, what's that woman's name?

Peggy Flanagan.

No, the other one.

Tina Smith. She was replaced by Peggy Flanagan.

Oh, sorry.

Okay, so I'm trying to think off the top of my head. The more establishment type people who are going to be in the Senate.

Right, there's a bunch of them.

Who are going to be on the opposite side.

Well, won't be Klobuchar.

Mark Warner is a good example.

Somebody like that.

Right.

You know, people people who are much more in the Schumer camp and will often use him as cover and be like, oh, blame Schumer when.

Secretly like they believe that type of stuff.

There are a lot of Democrats like that.

Yes, absolutely.

Oh, what's Connecticut? What's the guy who lied about Vietnam? Yeah, exactly. People like that. We're all.

Very secretly, very establishment. They're not with the Times. They're probably looking at this with horror, because now.

They actually have to do something.

That's why I keep highlighting December 11th, because they're feigning this lack of power.

You can't let them feign that.

We were talking about this last night.

It's the Republican Senate after the Tea Party wave in 2010, 2012, 2014, where they were being called wacko birds by Lindsey Graham and John McCain, and there was a real effort to undermine them, despite the fact that the Republican electorate was clearly, clearly, clearly going in one direction. You had mandates from Republican voters over and over again, and Mitch McConnell clung to power by blocking Obama's SCOTUS nomination. I mean, that's really what wins him the trust of Republicans, is he takes a big swing. So if Chuck Schumer has something like that in him, who knows if that's even enough, because this is even more of a route than Republicans had in 10, 12, and 14.

Yeah.

I mean, I go back to what Jack was saying on the livestream last night. If Democrats really want to seize the moment, and create a break from the failures of the past. This is still a very unpopular party. They should turf Chuck Schumer. That should happen.

It should be obvious.

Yes.

And the reckoning was, yes, primarily of Trump and the Iran war and all of those things. But if you look over the course of the Democratic primary process, there was a major reckoning that was happening within the Democratic Party as well, which will continue. moving forward. I mean, Haley Stevens is the prime example of that. And Abdul Syed's ultimate victory by seven, eight points in Michigan is another example of that. So, you know, that would be a very important message to send that we get it.

You're giving us some trust here. We are not going to let you down. We are going to be different. We are going to operate in a different way than we did in the past. Now, am I confident that's going to happen?

No.

But you do have some Senate candidates who just won who said they're not supporting Schumer for leadership. So there will at least be a conversation. There will at least be a fight. And I know the Democratic base is going to be on the side very much of the politicians who are saying, we've got to do something different here.

What does John Ossoff do?

That's a big question.

But in terms of when he starts getting questions about leadership. I mean, in terms of whether he would support Schumer.

Schumer.

Not whether he would step into the role, but what does he do with Schumer? It's a big question. It's a big question for Tallarico.

I mean, these guys.

I think he'd probably vote for Schumer.

Probably. But he also got elected on a populist narrative.

Yeah, I mean, if you're a smart politician, the smart politician move is to vote against Schumer.

Yes.

The base doesn't.

Want you voting for him.

And he's not popular. It's not like he's popular with the general public. If you are representing a Republican state like Texas, a red state like Texas. This is a way both to please your base and to please the electorate in Texas. I'm standing up to the party leadership. We're doing something different. So there will be a lot of political incentives for him, for Adam Hamilton. Scott Collins, if he ends up in there as well. Andrews, you'll have incentive. You could have a horseshoe of the moderates who just won in red states and the progressives who want someone more aggressive than Elizabeth Warren, Chris Van Hollen, somebody like that. You could see how it could come together.

I don't think it's preposterous to imagine.

Good point.

By the way, even more updates. Steve Scalise apparently going to be running. So it's going to be Scalise versus Jim Jordan.

Jordan gets that, actually. I think Jordan gets that.

I think he probably wins that. But, I mean, that's big implications.

Scalise has a lot of lobbying connections.

Yeah, exactly. That's going to be his pitch. He's going to be like, guys, we needed more money, actually, to win this.

Jordan is a better small-dollar fundraiser than Scalise.

So, anyway, okay.

I wonder if Jordan plays this. I don't know if his Benghazi bullshit is going to work this time around. No.

I mean, in the face now of what, man, in.

The face of, all these investigations and the corruption stuff that's going to happen.

That's a good pitch for Jordan probably because he kind of, they'll say he's the one who knows how to head off those types of investigations because he's been part of them.

Right, and he did it last time.

I don't know.

I have no idea.

I don't see it.

Let's talk about data centers and then we can, I'll probably have to jump at that point because I'm going to do an interview with Navarra Media. Got to spread the good word across the pond.

Yeah.

And I think I'm talking to Owen Jones later today, too. So the Brits are very interested in what's going on with this right now. But but I do want to talk about this data center piece, because, again, the reckoning of the billionaire class extended far beyond just Trump. Let's go and put this up on the screen. There were a bunch of data center ballot initiatives across the country where people were voting. Do you want this thing in your community or not? And guess what the score is.

41 to 0 against. In nearly every case, it's about 67 to 80 percent opposing data centers. This was true in California, in Ohio, in every state where this was tested. And then they've got a link to the results here. And, you know, you had Ohio, you had Maine, Illinois, Kansas, California, Florida, North Dakota, New Jersey, Nevada, Wisconsin, in every single state. instance, voters said, abso-fucking-lutely not. And this is what I mean when I talk about the potential coalition that a smart and principled politician could pull together for 2028. I think data centers, the reason we've covered it is because it was really the bleeding edge of an overall AI resistance.

It was the most in-your-face manifestation of of this loss of control to tech oligarchs. And the concerns ranged a broad amount of issues. It was the noise, it was the pollution, it was the energy bills, but there was also- Corruption. Yes, corruption. There was also just this sense of, we have handed so much power, these people have taken so much power from us, including in what we can have in our own community, like the building, the character of our own community.

And so it was really the bleeding edge of that. And now you have this massive reckoning. You add to that the fact that Will Lawrence wins in Michigan, Gina Hinojosa wins in Texas, running against data centers there. You have a bunch of politicians who are winning in spite of technology. billionaires spending heavily in their races against them.

So this is another real message from the American people and mandate that is being issued here to politicians that they are not for the Trump, David Sachs, Elon Musk off to the races with AI development. And my big prediction is that this sentiment, which started with data centers, is only going to grow and become more central as people see exactly all of what the tech oligarchs have in store for us. Even, Sagar, to the point you always make, even in their utopian vision, most people look at it and go, why would I want that?

Why would I want that?

Why would I want your quote-unquote utopia, which involves eliminating my job and my ability to earn a living for myself?

And 22 hours of screen time a day watching Netflix AI slots.

Or TikTok. Like, literally, that's the end result.

That Fruit Island or whatever they think it is.

Yeah, Fruit Island.

Alluring.

I do think this is, so we talk about mandate and, like, what they need to do.

By the way, this is the one they actually could do. It's the most deliverable.

Stop.

Stop is much easier than do. That's one of the, you know, I mean, it's one of the ever-present lessons in all of politics. Stopping something from happening is much easier than making something happen because then you actually have to plan for it.

It has to be, affirmative.

And so I have multiple questions around AI. And the big question actually for the Democrats in the House and in the Senate is are they going to go in kind of the Dario direction? Like they're going to pass the AI with the guardrails? Or are they going to be like, no, we're not doing this shit literally at all, right?

I think that's a very open and kind of interesting question.

About how they govern. But on the data center front specifically, it's dead.

Like there will not be more private data center investment or zone that will be allowed in this nation, at least at the pace that we've seen so far.

If anything, I expect a dramatic rollback.

Elon's first and only reaction last night was maybe data centers in space are looking pretty good right now. I mean, that's what they're basically having to say is like, oh, well, we can't build.

Them in the Gulf because Iran will blow them up.

And I guess we can't build them in Texas because because a bunch of people are going to vote Democrat.

And so that means where? We got to go up. That's bullshit. And we all know it, right?

And so that actually freezes the, I actually don't think the market is reacting correctly. Last night, the S & P dropped by 2%. I think it's back up.

It's like skyrocketing this morning, actually.

It looks like, yeah, so right back. Erase.

How does Trump explain that? It's incredible.

He loves to talk about the market gains that he's ushering in.

Actually, I don't really understand it.

Well, this wasn't about him, Emily.

You're right.

He was not on the ballot.

This is about every other Republican in the country. I don't know about him.

I honestly don't really get why it's up because, and I'm not saying this in a disparaging way, like this is not good for the AI industry.

This is actually very bad.

But maybe the argument is that the AI industry gets the... They've been pushing for some self-regulation. So maybe they get the self-regulation that they are pushing for.

That's what I was getting at.

Maybe we get a slow air let out of a bubble instead of a spectacular explosion and collapse. But I don't understand the market logic.

Yeah, I was just looking right now.

One of my friends is talking about the various ways that they could go about this on AI. So they could do this shift to the Dario kind of EA... AI with guardrails development. They could just do the so-called like ban, whatever, what is it? Super, you know, AGI or something, uh, recursive self-improvement, but they could also make it go a lot further. They could do an entire moratorium. Uh, they could actually say, no, we're not doing any more development.

Like we're actually doing a straight up pause, right? And they could force Trump's hand to have to veto those types of things. This is another thing that we have to mention because of the results last night. And remember, the amount of power that these states have to regulate and to ban a lot of these things, not just at data centers, but remember Ron DeSantis and others who are putting moratoriums and their own individual state laws on, that now becomes a question where if Trump will veto it at the federal level, Democrats can actually lead at a state level and stop a lot of this.

From going forward.

One thing people have pointed out is that if these frontier AI companies... would stop just doing new models, they instantly actually become profitable with the product that they have. They're just taking all of the profit that they're making and dumping it into Moving closer to recursive self-improvement.

Yes.

And so maybe the market is like, hey, maybe they're going to start making some profits now since they can't build out the data centers anymore.

The reason they don't want to do that is because when you stop training the models, then you become a normal business. And then you don't get to have like an $ 8 trillion valuation or whatever insane number they put out there because you no longer have this theoretical possibility hanging out there of all of the like, We're going to literally capture all of human productivity and run the entire global economy. Once that's off the table, then okay, now you're like a normal business in the process of building apps, basically, that are extremely powerful. I'm not trying to downplay, obviously, but that's why they haven't liked going in that direction, even though it would be an actually better business and more profitable. And the models are already, obviously,

extremely powerful. There's a lot that they would already do to upend many industries here and around the world. So there is a lot of room to move in that direction. But yeah, then you don't get your multi, multi-trillion dollar valuation. I wanted to play, if we can grab it, it's in the rundown, guys, in this block under Abdul. In that 60 Minutes interview that he gave to Ross Douthat and was quite wide-ranging, they did get into AI, which is a particular interest of Ross, has talked a lot about this and has a lot of concerns himself. pitched himself as, you know, one of the things that he wants to do is right now he thinks there should be, he agrees with Bernie that there should be a pause on new AI development. And I think you're going to

see other candidates who just won who probably share the same position. Do we have that clip, guys? Okay, let's go ahead and play it.

What about the frontier where companies are pushing forward? Would you limit that?

Full-on pause.

Okay.

And what happens then, the instant question, what happens if we pause and China doesn't?

See, I just don't think that that's, I don't take that as seriously as a lot of people do.

Here's why.

A lot of the frontier research is just spoofing our models.

China's research.

China's research. And it'd be like, you know, you're pulling a skier on a boat and you speed up the boat and you're like, the skier.

Is still so close.

We got to speed up. Skier is still so close. Well, it's because you're pulling the skier. And I think that's in part what's happening, right? And they've been very, very good at just mocking our technology. So I think if we slow down, I think we will find that a lot of what China is doing is more about the dispersion of this technology than it is on frontier research.

And at the same time, I think we need an international treaty. I think we need to be working with the Chinese.

Because eventually, the water skier can still swim and catch up.

I mean, that's where the analogy falls apart.

Just running with the metaphor.

But eventually, yes, they are going to be able to hop on a jet ski and catch up. But the point that I'm making here is that I think all of us are interested in the preservation of humanity, right? Because, you know, in China, they're humans too, and we're humans too, and creating robots that get to this point of recursive self-improvement, kind of like that horror point in Fantasia where you've got the mops with the buckets that are self-creating. None of us want to get there, and none of us want to see what happens when you open Pandora's box and all of a sudden AI has far exceeded our control.

So I think we all have an incentive to get this right, but to understand that we are going to have to figure out how to work together similarly to what we've done when it came to other potentially humanity-risking technological endeavors like nuclear power to be able to contain the potential threat and work together to make sure that we are focused more on protecting humanity than just simply what the microscale incentives might look like.

I was really excited to see that because, number one, Abdul is a political superstar. I mean, what he overcame to win by a wide margin in Michigan is extraordinary, both in the primary and in the general election. The Haley Stevens thing, the racist smear campaigns, all of the money that poured in, all of that. And he ends up winning and winning quite easily. And by the way, and this is a side note, 95% of Democrats voted for him. So the entire media narrative, oh my God, Democrats are divided over Israel.

Bullshit.

Democrats are not divided. They are quite united. In fact, the only people that are divided are a few Israel first elected Democrats who no longer think that they see themselves in the Democratic Party. And you know what? Please move along. But What I hear in that response from Abdul as someone who is deeply engaging with all of the AI discourse and reading and all of that all the time, this is a man who has spent a lot of time also reading and thinking about it.

He just read about it.

Exactly.

Compare that to the AOC answer on Taiwan.

Yes.

Wow.

Thank you for reading the news.

He's talking about recursive self-improvement.

Right, exactly.

Even his comment about the Fantasia nightmare with the... That's something that people in the space talk about quite a bit. This is someone who has thought a lot about this issue. He's not coming to it casually. And so Bernie has already been a champion. Greg Kazar in the House has been a champion. But Abdul is such an extraordinary political talent.

Having him in the Senate... And pushing forward on this issue is going to be, I think, very consequential. And by the way, this will be the minimum requirement for Democrats running in 2028. This will be another litmus test issue. You will need to be for a full AI pause. if you're going to win the Democratic nomination. That is my theory. And you're going to have, you know, tech oligarchs have their guy in J.D.

If we're alive by them.

Yeah, exactly. They have their guy in J.D., so they feel like they've got their player on the Republican side. They're likely to get behind probably Gavin or some other player on the Democratic side. But I do not think it will be successful because the backlash to this stuff is only going to get bigger as it becomes more tangible to people. J.D.

's, you know, remember on the campaign, what did he say? He's like, well, data centers could be good or something.

I was like, Oh, well, it's like, you know, a lot of his career to Peter Thiel. And I know that's a little bit simplistic, you know, like when I say it, but that is.

Where I just think it's, I just think it's reductive in terms of like, because, okay.

Yeah.

It's not his political career is actually his career, his life.

Yeah.

I think what it is more under this now is he was trying to square the circle.

I don't even think it has shit to do with Peter Thiel.

He's trying to square the circle with all the money that he needs to be able to run. with the 2028 campaign and where the popular, obviously, electorate was. And this basically just blew up this entire plan that they were kind of looking at from the Elon money and others. I mean, if anything, this election shows that that money doesn't matter at all in the way of actual material.

If anything, yeah, it can hurt. It could be actively against you.

And I was going to say, we would be remiss if while we're talking about data centers, we didn't zoom into Will Lawrence, who came on our show a couple of times. And this was, I believe, Ryan, you were telling us last night, the most expensive house race in the entire country.

23 million at least.

And how did that go for them?

I think they're down by four or five. I mean, they're going to lose.

They kept it closer. There was less of a shift than in other districts. The money made a difference.

It did.

And I do want to caution about the narrative that, oh, the money is all bad and it's a backlash, et cetera, to the money. I mean, I do think Elon spending $ 200 million in Texas, people found that grotesque.

And Tallarico ran on it.

But money still does... matter. If you have, you know, an overwhelming advantage, like, for example, I think of Angie Nixon, if the Louisiana candidate Jamie Davis had been funded more, I think they may have been able to get over that hump. But there is a point of diminishing returns. And this is something Hillary Clinton learned in 2016. You know, if you can spend all of the money in the world, if you're selling product people don't want, they're still not going to buy your product, you know. And so I think that's part of what Republicans were dealing with here.

But that's not to say that Money in politics is irrelevant and doesn't matter. It still very much does matter.

A hundred percent.

Yeah.

No, that's very, very true.

And I mean, I actually am really the big question on the AI thing since we're talking about that.

What is Zuckerberg going to do? what are these guys?

He's going to start calling out like a badass.

Yeah, I'm like, bro, Zuck and Elon. I mean, let's put, Elon's in like his own boat. Like, I'm talking about Zuck.

Literally.

And Bezos.

Altman.

And Altman. And Jensen.

Yeah.

And I mean, who else?

All the heavy hitters.

Oh my God. Like these guys.

How are the best?

Sundar Pichai.

Andreessen Horowitz.

Chamath will be back to climate change shit lib by tomorrow.

Pronoun climate change.

Pronoun climate change shit lib, which he always was. But I mean, I'm trying to think too, like down the line. There's like Andreessen. Those people made a bet and it's their debt, right? I thought they were very good at making bets.

I think that this has been a very illuminating experience for the Democratic base. Whether it's Zuckerberg or Altman or whoever, I don't think it's going to be as simple as now I'm celebrating diversity and here's my Kente cloth and let me, you know, Black Lives Matter. It's not going to work the way that it did before because they really have exposed themselves. And because the central argument in this election really was fuck the billionaires. And it didn't matter if it was Texas or Maine or Michigan or Iowa.

Across the country, candidates that were moderate and candidates that were progressive, there was a class war going on. narrative that was quite front and center. And that is not going back because, I mean, people are just horrified by the amount of wealth and power that these guys accumulated and flaunt. You know, they flaunted it in your face, handing over the entire federal government to Elon Musk, the richest man on the planet, who's now on certain days a trillionaire. I don't think that they're going to be able to come crawling back to the Democratic base the way that they are likely already thinking that they will.

And like I said, they're going to have their candidate or candidates in the Democratic primary. They will try to play that game. I do not think the Democratic base is going to fall for it this time.

Big questions. All right. Crystal, I know you have to get.

Yeah, I got to run.

So we can.

wrap this up thank you guys so much for watching we appreciate it it's been a lot of fun to do it again here at the desk and for all the premium members and others who signed up of course we'll still have our continued and normal regular coverage throughout the week so stay tuned and we'll see you all then

11/4/26: Trump and MAGA Self Implode After Major Losses, Data Centers Crushed At Ballot Box

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