2 00:00:14,472 --> 00:00:15,765 Welcome to Party Politics, I'm Jeronimo Cortina, a political science professor at the University of Houston.

And I'm Brandon Rottinghaus, a political science professor also here at the University of Houston.

Thanks for hanging out with us.

And talk a little bit of politics on Party Politics this week, though.

It's sort of the gladiator tradition of party politics, right?

You will be entertained.

It's a lot of Republican on Republican violence this week.

I think definitely at the presidential level, certainly here in Texas, we've seen this a lot before.

But this is going to be ramped up in a way I think that we haven't seen before for quite a while.

So let's dig into it.

The kind of most impressive news of the week was that the CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Committee, which is a long term political action committee that appeals to conservatives sometimes very conservatives, hosted a meeting this week last week, and several notables came, including Donald Trump, Nikki Haley.

Some people skip, though, like Ron DeSantis, so we can talk about that.

But the big news was that Donald Trump basically frames the 2024 election as an existential, very dark thing.

He says that this is the final battle, which strikes me as very kind of Battlestar Galactica.

Anyway, right?

It's not appealing.

He says that he's the only one who can save the planet from World War Three.

He says that basically that communist globalists in the Deep state are coming to get you.

So beware.

Are you specifically and mainly generally.

And then that basically he is your retribution.

So if you want to get back at this, you have to vote for Donald Trump.

It's a pretty kind of dark theme, right, that he echoed right in his inaugural address and now is kind of returning to that grievance politics.

Will it work?

What do you think?

Well, nothing new.

I mean, there was nothing new on Trump's speech.

Yeah, nothing like, you know, he was talking to a MAGA almost packed room.

Yeah.

Because it was not entirely for packed a ballroom.

So not.

Yeah.

I mean, I'm not very convinced that he has an extra punch.

Like I thought when I watched the speech that he was trying to look for something.

Right?

Yeah.

Something here that would propel him.

I mean, you just mentioned the most, I guess, important phrase during his speech, but everything else was the same.

Exactly the same that we have heard in the past five years.

Yeah.

So that's actually interesting.

So, I mean, two things are important.

What you said.

Number one is that it was pretty empty, right?

Even for a Nikki Haley speech, it was pretty empty.

So he was making fun of her for that.

But like his it was not much better.

But also that he seems to be kind of extemporaneously attempting to try to find some rhythm or some kind of a theme that's going to work for him.

But it doesn't seem to be getting that much better, in part because it's a very sharp campaigner like he's not very disciplined in that.

So here's a great example of that, actually.

Here's a direct quote.

He says, "I stand here today and I'm the only candidate who can make you this promise.

I will prevent and very easily World War three."

Wild applause, according to Politico.

And then it says, And you're going to have World War three, by the way, and then it says confused applause.

Oh, so are we happening it or not?

Or are you going to stop it or not?

It's confusing.

And I mean, obviously the end result of it, regardless of all of the kind of specific details are that he wants to be able to capture that kind of grievance filled politics and make the conservative Party make the Republican Party basically the MAGA party.

Right.

Right.

And there are real risks to that.

And that was what CPAC was.

Right.

It was a MAGA event.

I mean, Nikki Haley won.

Yes.

And these new candidates that suddenly appeared on TV.

But that was it, right?

Everything was set back.

It was also a time for Trump's sons, Don Junior, to advertise a cell phone company.

That's good.

Yeah.

And I think.

He was Trump.

Why is that still like, well.

We heard the other advertised about, you know, precious precious metals or rocks or something like.

That, right?

So it was, Oh, well, yeah.

It's like a big infomercial for Donald Trump.

I didn't understand Bernie's, you know, it's how I guess the monetization of political ideas, I mean at the end he's if this thing is selling yeah let it run.

This group will buy right I mean Oh yes people you they go home, they drink Trump wine.

They're looking forward to their Trump steak.

Right.

And then they log on to Trump University and like, Yeah, but that's not necessarily going to be a broader appeal.

I think one thing he did do is try to make that broader appeal, is to try to put some distance between him and Ron DeSantis.

So during the address, he basically chose to poke DeSantis a little bit.

And Republicans who have tried to suggest maybe we should trim some of these entitlement programs like Social Security are very unpopular.

We talked about this weeks ago about the president's speech.

But basically he says that, you know, some people in the party have been attempting to try to whittle it down or destroy Social Security, and he says he won't.

So that's one avenue, perhaps, where he can use to kind of press against DeSantis, some of the Republicans.

But it's a pretty thin broth, I think, in terms of trying to move him to the next level.

That said, people still like him.

So the straw poll, get this came out right immediately after after sort of the attendees had seen the universe of potential options.

Trump wins with 62% of the vote, a 42 point romp over Ron DeSantis.

So obviously that's a pretty clear indication that this wing of the party still embraces Trump, and it's this wing of the party that does the voting.

They do the giving small dollar, they do the block walking right there, knocking on doors in cold New Hampshire.

Yeah, but but on the other hand, you have DeSantis, right?

And DeSantis wanting to.

He was at the Reagan Library.

Yeah.

Right at the same time.

And also he attend the Club for Growth.

Yeah right Yeah that's where the big checks are reach.

Where the big money.

Is.

Yeah.

That's where you know the traditional or not the non MAGA Republicans are right.

I'm not saying that the older folks don't write big checks, but here we're talking about big huge, huge checks.

Institutional support in a way that you don't have at CPAC where it's like more grassroots.

But I don't know if you had to pick, what would you pick running for president in today's day and age?

If you're a Republican, which side would you rather be on?

Which which which is team of Avengers in the Civil War?

Do you want rushing to your aid?

Well, the problem is that the you know, the Trump brand is not sending anymore.

Yeah, I mean, we just saw it, what, 2022?

I think November is not selling and people are not buying that on.

Right.

That's good.

So I don't know if the rebranding of the rebrand of the rebrand rebrand, we've seen broth right.

Not working how Trump ties selling this still selling.

Well like I want to get you one that's here and that's why you're worth it, right?

Thanks.

I'll get rid of it.

Well, here's actually an interesting question.

So obviously, you know, there's an ecosystem here, right?

We've got Republicans who are you know.

Is that going to be your word of the ecosystem, political.

Ecosystem.

Okay.

And so basically they have to figure out, you know, how they're going to get a nominee and then they're going have to get a vice president.

So one question is, who is going to be the vice president?

So typically, you know, that's been the sort of logic that you kind of bounce a ticker to try to find somebody who's going to be kind of, you know, compliment to you.

In this case, actually, the survey, a survey was done there of some of the figures asking who they thought should be the vice president.

And so it's natural to see like other competitors potentially, but they weren't anywhere near the top of the poll.

Nikki Haley, who we'll talk about in a second, Ron DeSantis, who we'll talk about in a second, didn't make the field, but Cory Lake did, who was a failed gubernatorial candidate in Arizona.

That's she's the one who got the most votes.

So Trump's going to want somebody who's like him, who's loyal.

That's probably not like most of what the rest of the field will look like, especially since they're literally running against him.

So that's going to be another kind of problem you're out to.

Like, if Trump does win, who does he pick?

You mentioned the person who you didn't know.

I think it's Perry Johnson, who's a Michigan businessman.

He got 5% of the vote.

So that's not bad.

I guess, for not being known very much.

It's not bad.

So that's interesting to note.

But Nikki Haley, as you said, actually kind of raised some eyebrows this week at the Club for Growth, talking about her challenge and the way she is framed her nomination.

Her candidacy has been to say that the party's spending too much money or they're allowing too much money to be spent.

She says Republicans are to blame.

Democrats are to blame and basically says that this is something that has to be fixed for the future.

So my question to you is, is this a good strategy for her?

Right?

I mean, Trump goes for the kind of grievance filled, you know, World War three is coming.

I'm the only one who can save, you know, And yeah.

Yeah, same.

Time.

Yeah, but maybe not so confusing.

But he goes for that grievance, sort of politics.

But she goes for the kind of traditional Republican low spending, kind of low taxes.

Right.

Return to that theme of Republican Party politics.

Is it going to work?

Is it going to give her enough of the vote to be able to be competitive in some of these states?

Well, the way that I see it is, you know, society has changed so much.

Right?

Obviously, within the Republican Party, you have a good section or fraction or a faction within the Republican Party that yeah, that that stuff of that that is, you know, towards all these cultural and social issues and red meat and everything like that.

Right.

It's a cornerstone of the cultural wars that segment of the population is kind of going down given the demographics.

On the other hand, you have, you know, the rest of the population, 70, 80% of the population that have been brought up in a world that is more acceptable of people's differences, you know, that issues of race and ethnicity are like, you know, not not that they're not important, but, you know, they're used to be in a society that is more plural of ideas, flaws in terms of ethnicity, policies, in terms of sexual orientation, etc., etc..

So for them, if you're trying to sell that product, yeah, for them is like, I don't want to buy it.

Yeah, like I'm 100% on interest.

It's like when you know, they say, Well, we have mine today, it's like I, so I don't care.

Well we put cheese and I don't care.

I don't want it's.

The edge of.

It, you know, like I don't want anything.

No, it has to do with eggplant.

I don't care.

Thank you.

Bye.

Right.

So these voters are not doing it.

Yeah.

And I think that that has to put attention, or at least like a small alarm.

Yeah.

To the Republican Party is like, hey, you want to be competitive?

You cannot go this route.

I mean, this might get you in the next one or two elections.

Yeah, but that's it.

But Republicans have been losing.

Yeah.

As President Trump says.

Bigly.

Yeah, right.

In many, many, many, many elections.

And actually, on that very point, you know, she makes the appeal to Republicans who are tired of losing.

She uses this exact language because of that reason that they haven't been doing that well.

And she didn't pointing the finger to say Donald Trump, Sarah Palin, we're losing.

But implicitly, that's what she's saying, is that that type of politics isn't getting them any closer.

So she's hoping that candor gets her into.

I think a lot of, you know, kind of areas where she's going to be successful.

But I think that the spending issue is like a Trojan horse for Republicans.

Like you send that in.

She sends that in and to say like, oh, you know, low spending kind of candidate.

And then all of a sudden there's lots of other issues because that's not the only thing she can talk about.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

This was the most prominent thing in a roomful of very prominent donors, potential donors.

So I think that's useful for her to do.

But obviously she's not going to be alone.

She's going to have possibly Tim Scott, her fellow, you know, South Carolinian running.

But one person has said this week that they are not running, and that's Larry Hogan, who's the former governor of Maryland, a by many accounts, seen as a kind of moderate, similar to Haley, at least her talk about Club for Growth is that she kind of a, you know, low spending, kind of low taxes, keep regulations low, sort of a politician, not much on the kind of social issues.

He says he doesn't want to be in a pile up of a bunch of people fighting.

But really, this is probably the Republican's last hope for there to be a real moderate choice here.

And so in that way, it's became national news for a couple of days.

Yeah, somebody not running for president who most people didn't know is not normally news.

But I think, you know, those of us who watch this and see how the field is going to unfold, see that him not joining is pretty impactful.

So what do you think?

Well, I mean, the way that he outlining these is interesting, right?

Because he has a you know, a bunch of people run by.

It's going to be Trump.

DeSantis Yeah, well, potentially, yeah, yeah, probably these and that, etc., etc.. Scott Yeah.

So I guess what he doesn't want to do, as you say, is give more likelihood to Trump for him to win.

It's a good point.

Yeah.

So therefore he says, no, I'm not going to be there because I don't want aways he doesn't want to, you know, divide the vote in such a way that you know, yeah, vote for him then you're not going to vote for these because like the calendar said theory and right they were yet.

Steve Right.

Oh yeah.

And want say yeah I think you're right that you know he recognizes as many do and I think you make a great point that like that's how Trump won right the party Oh yeah I did and there's a wing of the party like we said, that will always be forever.

TRUMP And so that's going to be a strategy that gets Trump the nomination.

So more people running, taking off little pieces could be a problem.

So that's really interesting.

So we'll see how that plays out.

But obviously the presidential race is not just one sided.

You've got a different party to the Democratic Party.

Marianne Williamson, who says that she's going to challenge Joe Biden.

We hesitated to leave to include this because obviously she has a very long shot bid.

She dropped out of the 2020 race because she kind of struggled to push back on the perception that she was the crystal woo woo lady.

Those are her words, not mine.

She was a one time spiritual advisor to Oprah Winfrey, but has a following.

All right.

There's a kind of wing of the party that really likes her.

So what do you think about this?

I mean, are we at all is Biden all worried about a challenge here?

Well, I mean, Biden should be worried because the current polls, a Washington Post ABC poll a couple of months last month reveal that 58% of Democratic voters said they would prefer a candidate other than Biden for the 2024.

So it's not her.

It's him.

It's him.

Right.

That's a problem.

Okay.

So the question is, if Marianne Willingham, you know, a fellow Houstonian.

Wait.

That's right.

You can pull it out.

I mean, it's unlikely Last time she was underwater, when you put the.

Yeah.

You know, the net poll results, right?

She owed pollsters four points.

She was minus.

I like how you think of that.

You think like a pollster.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So you owe me for putting you on this poll, right?

So I think, you know, might not be, but might be.

The cattle is for all their potential candidates to say, well, you know, we have 58.

Yeah.

Let's give it a try and see what happens.

Yeah.

See because it.

Yeah, exactly.

Interesting.

Well the other kind of side of things are back home here in Texas.

Ron DeSantis didn't go to CPAC, but he did come to Texas.

So he made a pitch at the Harris County Lincoln Reagan Dinner fundraiser and effectively talked about a lot of things.

He says that he's pushed back in Florida against anti or against left wing woke elite takeover of politics, education, COVID 19.

He invoked the Battle of the Alamo, saying that this is a battle that we have to fight and that, you know, instead of, you know, having, you know, the sort of woke foot soldiers, that they should fight them with American values.

So I like it when people invoke the Alamo, forgetting that like the Alamo was a disaster strategically, although it did provide a kind of spark in a way that you could argue is what the spirit of this is.

But it's bizarre in all kinds of ways.

But what do you make?

Number one of him not going to CPAC, talk about those things in number two, him coming to Texas on Greg Abbott's territory?

Yeah, it's well, on the first one, I think that I think he knows that setback this year was Trump's event, right?

And it's.

TRUMP Yeah.

Trump I can said like, I'm not going to waste my time, right?

Yeah.

No.

So I guess potentially to avoid any confrontation or being humiliated, you know, by yeah, you know, Trump can give you.

A nickname, right?

Yeah.

Like Ronda sanctimonious, which is a little clunky.

But maybe it'll sell, you know?

No, Right.

I past.

But then coming here in Texas.

Right.

It's, you know, in terms of public policy, Florida and Texas or governor the Senate and governor avoid having close to close I mean head to head, right?

Yes.

Can become you know, who can be at the right of the other candidate.

Yeah.

Okay.

So if it's called the 19, it's like we're we're not going to do that.

We're not going to do that class.

We're not going to do that and that and that right.

Right.

And it's the same thing in terms of the policies like, you know, abortion, gun access, migrants to blue cards.

Yes.

Diversity issues, you know, etc., etc., etc..

There's I feel that competition right between them.

So having here coming DeSantis that perhaps sees, you know, even though Abbott is also very conservative.

Similarly when you put in paper I DeSantis is more vocal Yeah right And DeSantis goes you know yeah like Disney World is world.

Yeah yeah exactly Yeah will control their ride.

That these are world and he goes full throttle ride Mickey.

Mouse is going to have to put a like put a shirt on like.

Exactly something like that.

No more like an even though they are right about the same thing I think Governor Abbott is more I would say, cautious in how he uses his words.

But again, the question is, yeah, you know, what do you know?

I guess once again, the Trump MAGA movement once, right?

Because the Trump MAGA movement, once Trumpism without Trump.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So who's going to be able to fill that gap?

Yeah, it's a good question.

Yeah.

I think the DeSantis can fill that gap pretty nicely.

To do it on like core turf is pretty tough.

Trump still has pretty positive approval ratings here in Texas, and it's going to take something pretty dramatic to unseat that.

And I think he recognizes that.

But look, if he can take some of the money and be competitive, then that's a long term play.

And so it's probably pretty smart for him to kind of, yeah, strategically do this.

The question is, is Trump smart enough to figure all this out and maneuver around it without just sort of resulting to kind of calling him nicknames and, you know, being kind of petty on Twitter?

I don't know.

We'll see.

I'm guessing.

No, no.

No.

Yeah.

You just say no is like truth social.

So of course, true also.

Yeah.

Where where people get their news.

So yeah, I think that's right.

Well, obviously the Civil War wasn't just about the presidential level.

There's more and down ballot on in District 23, which runs mostly along the Texas border.

Tony Gonzalez is a Republican representative and kind of a star for them, actually like this one.

It was like a pretty big deal.

He's held that district.

No way.

That shows that, like Democrats haven't been able to find an answer, you know, to to the kind of politics there.

So he's been a kind of a kind of a rising star.

But it turns out that the Texas GOP is not that happy with him on a couple of things.

So on a vote of 57 to 5 with one abstention, the Texas GOP has decided to censor Tony Gonzalez basically over his votes to protect same sex marriage and strengthen existing gun laws.

This was an interesting vote because it kind of rolled off his back.

Right.

So he tweets out, No mames.

Puro Pedo.

Basically, like, I can't believe it.

And well, how would you how would you I'll translate it and what I think.

But you need to tell me the real translation, which is like I get like, I can't believe it.

Like, this is just talk, right?

Like again, it's just talk from the GOP.

And I think it makes more sense because, like, you know, he's been a real kind of vanguard on gun issues, right?

Because he representative all day he's been somebody who can show he can win in a, you know, conservative rural district that also has some pretty big urban elements.

So what do you make of this?

And please check my like, interpretation of his tweet, which is actually, I think, actually perfectly played.

No, I think, you know, eventually, you know, the truth is very telling.

Yeah.

Because I think you know, yeah, you're translation is adequate.

Okay.

So okay whatever.

That's good.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it'll do right.

But I think that the way that he tweet in Spanish.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's like saying like you don't get it right, Like you are completely out of touch and you don't get it.

So the 23rd district, the median age is around 35 years of age.

It's 50-50.

Well, 51-49 male female, and he's 70% Hispanic.

He found a formula.

And that formula that I guess some Republicans have not found yet is, yes, we have conservative issues, issues about, you know, traditional conservative, very traditional.

Right.

Yeah.

But on the other hand, he understands the new generation.

Yeah.

Same sex marriage, right.

Is not for younger generations.

That is not an issue.

Yeah, it's whatever.

Yeah.

So it's I'm not going to oppose what my constituents want.

Yeah.

It's just irrelevant.

Yeah.

Issues about control.

It's common sense.

Yeah.

You can ask any, you know, responsible gun owner, right.

Yeah.

It's like hey the one.

Yeah.

You know, a 16 year old to go and buy an assault rifle, there's like, no.

yeah, who's Mental health has not been recorded adequa You know.

No, absolutely 100%.

No I make a great point.

And actually, it's funny because not only did he tweet that, I think which was a great response, but also it marginalizes the impact of the Republican Party in this race.

Now, the party can effectively raise money for somebody else and maybe back somebody else, but they won't, right?

They won't, because you want to win the seat.

So think about this.

I mean, politically speaking, the bear portion of this district is growing.

And that's really where, as you're saying, like there's a lot more of this kind of diverse politics.

Right.

That has grown about 100,000 people since 2010.

And the numbers that the Republicans have been winning in that district have been shrinking.

So he knows he's got to hold that line.

The rest of the district hasn't been growing at all.

It's like losing population.

But the Republican votes is increasing.

So he knows where his politics are.

Exactly.

Let him do it.

The Democrats embrace.

And we are.

And obviously there's a lot of differences there.

But he's in a position where the Democrats want to keep that seat and he's found a formula that works to represent his district.

So let him do it right.

So party purity is kind of a double edged sword.

Speaking of double edged sword, it's interesting to say that, like hypocrisy can run pretty deep in politics.

I don't want to spend too much time talking about this, but obviously there's some hypocrisy going on.

I don't know if I have broken news for you, but basically, like sometimes politicians are not fair with how they talk about things.

I didn't know that.

The debate over drag shows in Texas has heated up this week of last week, a representative, Nate Schatz line, who is a very anti drag, very conservative lawmaker from Fort Worth, has been revealed to have video that showed up that has him wearing a dress and masquerading in a kind of feather mask, skipping through a park, he says, for a high school theater project that it was just a lark.

And other people say, well, that's what drag is.

It's an expression.

This is going to be a debate that we'll have and talk about.

But obviously, this is interesting because, you know, this will get to the core of the hypocrisy about how people play these issues and whether or not this is something that is, you know, kind of a social policy that the state should regulate.

So what do you make of all of this kind of weirdness?

Well, I mean, it's like I don't get it.

No.

Yeah, I mean, it's like, why?

Yeah, I mean, like, I don't understand what is the the public policy intention of having something that had not had, you know, significant public policy issues.

Right.

Yeah.

Over the past and well, we're going to try to regulate.

Yeah.

So that's one issue right there.

The important issue is like, okay, wait, you said that less regulation, less government.

The government is not the answer, right?

The problem is the government, you know, paraphrasing President Reagan, Right.

So which one is.

Yes, you get me very confused every single time and I just don't get it.

And the law he's proposed doesn't distinguish between a sexually explicit drag show and a theater bar, nightclub or commercial business.

So it's definitely something that's interesting.

Molly Ivins, a famous journalist from Texas, once said that the Texas government and Texas politics is the finest form of free entertainment ever invented.

So that's definitely true.

We're going to talk all next week about the legislature here at midterm.

So we'll get into all of those details.

But obviously, we're going have to wrap it up for the week.

Absolutely.

Well, thanks for watching us.

Thanks to Houston Public Media for helping us making this show look good and sound good.

I'm Brandon Rottinghaus.

And I'm Jeronimo Cortina.

See you next week.