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This week on the Andrew Yang Podcast. And so if you come in and you're like a real candidate with a real message, I mean, Brian Bangs is an interesting one because he's running for Senate as an independent in South Dakota, and it's just him now versus the Republican. And actually now like the Democratic nominee in South Dakota, 'cause he dropped out, 'cause he was like, oh snap, I can't compete. Hey, that guy can, like, let me get out.

Jeez.

So it's not an exaggeration to say that like independents in these states are just like a lot stronger than the Dems would be. Happy summer 2026. It is me and Zach, Zach and me. Zach just got back from Tokyo, Japan. Is there any other Tokyo?

The one and only.

Congratulations, man. I love me some Japan.

I will say you should go. Definitely go. Go soon because the yen is down compared to the dollar.

Did it feel like everything was on sale?

Everything's on sale. Yeah.

It felt the same way for me when I visited it like a year and a half ago or so. And like you felt like the entire Country was for sale in the sense you could get delicious ramen or sushi or fruit or whatever you wanted, and it was awesome and delightful.

Like the best sushi ever had for like ten bucks.

The place, a lot of it. The place feels very, very safe, very clean, very polite. So I'm so glad you had a chance to go. This is your first time, right?

First time. It was great, man.

It wasn't your first time in Asia.

I've been to Indonesia, um, went to Bali a while back. But it's my first time or second time in Asia.

The second time in Asia. So, it's just Indonesia and Tokyo?

That's it. That's my Asian experience.

Wow, that's dope. I mean, you know what's funny is that's more like my Europe experience because since I was young, I've been going to Asia because look, look at this face. No, but I, I, I studied abroad in Hong Kong in, um, the '90s before the changeover. So, I had that experience. I had family there.

Oh, wow.

My cousins, whom you actually met during the campaign. And then every chance I get, anytime I had a holiday, I went and visited my extended family and now my parents in Taiwan.

Yeah.

Um, so, but I, my joke is I've been to Iowa 25 times and Italy 0 times. Um, so it's probably the reverse for you, right? You've probably been to Europe. Not, maybe not like a giant amount.

Not 25 times.

I studied abroad in Florence, which was fun.

What?

Yeah.

Really?

I did like 4 or 5 months there. Yeah, it was fun. Europe's great. I mean, I was broke then, so I want to go back. I mean, I've been back to London. I've been back to Italy. Been back to parts of Europe. But Italy's beautiful, beautiful place. But we were so broke, so it was like a different, different experience being broke as a person traveling is—it's very fun. Yeah, that was very fun.

I'd like to go back and maybe stay at a nicer hotel or something, because you can hostel it and social it and find other broke expats and then get into a bit of trouble. Fellow travelers.

Yeah, this sounds great. But yeah. Japan, highly recommend. 10 out of 10 food-wise, for sure. It's great, man.

And he actually went to Kyoto, which I've never been to. Yeah, I saw a lot of temples. And other places I really wanted to go. Did you go to like the Imperial Gardens? That's a dream of mine.

I didn't do the gardens. We did— I can't remember the name of it, but the one with like the, um, the like the 10,000 bright orange gates that you walk under.

It's fun.

That was cool. Bit of a hike. Um, very cool. Temples are cool. Food's great. Saw Mount Fuji, also cool. Wow. It was great, man. Yeah, that is dope.

So congrats on that. He even brought back some sake-flavored KitKat. Brought some KitKats back.

So in Japan, 7-Eleven is the best.

Is like, oh my God, my kids, when they saw 7-Eleven there, they just like wanted to go every day.

I don't know how to explain it. And I did too. It's like, so they have real food there. It's delicious. Like they have an egg salad sandwich. That is, it's gone viral a few times. Delicious. Um, their competitor there is called Lawson's, also delicious. Um, but they had this, imagine like 2 pancakes put together. Mm-hmm. Like little mini pancakes. Yeah. And then in the middle's like butter and syrup. Yeah.

That was delicious. Delicious.

Then they have the Kit Kats. They have like a million different flavor Kit Kats. Yes. Which I think we're, we're getting more of, but not the same. They have like sake flavor Kit Kats and sugar and Banana flavored Kit Kats. I brought back the I brought back a bunch. The sake ones didn't were not a hit. Those are a little funky.

Still, we appreciated the thought. Most of them were good. And Noble HQ. So I didn't go as far as Tokyo. I mean, I spent some time in LA promoting my reality TV show. Not mine, really. I was on it. Not yours. Nation's dumbest. And I'm now publicly off the show, so I can talk at least about my journey, my arc. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you.

For those who didn't watch, do you want to summarize it, or what do you want to do?

Uh, I mean, how to summarize? Just like, you know, I managed to demonstrate that I am less dumb than some others. I've— the show is still ongoing. I'm a text buddy with the cast members. And you— so you had no idea. I mean, I kind of roughly described what the hell was going on during my taping.

Right.

But then the thing that I'm not sure people realize is how stress-inducing reality TV is. And so when you see the fatigue on Some people's faces, you know, if they lose the competition, they're back for another day away from their family in another city, like blah blah blah. So I will say, people probably realize this about me: I did not expect to be there very long because I even said that publicly on the show. I was like, "I'm not here to be here for a while." You know, so I managed to free myself and you know and and. Had a blast watching it with my family. Really glad I did the show.

Yeah, it was funny because I knew what you had told me, right, and what you talked about the podcast, but I didn't know how it works. And I do, but I knew on reality TV they have writers, right? So they have people that take interviews from all the contestants or all the people on it, and then they cut them up and they create narratives. And the narrative on Andrew was something somewhat self-inflicted, but someone they wanted to do, like, you didn't want to be here very long. And I get it. Like, you're double Ivy League educated with a high IQ, and, you know, you got Carmen Electra on there, you know, who I don't think graduated high school and is not known for her— not known for her wits, known for other things. Um, uh, and so, you know, you're, you're not— you're probably not gonna— you know, there's a few people on there, like, you know, you'll be running circles around, at least from the intellectual stuff. Um, but they started throwing— they, they wanted you to stay for— there was a good bit for them, a narrative for them to keep you on a little longer, I think. Like, they were throwing you Like, they would be like— they'd ask questions and one person would be like, what colors do red and blue make? And you'd get like, like a funky definition of a burpee and have to— you know what I'm saying? Like, it was— they were throwing you some curveballs. Um, but it was good TV. I actually enjoyed it.

Yeah, there's a little bit of adversity, uh, baked in, but it's a great journey and experience. Uh, and I'm glad I said yes. I did get genuine, passionate Advice not to go on the show.

Did people text you during the show, like, what are you doing on here? Like, this is not serious.

I got some of those texts, yes.

Were they mad or were they just laughing?

You know, you know what's interesting? I feel really bad. I'm sorry, Yang Gang, on this. I got multiple people say they were really angry that they saw I was on the show because they felt like someone was somehow insulting me, not realizing that I voluntarily, like, like, like took the ask.

They tricked you or something.

Yeah, so there was like a— there was Um, so I apologize to anyone who felt that way because I did say yes, but someone's like, oh, you know, you're not dumb. Like, you know, what are you doing on the show? They were like mad on my behalf.

Mm-hmm.

And so I was like, I feel bad for that. Um, I got texts being like, hey, um, what are you doing on the show? And then I got, um, I got a text, um, that I really appreciated from someone who said, I have watched your episodes and I'm happy to report that you Um, have not destroyed your own reputation and have not hurt, um, any of the movements that you're associated with. And, uh, that, like, you know, that if anything, you might even have helped and enhanced them. So congratulations. But I— so I got messages like that.

So I get a lot of this because ever since I've— I ran your presidential campaign, people will text me sometimes instead of texting you, or they will— there's this sort of thing where it's like, I actually feel really bad about that. And then there's a lot of, uh, You know, what are you letting Andrew do? Or why aren't you controlling the legacy in this? And I, my response to anybody who's, who's said that to me or thought that is like, one, you're your own man. One, you know, ignoring whether I was supportive of this, whatever. I thought it was fun. Um, you're your own man, do your thing. But the other thing, which, which I thought was funny, is like, I think there's, there's some sort of high mightiness of politicians where they're like, no, this is a serious profession. And like, we're— the elected leaders we need to— which, part of that's true, but also I think people don't need to take themselves too seriously. Like, if you have presidential or political ambitions, this shouldn't stop any of that, you know what I mean?

Yeah, I mean, shit, you have a 2-time president who's clearly a reality TV star.

For sure.

And, you know, it's hard to cover yourself in dignity and seriousness when things have gone off the rails to this degree, you know what I mean? It's like, people look up And this has happened now twice for me. Once in total earnestness where there was a teenager who just ran up to me and was like, excuse me, excuse me, are you on Nation's Dumbest? Still have no idea who I am, no idea what my name is even. And I was like, yes, I am. She's like, can I get a picture with you? Like, my friends and I watch the show, we love it. And then took the picture and was so happy and then ran off. Still no idea. Then another person also was like, oh, you know, saw you on the show. So It— and by the way, I actually get the numbers. Millions of people are watching.

You know who watches broadcast TV? You know who watches broadcast? Voters.

Yeah, like ordinary humans.

Yeah, but the show was, you know, we— I remember talking to, like, when they were recruiting you, etc., like, it's meant to be a lighthearted show. And if you watch it in there, like, you know, yeah, they're gonna rib you a little bit, but it's fun, you know. Um, there were times where you get, you get humbled. You're like, oh yeah, I didn't know how to do that, XYZ. Or I think there was one where I was like, Is Mount Rushmore in South Dakota or North Dakota? Like, bro, I'm glad you got Dakotas. I would have been somewhere around there, but I wouldn't— I don't know. You know, he had some— like, some of them were like relatively, um, difficult trivia or sort of out-of-the-box trivia, but it was generally fun. I'm glad you did it.

If you haven't watched the show and you were scared to watch the show, it's really good family entertainment. Yeah, like my kids, my wife have really enjoyed it. Yeah, we actually— I kind of miss me being on it. Like, we watched episodes after I'm, I'm gone and, you know, I mean—

Well, you were certainly a comedic figure on there.

People asked me, and to your point about the writers, People asked me whether they wrote all of the things that I said, and I was like, they did not. You know, it doesn't work like that. I mean, if there was one person whose lines they wrote, it was Jack Whitehall's, the host's. He had an earpiece in, so sometimes they would pipe in things for him to say. But the rest of us are just out in the wild. And, um, I was entertaining enough where some people were like, did they tell you to—

Did they give you prompts?

Yeah.

I didn't think— I didn't know what to think. I don't watch these shows normally, but I genuinely sort of enjoyed it, you know? It's a little hokey, but it was fun.

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Pickup fees may apply. Certainly one of the defining things of the summer. Other things that are defining the summer is this lefty populist wave that people are talking about, particularly Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan. And, um, Francesca Hong in Wisconsin.

A lot of questions about this, about the rise of socialism, DSA.

Totes.

I would love your thoughts.

So let me say on the Michigan race, I'm actually friendly with both Abdul El-Sayed and Haley Stevens. And so I was like, immediately, I was like, I'm just gonna stay the heck out of this one.

Not touching this.

Um, and I don't make it a habit to butt into races that, uh, I'm not you know, I don't really have an involvement in, um, in places that, you know, like I'm not that close to. Um, there are some candidates that I'm actively boosting right now, and, uh, you know, people who keep up with me know, uh, it's— there are 3 U.S. Senate candidates who are running as independents who now 2 of them are just one-on-one with the Republican.

Because the Dem dropped out?

Because the Dem dropped out. I mean, talk about magic. And these 3 states, uh, Idaho, South Dakota, and Montana— Dakota again— So sparsely populated and so inexpensive. One of my jokes is that, um, you're not going to believe it, but each of these states still has 2 senators. Yeah, you know, it's like, that's the math. So, like, would you rather go into an expensive populous state that's going to cost tens of millions of dollars, or would you rather go into a state where the Republican has raised $1.4 million?

Which is— raising $10 grand in a race like that is substantial.

Yeah, like our guy in Idaho, Todd Achilles, which is his real name. It's so dope, his name is Todd Achilles in the year of the Odyssey. You know, just broke $1 million. He's one-on-one with an 83-year-old unpopular Republican incumbent who's been there for 18 years.

He's 83?

And has not— right now he's 83 and has not had a town hall in 18 years. No one even knows that the guy's alive. And, you know, and he has been running unopposed in ruby-red Idaho forever. because a Democrat running is a waste of time. And then the Democrat, to his credit, dropped out. So those 3 candidates, I'm like, you know, obviously, you know, you don't want to spread yourself too thin. So Todd Achilles, Brian Bangs, and Seth Bodnar are my guys to try and create like a genuine fulcrum or alternative in the Senate. Could be transformative. So in the Michigan race, it was fascinating because First, let me say Abdul Al-Sayed, like Zoran Mamdani, is a very, very talented figure, messenger, etc. He's a Rhodes Scholar.

Former doctor. He's a doctor too, wasn't he?

Yeah, yeah. He's an MD. Medical doctor. Also has a degree in public health and really, really fast on his feet. Has a genuine point of view. Yeah. And then Uh, it's— there's an anti-incumbency wave right now, in part because of really terrible economic indicators. So 63% of Americans say they're living paycheck to paycheck. 80% rate the economy poorly. Credit card delinquencies are up to 13%, which is a multi-year high. So you look at it like Ameri— by the way, too, like, even here in New York, you go to any restaurant, cafe, grocery store— have you gotten sticker shock lately? Mm-hmm. Yeah, you go in here, it's like, oh my gosh. Yeah. So that's happening to Americans across the board and people are really pissed off. Yeah.

My Dunkin' Donuts coffee has gone up. That's the one I track every day. I see the price. That's not what it used to be. $4.20. Now it's $4.80.

Yeah. I mean, Chipotle burritos are one of the more famous ones, but like, I looked at— yeah, I looked at a sandwich the other day and it was like $12.50 and I was like, huh, that sandwich, it's a little more than I remember. It was a chicken parm. Yeah. And, you know, so So everyone's pissed off, and Abdul El-Sayed reads as more pissed off than Haley Stevens, who's like a very, very sensible, productive legislator who now, by the way, is taking defeat like a champ, where she's turned around the next day.

Yeah, she turns and supported him.

And is like, let's go.

Which I thought was classy.

Yeah, she's like classy and like a true public servant type spirit.

Did she have to give up her seat in Congress to run, or can you do both? I don't know the mechanics.

I would have to dig in. I think that she's able to keep her seat because I did not see her stepping down.

Hopefully it's somewhat easier to probably to be a good patriot there. Like, you know, I'll stick here and help you win wherever it is.

But yeah, so, and that's going to be a very, very important Senate seat because they're all important, but Michigan's a genuine swing seat, uh, and it's going to be fascinating, um, in November.

It is crazy seeing like the entire Democratic establishment sort of endorse Haley and You know, through their—

Outgoing senator, outgoing governor.

Yeah, the senator leaving endorsed her, like Pointer or whatever.

Every single establishment type. And then Abdul had Bernie, AOC, Elizabeth Warren, the progressive camp, who most of whom, by the way, stayed out of the Francesca Hong Wisconsin gubernatorial primary, which was a fascinating thing to see. And a lot of it was just candidate quality, not— but like Abdullah El-Sayed, Rhodes Scholar. Francesca Hong, very, very different background. And— More controversial. She said some takes. Yeah, yeah. No, I mean, like the cancel Thanksgiving stuff, like the, you know, the media tour that could have been a cleanup activity, but instead sort of furthered some messy narratives. And so, you know, they said, you know what, we're not going to support her. And interestingly, Francesca Hong, like Abdul El-Sayed, and this needs to be said, so Abdul El-Sayed going into the primary seemed like he was up by maybe 10 points. Yeah. Francesca Hong also up by 10 points. Yeah. Abdul El-Sayed ends up winning by 3 or so. So it tightened a lot. Yeah. There were a lot of folks who came out and voted for Haley Stevens. And then Francesca Hong goes from up 10 to just losing outright. Yeah. And so there's something revealing in their relative underperformance compared to the polls.

I'm also curious, the— with Abdul winning, the odds of the Republican winning went up. And when Francesca lost, the odds of the Republican winning went down. Now, these are odds, right? The polls haven't really come out yet, but there's some sort of narrative where the Republicans think they can beat the progressive. And because it is an easy playbook for them, they get to brand him a socialist, play anything he said that— and Abdullah said some stuff that is probably like, let's call it, at least to put it nicely, not mainstream views, that they'll play on ads, right? For sure. But the The Democrats have a more mainstream candidate in Wisconsin running, and they won't be able to do the same playbook. I'm curious your thoughts on how this shapes up in the general, and I guess what it means broadly speaking for the Democratic Party.

So that's conventional wisdom, but I'll look at these specific contests.

Yeah.

I think Francesca Hong was going to lose a general for governor of Wisconsin, and the person that beat her probably wins. Um, so the, the, uh, Crowley, who's like a normie mainstream, uh, Democrat.

Yeah.

Um, so big picture, this is going to be a very, very Dem cycle. Everyone's pissed at this administration on the economy and affordability. Said he would lower prices, isn't lowering prices. Instead, he's minting on crypto and like charging for access to Truth Social and like a bunch of garbage. And, you know, Trump's personal fortune, his family fortune, just like going up and up and up while Your grocery bills also going up and up and up. So everyone's pissed off. So if you look at a swing state like Wisconsin and Michigan, everything being equal, the Dem wins. So Francesca Hong would have massive vulnerabilities in the general because you could play some of her soundbites till the cows come home, and she's just not like a strong candidate. And so the Dems dodged a bullet by her losing. Abdul Al-Sayed versus Haley Stevens versus Rogers, the Republican. I mean, that's an interesting one because Haley Stevens certainly reads as more moderate and up the middle and the rest of it, harder to demonize and caricature.

Yeah.

On the other hand, Abdul El-Sayed does have more, you know, like a hardcore following in Michigan. I think that Abdul El-Sayed has a tougher hill to climb than Haley Stevens would, but It's such like a Dem cycle that you'd have to consider him like a slight favorite.

Mm-hmm.

I think if your entire, you know, reason for being was who is a better candidate in the general and who might cost you less money to put over the top, Kellie Stevens was probably like, you know, like a finer choice. But, you know, I would guess that it's going to be very, very competitive in November with Abdul El-Sayed. Like, you know, I think he has a real chance to win.

Do you— so the mainstream narrative on the Democratic Socialists is that it's sort of taking over the party, or there's this angry wave of populism in the left.

By the way, there were a couple of other things too, like Shree Thanedar, who is an incumbent member of Congress in Michigan, also lost his primary, and incumbents almost never lose those primaries. It happened on the Republican side too. It's just everyone's pissed off. But continue.

No, I mean, that's— but yeah, for sure. And but I'm curious, you know, some have equated it to like what the Republicans had going with the Tea Party years ago, which eventually you could argue led to Trump in some sense, at least a very angry wing of your party eventually all coalescing around one candidate. But in this case, it might also just be sort of candidate-driven, you know, where you've got a compelling person making— hitting the right talking points. They're gonna win. I'm curious your thoughts on the rise of socialism in the party or the DSA and what that— you know, the Dems are gonna be dealing with this for a while. My assumption is yes.

Sure.

I'm curious where you think this goes, and particularly when it comes down to the presidential race in a couple years.

It's here to stay.

Yeah.

It's here to stay largely because of the economic situation and the underemployment of recent college graduates in particular.

Yeah.

I mean, it's 42 or 50%, depending upon which stat you look at. So if you got a degree and you're working as a barista or in retail and you still have school loans.

Or not working.

And then someone says, hey, like, I'm here to shake it up. And you're like, heck yeah, like, let's go. And you can see that in the voting numbers where you have like older voters, they skew away from this particular message. But like young and educated, ding, ding, ding. Like the highest I think is literally you have a PhD and you're making less than a certain amount of money. Then it's like, you know, this is totally my jam.

Yeah.

And so it's here to stay in the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party has a problem here, which is it needs military veterans and moderates or people that read as such to contend in a lot of swing districts. And then in certain really blue zones, most notably New York City, you can run as like a, you know, super lefty. and actually win the primary because all you really need is to get an extra 15,000, 20,000, 25,000 people to show up to your primary and you win.

Mm-hmm.

And then the Republicans are gonna take those figures and say, look, this is the Democratic Party, even though it's still a relative— relatively low proportion of Democratic members of Congress. It's just that they're really, really visible because Both sides of the media and social media all will amplify their visibility.

Yeah.

But, but it's going to go on and on, and it's definitely going to play out in the 2028 Dem primary where there's going to be someone who represents that camp running, and everyone thinks it's going to be AOC. It very well could be AOC. By the way, just want to make a comment too. It's like I feel bad for the public announcement of AOC's engagement, just like you do anytime, like a long-term relationship goes badly.

Yeah, it sucks.

Yeah, it sucks.

It has nothing to do with her political views.

Yeah, it's just, it's like, yeah, it stinks. So the people who could run that banner in the Dem primary, AOC is the most obvious one, and Bernie is really trying to give AOC the standard. And then number two is Ro Khanna, who has been really trying very, very hard to become the new standard bearer over there. And that's been a fascinating journey. So you know I like Ro. I'm friendly with him. Some of the moves that he's been making, like you know, rub some people the wrong way. That's going to be an interesting one. But I just want to throw Ro is number two. And then there are a couple of others. like on the periphery, like maybe Shawn Fain, the head of the UAW, maybe someone else wants to take on the progressive mantle. And the progressive mantle will have like a certain amount of energy baked in—

Yeah.

To the Democratic primary electorate. One of the major questions is like, does that level of support break through to a majority? Now, there's a chance sans ranked-choice voting, and the DNC just did something super dumb, which they decided not to use ranked-choice voting for their primaries. It was on the table. And then they decided not to. So one of the dangers for the Dems is that you have, let's say, an AOC type who ends up being, you know, the attractor.

Gets 20% or whatever it is.

Yeah, yeah, whatever it is. Let's call it 25%, 30%, 28%. And then you have the moderate vote that's split among—

10 different ways.

Yeah, like—

And 3 big candidates and then a bunch of—

6, 7, 8 different people. And then you wind up— so the odds of that happening, significant.

I think outsider energy will be big this cycle, as it is right now. I don't think it has to mean socialist or DSA situation. I think Liz Smith, who's was Pete Buttigieg's comms director and probably my favorite comms person in the Dem Party, was certainly one of them. She she put out a Twitter thread. They won a race with an outsider, former mayor of Hartford, who won the congressional. Oh yeah, I saw that. And he's not a far lefty. He's just a new voice with a new vision and conviction. And the last thing I'll say, Andrew, I'm curious, I think you'd agree with this, but the Dems are complaining and the moderate Democratic establishment complaining about what they're having to navigate right now, but they made their own bed, man. This is what happens when you prop up Joe Biden instead of having a primary last time. You're just going to break any trust you had left. In my opinion, it's gone.

Yeah, yeah. The institutional trust in the Democratic Party is in the toilet because of the lack of the primary. And that there is something like the arc, if you were to take it over the years, you've had a deterioration of the American way of life over, you know, someone asked me when it started and I said the '80s, because that's when productivity and wages diverged, started to diverge.

Sure.

And so now everyone's like, okay, you know, like, I wanna change things. And, and so the moderate Dems are just in a tough spot now. You know, like, I believe that you need the moderate Dems to have any kind of governing coalition, and I line up with a lot of moderate Dems on a lot of, uh, like temperamental, dispositional—

Sure.

Um, uh, matters. But it, it's a mess. Uh, you know, they're like— and they're gonna end up with this internal struggle to define the party. And there's a bit of a vacuum right now because what does the Democratic Party stand for? And if you're a moderate Dem, you're like, we stand for business as usual, then like, that's a really hard case.

Do you think if you— it would be right around now if you were running for president again, it'd be this— this would be the time where you were like starting to declare, right? You were like, probably.

Well, I think that because you haven't seen any of these Dems declare and no one's going to make a move until—

No, but I meant you declared when you ran.

Oh, when I ran.

When you ran. Yeah. When you ran, this would be right around the top. Yeah, that's true. Do you think you would have had a warmer reception to running right now? I think you probably would have, because I think there's this appetite for any sort of new voice and energy. I think at the time when you were running, it was like, no, no, we just need— we have a great bench, we have a great party, we just, we picked the wrong candidate. We picked the wrong— Clinton was not the choice to beat Trump. I'm curious if you think it'd be easier right now if you're in the same situation, you're an anonymous man running for president.

What's interesting, Zach, is like I've seen now Because there are, you know, you can name like 8, 9, 10 Democrats who are clearly running for president and clearly just like going to Michigan, doing the Atlantic profile, like doing this. Oh, yeah, they're campaigning. So it's already on, um, uh, you know, uh, and I think just the way our culture works and certainly the way the media functions is just no one will do anything, um, with you in the presidential Until the midterms pass.

Yeah, that's true.

And then, you know, after the midterms pass, then you'll see everyone start to declare.

Yeah, unless you're the front-runner and they'll write a couple stories on you, like, is Newsom running? He's doing this, this is a presidential move, you know.

Well, I mean, we all know who, who's running, and, you know, you see stories about each of them because they're like, you know, beating the drum.

They're doing the thing, they're building the email lists, they're talking to donors, they're talking to the press. The one thing I'm not sure AOC is doing press, but I haven't seen her do the donor and the fieldwork yet. You know what I mean? Usually you'll see like Kamala's in Iowa. Just, why are you in Iowa?

Well, by the way, that is actually the major variable. And I made news. I don't know if you saw this.

You made news?

I made news when I said like, hey, I heard Kamala's running.

Oh yeah, yeah, I saw this. Yeah.

And so like that is like the major domino in the Democratic field where I think not shocking to anyone, like, you know, I think Kamala running again would be a terrible mistake. Like, I ran alongside her in 2020 and she dropped out before the voting started for good reason. Only reason why she became a contender was because Joe Biden made her his running mate because of a pledge to Jim Clyburn that he would make his running mate a Black woman.

Yeah.

And so And then, you know, she obviously got like the anointment without a competitive process in '24. So she's 0 for 2 in like, you know, and in a way that's not like indicative of future success.

Yeah.

And so for her to run again would be a mistake. But I think there's a very, very substantial chance she does. So here's what I heard. I heard from someone very plugged in in Democratic politics that Doug Emhoff, the former first gentleman, second gentleman, I don't know.

Second gentleman.

Second gentleman, was calling people saying, hey, prepare for a Kamala run. And then I heard from someone in California politics that Kamala was making moves that indicate that she's running again. And so that's when I put out— then the other big piece of news that came out was that the Democrats were making South Carolina first with— drumroll please— Jim Clyburn there to tell everyone who to vote for. So now the path is very, very clear for Kamala to announce and get the first state, which gives her like a massive leg up over the field. She still has huge name ID, still has a giant list. Her incentives to run are actually stronger than her incentives not to run, because if she doesn't run, then it's really a wrap and she might as well just go get the university appointment. You know what I mean?

Yes.

But with South Carolina first, so I put out a social media post saying like, hey, Hira Kamala's running again. That became a thing. And then I wrote a blog post being like, look, the Dems are poised to repeat their mistakes because they've given— and Jim Clyburn, by the way, I believe now he's 80.

And he controls what percent of the primary voting in that state?

I mean, it's sky high. Um, I mean, he got Joe Biden easily. Like, I mean, 2020, Joe Biden's not president if Clyburn doesn't make it happen. So, um, so that's one of the major variables in this Democratic field is does Kamala decide to run again?

I'll tell you exactly how it's going to happen. She's going to announce She's going to come out as a presumptive front-runner. It's the first poll come out, she'll be at 20%. She'll be ahead of Newsom by, you know, maybe double digits, you know, and then everybody else will be trickles. Right. And then maybe you'll have a little bit of a bump, but it'll stay around there. It'll start to drop a little. And then all it'll take is just one moment where she says some word salad and we'll all be reminded of exactly what we just did. And everybody will start paying attention to everybody else. Someone else have a moment and she'll drop and she'll drop and she'll drop and drop. That's how I think this plays out. Now, that— so my hope would be we don't get to South Carolina, right? Because at a certain point, if you've gone from 22%, you were the front-runner and you're now in mid-single digits, it gets embarrassing. You can't raise anymore, etc. So if she stays—

Do you think she does declare at some point?

I would say if she declares, that's how it goes. Yeah. But to your point, like, she's got more incentive to run than not to run. She probably does run. You know, they've been planting these seeds. She's getting everybody in her ears telling her to run.

Yeah, I mean, for the longest time, by the way, before I put out that social media post, I did not think she was gonna run.

Really?

I did not. I thought that she was playing patty cake with the idea to stay relevant, but I didn't think she was gonna run again. Maybe she doesn't. But then, but then, you know, I heard a couple things that pushed me the other direction. It was like, oh my gosh, she is gonna run again.

You got people convincing her for sure. You can make the argument she didn't have a fair shake last time. Wasn't a real primary. Voters didn't get to know her. All that's nonsense. We got to know her in 2020.

She's been surrounded by a lot of love and support too, which would tend to make one think that because she did a book tour that was like very, very lucrative and well attended, you know, the rest of it.

Oh yeah. Your mainstream Dems, they like Kamala. They don't have a problem with her. I don't think of it as like a real— I mean, some people do, but it's not like she's problematic. I feel like if I got a beer with Kamala Harris, it'd be fun.

Yeah, which is a fine, like, you know, like, conversational companion.

Yeah, yeah, that's—

yeah, yeah.

I mean, my biggest beef is that she, um, is that she's underperformed twice, and so for the good of the party, you wouldn't make that thrice. Yeah, yeah, dude. Is what I would say.

Uh, look, I hope they have a fair primary. That's what I would like. That'd be good for the party and the country.

Yeah, I, um, I mean, it's going to be fascinating. We certainly know a lot of people, um, and yeah, we'll see what role we end up playing.

I'm gonna get a call to run some campaign and I'll say no. Sure. I mean, that's not like because I'm great, that's because the bench is very low. Um, well, there's gonna be a lot of them too. Yeah, I'm saying there's gonna be 20 people running. There'll be so many people with experience. Yeah.

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And it's been fun building the alternative. It's been fun seeing candidates like Todd Achilles and Brian Banks and Seth Bodnar also, just by the way, like say, look, the Democratic brand is mud in these states, which it is.

Does Forward get more juice when stuff like that happens, when a Dem drops out or—

Oh yeah.

Uh, an Abdul wins a race? Is that more juice for Forward Party because people think we want more options? I'm curious.

I think we have a different vibe than, than, uh, like the Abdul lefty—

Oh, certainly. I meant like— Wing.

Um, but, uh, but there is like an anti-incumbency sense. There's like a real doubt in the Democratic establishment. And if you look at Seth Bodnar's fundraising, but like as an example, He raised literally maybe like 20 to 30 times more than the Democrat in that Senate race. Like, the Democratic nominee had raised maybe $50,000.

Geez.

And he'd raised like $1.1 million. So it's like, you know, I mean, it's kind of embarrassing in the sense of the Democratic Party in a place like Montana or South Dakota or Idaho is, you know, like, like a pair of sticks or something. Like, it's like, it's— there's really not much there. And, and so if you come in and you're like a real candidate with a real message, I mean, Brian Bangs is an interesting one because he's running for Senate as an independent in South Dakota, and it's just him now versus the Republican. Bangs was the Democratic Senate candidate in 2022.

Oh, interesting.

And then he walked around. He'd been an independent his whole life. He signed up as a Democrat, ran for Senate, um, and then he's like, wow, people hate Democrats here. And then he was like, okay, I'm gonna run again as an independent. And then the Dems were like, oh, you're a traitor. And then they ran this other guy who seemed fine, um, and actually now like the Democratic nominee in South Dakota because he dropped out because he was like, oh snap, I can't compete. Hey, that guy can, like, let me get out. Jeez. So It's not an exaggeration to say that, like, independents in these states are just, like, a lot stronger than the Dems would be. And so we get juice from that for sure.

I always wonder if this is, like, how the corruption works in some sense. Like, let's say you're in Idaho where the Republican's going to win this race. Yeah.

And then they don't even pretend. Probably. It's just like a—

Right. So then no one's donating to the Dem because there are no Dems and they can't win. And the Republican, you know, they're going to win. So why are you donating to this guy or gal?

Right. Yes.

You're donating for access.

That is kind of the point.

That's the thing. Like, you— why am I raising money? Because you want me to pick up your call. You want access. That's the gig.

By the way, it's one reason why it's such a golden opportunity for these independents.

Yeah.

In these states, because the Republican— everyone just assumes it's going to be a cakewalk. They never run a competitive race. They don't have that much money because they had never had any real opposition. And so one of the rationales for these uh, contests is like, let's say someone like, um, uh, Todd Achilles, uh, or Brian Bangs ends up being a contender for real. What happened in Nebraska 2 years ago in '24 is that the Republican Party sent $10 million to submarine Dan Osborn because he was actually gonna beat—

Yeah.

Um, uh, I think her name was Deb Fischer.

Yeah.

Um, and can you imagine Republicans having to be like, we have to stroke a $10 million check to Nebraska?

Yeah.

To fight off this freaking, like, random Pipefitter, which is what happened. That was like a real-life thing. And Dan Osborn's running again in '26. So like the independent wave is growing every 2 years.

Yeah. And it helps the minority party, if you will, right? Which is a good thing. You get more competitive races.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, the Dem Party is— their brand is deeply underwater in the majority of the country. And so like running a sacrificial lamb in these states is a waste of everyone's time.

Yeah. Buckle up, man.

Yes, good times. So do check out those candidates. And, uh, and thank you for hanging with me and Zach. We're now going to take a few of your questions.

We'll take some questions. We've talked this a bit. I'm going to paraphrase this question because it's from a lot of people, but, um, with AI accelerating, is UBI enough? You know what I mean?

I think most people who are really deep into my stuff know that I've always seen UBI as a foundation or a floor, and then you have to build a new house.

Yeah.

And the way to build the new house, in my view, requires caring and nurturing economy, a health and wellness economy, and an arts and creativity economy, and people pursuing their own goals and human flourishing in different ways, and essentially parallel structures around each of those. Now, that gets kind of utopian seeming. But it's also necessary as AI is gonna soak up more and more of the work. But everything I just described, for most people, they can't frankly visualize like what that is. So we're gonna start with just like, look, just get—

Get the floor.

Get the floor. And then people will be like, oh, let me invest this thing. But I think you need multiple currencies around different human pursuits.

And you could fund 'em with exponential growth and value created by AI, theoretically.

Yeah, one of the great frustrations I have right now is that people are like, oh, you know, America's broke, America's broke. It's like, well, we're broke because we've had a really, really corrupt and inept political class that has kicked the can down the road and like, you know, made it so. But like, there is so much wealth in this country, so much wealth. And, you know, it's like I'm adjacent to some of the wealth. Like, I'm in—

For sure, yeah.

I'm in rich people's homes and whatnot. And like, the best of them are just, you know, like, You know, it's like you could take away a certain amount of money and it would have no impact on their lives, and they know that. Uh, you know, there's like so much— I mean, shit, you have multiple trillion-dollar companies coming online right now.

For sure.

That are built on our data. There's just like— this is still the richest, most advanced society in the history of the world, and we're gonna have a lot more top-line wealth. It's just right now it's not going to be Distributed at all in a way that's going to make people happy.

And that's the rub. Yeah, it's not the dollar amount. That's the other thing. We spend more on healthcare, education, veterans. We spend more than every other country per capita and gross most of the time. Yes, the results.

I mean, it's funny, man, because I used to talk about the size of the economy when I was running for president and it was like, let's call it $24 trillion. Like $25 trillion. Now it's $31 trillion. I mean, shit, things just keep on heading up.

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Oh yeah, so I'm not sure we've talked about it on the pod, but Noble bought another wireless company called Helium. Yeah, and so we've been having fun joining forces, integrating there. Yeah, it's a lot of work, but you know, it's awesome to have even more people in the fam. So it's great, like now we have a couple different ways to connect people.

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All right, let's ask a fun question. This is from Jonathan in Memphis. He says, hi Andrew, I'm an 8th grade science and STEM teacher in Memphis. Thank you, Jonathan. Beyond technical skills, what do you believe schools should prioritize so students develop the human traits AI can't replace? A deep sense of their own dignity and worth, the habit of pursuing excellence, and a real responsibility to something bigger than themselves. Curious your thoughts.

I love this so much. Congratulations for being an 8th grade science teacher. I think we all remember our 8th grade science teacher.

I do.

Yeah. And that's like a really formative subject and period. The best things to try and develop— and I've got actually a son who's going into 9th grade, so I can—

Gosh, you're going to high school.

Yeah, I know, it's freaky.

Crazy.

So, and I have written a little bit about this and I'm going to write more on this. Thank you for educating our kids. I'm going to just go old school where it's like, you know, what made people successful previously? It was that they cared about something, they were resilient, they were conscientious, they were dedicated, they were somewhat sociable. Those things are all gonna apply as AI comes online even more so. And I'm gonna say that they become more needed because a lot of our kids unfortunately don't have a lot of these qualities in the same way because of our rectangles of sadness and like the, you know, the screen time and the rest of it. So as a parent, I have my kids learning stuff that I know AI is 100% gonna automate, but it doesn't matter because the goal is for them to develop a work ethic and interests and—

Mm-hmm.

Like a sense that they can actually make progress towards a goal. So some of the things that I completely missed the boat on as a kid-ish that now I would push on, I think team sports are great.

Almost ideal. Team activities in general, but sports, having a— you need the goal. So like musicals are good, but like chess club, less good unless there's a version of competition or like end product, but better than nothing. Sorry, keep going.

Yeah, no, no, I'm with you. Yeah. Team sports, Drama.

Yeah.

Music. Music collectively is, you know, probably a little bit better.

Um, if you're performing, that's good. You're working towards a— yeah.

Performing great.

Yeah.

Um, I played piano, um, which was relatively solitary the way I did it. Um, so when I was a nerdy kid, I thought to myself like, oh, these other things are irrelevant. It's all about Your studies. And now I know how stupid that is. If anything, I'm actually kind of a little more the opposite, where your studies are less relevant than your caring about something, your personality. So, Zach here, for those of you guys who don't know, Zach was like the lead in his high school play.

Mm-hmm.

And that, you know, I think comes through in some of Zach's Uh, you know, like energy, confidence, uh, passion, like belief, ability to command a room. Uh, and you could look at that as a child and be like, well, that kid's not gonna be a fucking movie star or whatever, right? Yeah, you know, like what a waste of time. As a matter of fact, schools, the first thing they chop is drama.

Yeah.

But then I'd actually flip it and say, you know what, like that stuff's gonna stand the test of time.

I had a meeting with our team the other day and I said, I started to see this trend and I said, we don't— new rule, guys, we don't ship slop. And what I mean, like I saw people just, if I'd ask 'em to do something, hey, can you gimme like a, gimme a one-pager on what we wanna do for this event we're sponsoring or blah, blah, blah. And it would, you know, whoever it was, like they'd put it in, put it in AI and give it back to me. He was like, and I said like, look, if it's, if AI's doing the job, I could have done that myself. You know, like, You're all here because we think you're talented and think you're critical thinkers and you think you're good with people and we think you bring something to the table. But if you're just letting AI do the job, that, that's a very fast way to get yourself, you know, become obsolete, you know? So I agree with you big time. And I think the future is analog. I think, I think we're gonna start seeing trends toward more old school stuff. I would venture to say newspapers come back.

In terms of education, for sure. I mean, the longer, as a parent, the longer you can keep the kids off of social media and the screens, The better, you know, the more analog you can be, the better. And this is as someone who has not done a great job with that.

Yeah, it's hard. Some of the best investors I know are investing in like in-person events and concerts and food festivals and things that are in real life.

Well, you know what, the first thing that popped into my mind is very unfortunate, Zach.

What?

But like I thought to myself, ooh, like rich consumers are gonna want that.

Yeah, it'll— my thought would be it would start— you could start seeing the wealthiest pay extra for the analog, right? But my hope would be over time it trickles down where the, you know, you start to use modern technology to deliver analog. You know, the stupid analogy would be like a robot, an Amazon robot delivering you your Washington Post, which they own, but a print copy. Um, maybe, I don't know.

I mean, I, I love me a good—

I think this is— but it's— I mean, well, I know, I know this, like, from a branding standpoint, advertising standpoint, companies are getting more value out of event sponsorships and experiential sponsorships than Facebook and Google Ads and things like that.

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We'll have a booth, it'll be fun. Yeah, yeah. Anyway, any closing thoughts for the pod today?

Uh, you know, there's a little bit more time this summer. Uh, try and get all you can out of it. Um, you know, Zach's going back to Tokyo. He's become a Japan— um, he's not. That's gonna be a lot.

I learned a couple phrases. Arigato gozaimasu, which means thank you very, very much, or something like thank you with honor. I don't know, you just say that everywhere. Uh, yes. And arigato, that's hello. Uh, that's about it. That's all I learned. Um, I learned some other phrases that I forgot, to be fair. I tried to absorb the culture. It was just I end up, dude. I'm I am American man. I came back first thing I did was order a cheeseburger. You know, couldn't really get those there. Oh, that's good. Hey, Odyssey.

Yeah, I thought it was one of the greatest films of all time.

Hell yeah, it was awesome. It was awesome. Guys, go see The Odyssey. Don't believe in any of the Twitter. I mean, not like you have it.

I lost respect for a couple people based upon their. Yes, The Odyssey was weird. Like, what are you?

What are you talking about?

Yeah, it's like get over your like hangups. What are you talking about? Also not, not elevated to that level, but I thought Spider-Man was very, very good.

It smoked it in the box office, and that's a statement because Ozzy did really, really well.

Um, but Spider-Man's like— Spider-Man's very, very good.

They're so global, and it's an action— it's a Marvel movie. Plus it wasn't 3 hours long. Yeah, that's true. It's— I mean, the Ozzy's commitment, but like, you get in there, like, my thought on Ozzy was like, I can't believe this is on camera right now.

It was the shortest 3-hour movie I've ever seen. Yeah, I can't believe I'm watching this. Like, what? In a good way.

Yeah, like Cyclops looks real. Like, what is going on? Uh, it was really cool. Chris— I mean, Christopher Nolan is my— as a classic white boy take, uh, Christopher Nolan is my favorite director.

Yeah, it was, it was an amazing, uh, like, it was an amazing achievement. Yes, it was. Like, I was like, oh, this is actually the best, uh, Western civilization can produce.

Yeah, it's a—

I mean, uh, because he had all the talent, he had enough money, and like, yeah, all the best actors. Yeah, yeah. And, and what was remarkable is like, it was a bargain at the $250 million he spent. spent on it, you know what I mean? Yeah, because he, he got the cast at a discount. He did like a bunch of stuff practically.

Getting a lead in a Nolan movie helps your career massively. Um, they all know it now, you know. They, they talk about like, uh, he had me in one movie, he didn't have me— he didn't ask me back. And after, like, he asked me back for a while. I don't know if I did a good job.

Yeah, Travis Scott.

Travis Scott. That's the thing, you see on Twitter like, oh, Travis Scott's the movie. What? Travis Scott's awesome in the movie. He's awesome in the movie.

They're all awesome.

Elliot Page, awesome in the movie. Like, I'm not buying this. Like, it's— I had a blast.

Thank you for helping recap the summer with me and Zach, but it's not over yet.

Not over yet. Love you guys.

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