I'm Brian Derrick, and on this special episode of Vibes Only, I've got updates for you on Trump's attempt to block mail-in voting right now, on Supreme Court rulings related to Missouri's congressional map, and details on the insane money-making venture that is the Republican National Convention happening this week. We'll also get into a snapshot of what JD Vance's 2028 ambitions could include, and of course, we'll send you off with a good vibe. Let's get into it. Good morning, party people. We have a different kind of episode for you today because Glennis is traveling, and so you are stuck with me checking the vibes of American politics this week. The first thing that we absolutely must discuss today is the Republican National Convention that they are throwing this week in advance of the midterm election cycle, which is really unprecedented. We've never had a m- major party throw a convention for midterms before. When you sort of peel back the layers of what's actually going on, it becomes more clear why they think this is the year for them to do this and why it's actually probably gonna backfire on them. So the backstory here is that Donald Trump insisted on throwing a convention. We know that he loves a rally. We know that he loves to be the center of attention and to have a mic in front of his face and people cheering for his every word, no matter how crazy the things he says are. And this provides him the opportunity to do all of those things. But it also provides Republicans the opportunity to raise money that they see as their only saving grace in this midterm election cycle. All of the data available to us says that this is going to be a wipeout for Republicans. When you look at Trump's favorability and approval ratings, when you look at how Americans in general see the economy right now, when you look at the generic ballot, when you look at jobs numbers, when you look at inflation numbers, when you… Like, truly across the board, gas prices. Things are going very poorly for the Republican Party. And so I think when they scheduled this almost a year ago, they were hoping that this was going to be a chance to rally around a new message for the midterm election cycle. But they've never been able to turn the page on all of the shitty messaging that Donald Trump has been putting out because he's surrounded by sycophants who gas him up no matter what happens, no matter how bad the things that he does are. That's leaving them kind of stuck with the short straw when it comes to this convention. The second component for us to consider with this convention is the money. And Republicans are using this as a huge fundraising opportunity because they plan on pouring hundreds of millions, really billions of dollars into attacking Democrats as socialists and extremists and communists and all the ists that they love. I actually don't feel like it's going to be enough in, in this midterm cycle for them to simply outspend Democrats. It is a meaningful threat because we know that money does move the needle and creates a sort of center of gravity to pull voters back to their tendencies. People who might be more independent-minded or might be more center-right Republicans who might be drifting away from them right now oftentimes are the people who are most susceptible or persuadable by a billion dollars of advertising. But it says a lot who they're raising money for and from as well. Number one, doing it in Texas means that they are going after oil and gas money through and through. We saw this in 2024 when Donald Trump asked gas and oil executives to give him a billion dollars. Really just the most outrageous sum of money you can imagine. Obama in 2012 raised$750 million total. That was his whole reelect. And if Obama spent a total of$750 million, Trump taking a billion from, just from oil and gas is a really big deal. And they got their money's worth because so far, in his first less than two years, Trump has spent four billion of our taxpayer dollars killing wind projects. Not creating an alternative, not spending money on different infrastructure or a new plan or all of the above energy policy or anything like that. Specifically paying companies, private companies money to not build wind projects so that our country stays more reliant on oil and gas. Those wind projects, for the record, would have powered every home in 15 US states. Like, we're not talking about small projects. We're talking about, like, national transformation of our energy infrastructure that Donald Trump killed in exchange for money into his campaign. It is corruption to a T in the most brazen way that we have ever seen in modern politics. And they're at it again. That is what is happening again. They're assembling all of these oil and gas execs in Dallas for this convention to write big fat checks and making them new promises about what they're gonna do if they're able to hold onto power in 2026 after the midterms. Just to give you a sample of the types of price tags that we're talking about, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep. Trump is appearing at an RNC roundtable, and to get in the door, you have to pay $250,000. Then if you want a photo with him, it is another $88,000. Vance, JD Vance, is also doing a ton of fundraising, and his roundtable is $75,000 per ticket with another $35,000 for a photo. This is really just an opportunity for them to go and collect for what they've already done for these oil and gas e-execs, and then also to pressure them to give them more money in order to save their hides in the midterms. And for Vance especially, I do just wanna make a note that this is a preview of what his 2028 presidential bid is going to look like. He's showing us who he is with the company that he keeps, and it is not a good look. So Axios published a piece just this morning called Vance's Secretive Donor Network, about how Vance is building a secret operation to run in 2028 backed by all of these tech bros and far-right donors who have been really influential in the Trump administration. So some of those individuals include GOP donor Ray Washburne, RFK Jr., HUD Secretary Scott Turner, Sean Duffy, the guy with his own reality show where he tells his daughter not to go to college, Senator Eric Schmitt, Trump 2024 campaign manager Chris LaCivita, nightmare, Trump White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, Hal Lambert, professional bareback rider, no comment, Rocker Steiner. It's bad. And it's essentially a continuation of what Vance's career has always been, which is following the wind wherever the wind takes him, the wind being what billionaire donors tell him to do. And so that's who he was as a little pet for Peter Thiel, and that is who he's going to be as a presidential candidate. And if he wins, which he can't,'cause we can't allow it. Then as president as well, he would be a continuation of this coin op presidency that Donald Trump has created to profit billions of dollars from being president. We will definitely be watching the RNC closely. Trump is speaking on both nights, which is so comical to me because Trump is one of the most unpopular humans in America right now. So the more he makes this a Trump show, the more of a disaster it's going to be for Republicans. We're already getting some pretty wild quotes. A lot of Republicans running in competitive districts are avoiding the convention entirely. They want nothing to do with it because they think the brand is so toxic. There's been new reporting about House candidates that have removed Trump's endorsement from their website and from their lawn signs because they don't want to be associated with him. A senior official on the Republican side associated with the White House told Politico, "My only hope is that no one watches it since it's competing versus NFL opening games. Hopefully nobody notices the embarrassing show." So we are not expecting this to be a huge boost for Republicans, but it is certainly going to line their pockets. The other news that people might have seen this week that I think is worth covering is what the fuck is going on in Missouri. This is a saga that we've been following for over a year where Republicans gerrymandered a new map in Missouri that would eliminate Emanuel Cleaver's seat, one Democratic seat, and help them basically avoid accountability from voters. We fought it, Oath participated as well, and thousands and thousands of donors gave to get a referendum on the ballot which would block this map from ever being used. Republicans in the state did all kinds of really shady shit to prevent that from happening and continue using this gerrymandered map. We got a favorable ruling this week from the Supreme Court. Maybe a little surprisingly, 'cause it was signed by Justice Kavanaugh, rejecting Republicans' appeal of the Missouri State Supreme Court's ruling that said, "No, you can't use this gerrymandered-ass map for November." Republicans tried to take that to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court said, "Not today, Satan." So we were celebrating. I literally started dancing on, on Instagram. It was a, it was a huge win. But then within an hour of that, we got a separate ruling from a separate court, a federal court, that said, "Oh no, actually, you should use the gerrymandered map." And this was a judge that they had cherry-picked, was nominated by Donald Trump, um, that currently is reinstituting that map because the Supreme Court did not actually say,"You have to use the old map." They just said, "We're denying your appeal of the Supreme Court's ruling." So it's complicated and confusing, but the real takeaway is it's bullshit. And as of right now, it is still unclear because now there's an appeal process for the other federal court that had a ruling that was favorable to Republicans. I had lost hope a while ago that we were gonna get a better map in Missouri in time for 2026, and I think that I'm back to the same place. I was really pleasantly surprised when we saw the Supreme Court ruling this week, but now I think we're back in a place where we should expect to lose that seat in November and then fight like hell to get the old map back for 2028. I'm not saying that we should give up. I'm just saying we should not factor keeping that seat into our math to get to a majority in the House, which is, again, why Oath has been anchoring on flipping 11 seats instead of the five or eight that a lot of other organizations have been aiming towards, is because we knew that with all the tomfoolery, including what still has yet to come, we would need some buffer in order to ensure that we held the House after November. And there's still definitely an opportunity for us to rack that up and flip way more seats than that, but we need to be anchoring on a strategy to at least get beyond that 218th seat, which is how we secure the majority. The other thing that we're really closely watching that I think people probably have a lot of questions about are mail-in ballots. The first ballots have now already been sent out for the midterm cycle. North Carolina has mailed ballots out. People have already returned ballots and literally cast their vote in the midterms, and yet Republicans still continue fighting for this imaginary federalization of a voter list which has no basis in the Constitution whatsoever. The federal government doesn't have a role in administering elections, and they're trying to insert USPS, which is famously not the fastest agency to implement new policy, and they're trying to make that a blocker on who can vote by mail state by state. They've continued moving forward with really sketchy plans, but we continue to win in court blocking those plans from actually being enacted. At this point, I still think that we are optimistic that none of these changes will affect who votes in the midterms, but we should assume that they're all laying pretext for Trump to claim more, additionally, as he has been for now six years, that mail-in ballots are fraudulent, that the election was rigged, and for that to be cover for Republicans to do more sketchy shit. And so definitely don't wanna downplay the overall threat because it's a multi-prong attack on our democracy that even when it's not successful in the immediate future on elections that are happening right now, we've seen it dramatically reduce trust in our election system from people on both sides of the aisle as they invite more and more and more partisan garbage into a system that is in many ways the envy of the world, that Americans are able to cast ballots and have for now 100-plus years in the ways that we currently do that we trust will determine who is the next person in power in that seat, which is not something that we have the ability to take for granted right now when there are so many people trying to undermine that process. So we're watching really closely what is gonna come back to the Supreme Court after the ruling that we already covered on the pod maybe two weeks ago. But as of right now, we should feel good that the longer that this goes on, the less and less likely it will be that they're able to make really drastic changes to an election that is already underway. I also wanna comment on the results of primaries that happened this week. We had Rhode Island and New Hampshire primaries. More under-the-radar races, but some that still, I think, point to general trends that are important in the midterm election cycle. In New Hampshire, Chris Pappas won the nomination for US Senate on the Democratic side and is gonna face another Sununu, this very political family. The former governor of New Hampshire's brother is now going to be the Republican nominee for US Senate running against Chris Pappas, who would be the first gay man elected to the US Senate, which is exciting. I feel really good about Chris's chances there. There are some polls that show that it's close, but New Hampshire's always a little weird and usually comes home to Democrats for Senate races, especially in a cycle like this. The other race that people were keeping an eye on was a nepo baby situation where Jeanne Shaheen, current US senator's daughter, was running to replace Chris Pappas in New Hampshire's First Congressional District, and she won over Maura Sullivan, who was a veteran and Obama alum. And so we will continue to have Shaheens representing New Hampshire, assuming she wins the general election, which should be very possible. For our Oath Candidate of the Week, this week I would like to highlight Will Lawrence, who is running in Michigan's Seventh Congressional District against Tom Barrett, who flipped the seat after Elissa Slotkin vacated it to advance to US Senate. This is a really tough Trump-leaning district, one of the only districts that has this profile that has nominated a true left-wing progressive, which is gonna be a huge test, I think, for that part of the party. If you are someone who regularly thinks that the Democratic Party is out of step with average voters or with its base, you should really be paying attention to this race because it's exactly the type of proving ground that would expand the number of people who are bought into the idea that that's the direction that the party needs to move in in order to grow majorities and govern differently. If the party does really well overall and Lawrence does really poorly in this race, it'll have the exact opposite effect, that a lot of people are going to think that progressives can't win in purple places. And it's one of a handful of races that we have highlighted and that I've talked about on my Instagram that match that same dynamic. You also have Randy Villegas in California, Matt Dunlap in Maine, of course, Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan, Angie Nixon in Florida. How these candidates perform is going to reflect on how progressives are seen as competitive or not competitive in swing districts and swing states, and that is going to have a huge effect on 2028. So if that's your jam and you wanna see more candidates in that mold, then this is exactly the kind of race that you should be supporting. Will Lawrence is also broke, so it's a great race for you to go throw money at if you have the ability to do that. Or literally, I'm not joking, go knock on doors. Fly to Michigan if you can, take some friends with you and, and go knock on doors to win in this district if that is an option for you. So our good vibe of the week, other than you getting to listen to my voice nonstop for this entire episode, is going to be from New York City, which is our favorite place to deliver good vibes to you from. New data coming out of the city shows that we've had the steepest drops in violent crime and homicide rates that the city's really ever seen, and we're on track thus far in 2026 for the lowest numbers in modern history. I think that it's a win politically for Democrats to have more places show that under Democratic leadership, whatever that looks like, they're able to make progress on quality of life issues that Republicans like to make national issues. When you have places like New York or San Francisco that the narrative, regardless of what the truth is, that the narrative is, are unsafe or unclean or unlivable or too expensive, then it is harder to pitch a national vision of the Democratic Party and what governance from the left should look like. I think that it's overall a win for New Yorkers, for Democrats, and for America to have the biggest city in America experiencing, what's the opposite of a crime wave? A vibe, a vibe wave. Uh, and so that is our good vibe of the week that we're gonna leave you with. We will be back next week. Glennis will be here joining me once again. Thank you guys for listening and sticking with us. We really appreciate all of your reviews, comments, shares. Make sure to tune in next week as we check the vibes ahead of the midterms. See you then.