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Charles Douglas and I have been doing these Friday lives long enough that we’ve developed a rhythm: sharp political analysis, real on-the-ground reporting from Charles, and then an ending that goes completely off the rails in a way that the chat simultaneously loves and hates. This week did not disappoint on any front.
We started with a contrary take on the Republican primaries that I think the political press is getting wrong. Then Charles walked us through what he’s seeing on the ground in Maine and beyond. We dug into the Democratic primary wave and what it actually tells us about where the party is going. And we ended on the DNC autopsy.
The throughline of the whole conversation was a question Charles put simply at the top: Can people provide financially for themselves and their families? That’s how they choose their politicians. Everything else, the primary results, the messaging debates, the door-knocking strategy, flows from that one root cause. The economic anxiety that drove people to Trump in 2016 and 2024 is still there. The question is whether Democrats are building the infrastructure and the message to capture it. We think they are.
We closed with a conversation about the rapper Drake that became so unhinged it unraveled into another Ahmed roast session, and the chat started actively trying to end the live stream. As Charles said, at least you know we aren’t AI lol.
Thanks again to all of you for making these live streams some of the best moments of my week! I love that we can have these really complex, nuanced, and sometimes difficult conversations about where we stand as a democracy, but still find plenty of ways to laugh together. I hope you have a great holiday weekend!
You can watch our full conversation above and read key takeaways below.
The Massie Race: Why Trump’s Primary Wins Actually Have Indications Of Weakness
The political press looked at Thomas Massie’s loss in Kentucky and declared Trump stronger than ever. I came to the opposite read, and I think the numbers back it up.
Trump’s political apparatus spent tens of millions, deployed Hegseth to the district, and put his full weight behind ousting Massie — and still only won by 10 points. I made this case directly on the live: 45% of the electorate voted for Massie despite the most expensive primary in history being run against him. When you drop that kind of money, and that kind of apparatus, and the result is 55-45, that is not dominance. That is a warning sign. The incumbent president of the United States influencing his own party’s primaries is baseline. It should not be treated as remarkable.
Massie is the first real test of the America First lane versus the MAGA lane. Charles and I have been talking about this division for weeks. Massie, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and Tucker Carlson represent something distinct from MAGA recently — a non-interventionist “America First” wing that is carving out its own niche. The fact that 45% of a Kentucky Republican primary electorate voted for that lane even after Trump’s full assault on it is a meaningful data point for 2028. Charles added the flip side: the replacement candidate is more MAGA, which moves the party further right and makes the general more winnable for Democrats.
The Ken Paxton endorsement is the clearest evidence that Trump is thinking with his ego, not his interests. John Cornyn is not a Cassidy or a Tillis. He is a pretty staunch Trump loyalist who may have spoken out on very minor things here and there. Trump went out of his way to endorse Paxton, who is reviled within his own party with polls worse than Cornyn. I said it plainly: this is the same pattern as 2022, where ego-driven endorsements of extreme candidates backfired in the general. And it is good news for James Tallarico, who just got an easier race out of it.
The low turnout numbers matter as much as the margin. Only about 100,000 people voted in Massie’s district primary. Charles made the point that turnout numbers reveal enthusiasm, and what those numbers show is a minority of people arguing with each other. MAGA is the establishment now, and establishments bleed enthusiasm. His lowest New York Times Siena poll this term has Trump at 37%, in the low 30s in other polls, and tanking with demographics he made gains with in 2024. Many in the media are calling that dominance. It is a shrinking pie, as I outlined in my recent appearance on MS NOW.
Democratic Primaries & The Anti-Establishment Wave
While Republicans are moving further into Trumpism, Democrats are moving toward candidates with a bias toward action and a working-class economic message. Charles and I both think these trends stack on top of each other in a way that bodes well for November.
The Chris Rabb win in Pennsylvania is a marker of where Democratic voters are moving. Charles laid it out: Rabb is a Democratic Socialist backed by Bernie. His competitor had Cory Booker and the establishment behind him. The establishment got hammered. Charles was clear that this is not about the socialist label, people don’t vote on that. It is about trust, economic messaging, and whether a candidate sounds like they actually believe what they are saying. Rabb is a flip-the-tables reset politician, and his win is another indicator of the party moving toward that kind of leader.
Charles’s theory on Michigan flips the conventional primary wisdom. The standard argument has been: choose the moderate candidate to win the general. Charles is arguing the opposite right now. The swing voters on the left are young people who didn’t show up for Kamala. Give them the candidate they want in the primary, and the older voters, who understand a Democrat needs to win, will fall in line for the general. He is leaning toward Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan because the progressive energy is real, the economic message is stronger, and the primary has been moving in his direction. Common Power is quietly making plans to go.
The Mamdani model is the template. I said it, and Charles backed it: what is winning right now is not ideology, it is bias toward action. Mamdani had concrete things he wanted to do — grocery stores, buses, affordability — got into office, and started doing them. People who voted for Trump and then Mamdani are not ideologically confused. They are looking for someone who will actually help them. AOC works because you cannot forget she was a bartender. The candidates losing are the ones who have been driven around in black cars for too long and can no longer feel what regular people are living through.
The anti-establishment energy has been the dominant political force for two decades. Obama, Trump, Trump again. The through line is not party. It is anti-establishment. I made the point that Trump can only win when he is out of power, because once he is in power, people recognize he has been lying to them. The consumer spending numbers look okay on paper, but buy now pay later, credit card debt, and economic uncertainty around AI tell a different story underneath. The message that writes itself is: he promised to lower your prices, he raised them. His biggest legislative accomplishment is the biggest wealth transfer to the rich in American history.
The Art of Persuasion: What Actually Works At The Door
Charles just came back from Maine and is heading to Iowa. The conversation about what actually moves voters at the door was one of the most practically useful things we’ve talked about on this show.
Susan Collins is more entrenched than the polling suggests. Charles reported that everywhere he went in Maine, cafes, doors, and conversations, he kept running into people who had worked for Collins, were currently working for her, or were local politicians aligned with her machine. She has mastered the art of sending money back home. People at the doors were saying Collins isn’t that bad. That is what three decades of constituent service buys you. Common Power was knocking the hard persuasion doors intentionally, not the easy GOTV doors, and the Collins entrenchment is real.
Cost, chaos, and corruption is the right messaging framework across the country. Charles endorsed this framework directly. Corruption works in red states because it is about leadership, not party voters. Chaos moves away from the immigration debate and toward something more universal, regardless of what you think about immigration, not like this, not killing people in the streets. Cost ties Trump’s actions directly to people’s lived experience. And I added the connective tissue: he is enriching himself while raising your prices. The $1.776 billion slush fund, the stock trades, the tariffs, the unnecessary war: it is all the same story.
Condemn the behavior, not the voter. Someone named Paul M in the chat made this point, and Charles and I both built on it. A lot of Trump voters are working through guilt right now. They see the chaos. And the moment you say something they experience as an attack on them personally for voting for him, you lose them. The approach that works is meeting people where they are, then making the case that it is time for something new. Charles noted that at the door, you sometimes have to say things that pain you. The goal is the W, not feeling righteous in the moment.
The DNC Autopsy: A Final Nail In Ken Martin’s Chairmanship?
We saved the DNC autopsy for near the end, and Charles’s summary was definitive: this is the final nail in the coffin for people who think establishment Democrats know what they are doing.
The report was not controversial. It was just poorly done. Charles laid it out plainly: no section on Gaza, nothing about Biden’s age, factual errors citing the wrong numbers for the wrong states. These are not things that were left out because they were too hot to handle. They were left out because the report was poorly done. Someone was put in charge who did not do the real work, did not cite sources properly, and did not talk to enough people. I added that rather than Ken Martin just acknowledging the report was bad and committing to redo it, he got weird and evasive about it for an extended period, which made the whole thing worse.
Charles’s contrarian read: a weak DNC is actually good for the movement right now. His argument is that when the establishment body is visibly failing, voters and candidates stop looking to it for permission and start looking elsewhere. That accelerates the rise of anti-establishment voices who are winning primaries and appealing to working-class voters and independents. The DNC’s weakness creates the vacuum that Rabb, Abdul, Tallarico, and candidates like them are filling. Getting this exposed now is better than having it surface during the 2028 primary when the stakes are higher, and the distrust would be more damaging.
Dan Pfeiffer and other major voices are calling for Ken Martin to step aside. I raised this on the live. When Pod Save America starts naming names, it signals that the conversation has moved beyond frustration. I said I do not know how much longer Martin will last, and that it is unfortunate but probably necessary. The DNC needs to regain trust before 2028, and that process cannot start until the people who mishandled this are no longer running it.
Bottom Line
Trump spent millions to win by 10 points in Kentucky while polling at 37% nationally and losing key demographics. Far too many in the media are calling that dominance. Meanwhile, Democratic primary voters are choosing candidates with a bias toward action and a working-class economic message. That is the actual story of this primary cycle.
If this conversation mattered to you, I hope you consider becoming a paid subscriber to Ahmed Baba News. If you’re already a paid subscriber, thank you! Independent pro-democracy journalism only works if people back it. And if you’d like to get involved and knock doors this election year, I also highly recommend checking out Common Power.
