No Dogs or Cats Were Harmed In the Making of This Post-Debate Podcast

WIRED’s Makena Kelly and Tim Marchman join Leah to discuss the memorable moments, the policies and, of course, the conspiracies that came up in Tuesday’s presidential debate.

Leah Feiger is @LeahFeiger. Makena Kelly is @kellymakena. Tim Marchman is @timmarchman. Write to us at [email protected]. Be sure to subscribe to the WIRED Politics Lab newsletter here.

Mentioned this week:
Trump Fans Spread Debate Conspiracy About Microphone Earrings by David Gilbert
What to Expect in the Trump-Harris Presidential Debate and How to Watch It by David Gilbert
A Visual Guide to the Influencers Shaping the 2024 Election by Makena Kelly

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Transcript

Note: This is an automated transcript, which may contain errors.

Leah Feiger: This is WIRED Politics Lab, a show about how tech is changing politics. I’m Leah Feiger, the senior politics editor at WIRED. Today on the show, the first debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump was last night and WIRED Politics Lab decided to record our episode right after it ended. The debate was frankly, fairly unhinged. Trump peddled absolutely absurd conspiracies and Harris had a number of memeable moments. It was a far cry from June’s debate between Trump and President Joe Biden, but both candidates went all in on appealing to their bases. Did they succeed? Joining me on the show to talk about all of this are my colleagues, Tim Marchman, director of politics, security, and science at WIRED.

Tim Marchman: Thank you for having me.

Leah Feiger: And senior WIRED reporter, Makena Kelly.

Makena Kelly: It’s good to be back.

Leah Feiger: How are you guys doing? It is so late. What did we just watch?

Tim Marchman: I really feel pretty stupefied. It was beyond what I anticipated.

Makena Kelly: With everything that Trump brought up related to the conspiracies, which I know that we’re going to get into.

Leah Feiger: Oh, yes.

Makena Kelly: This whole debate to me felt as if, I think it was just like come to life, the GOP living in this complete alternate reality. Like everything having to do with those conspiracies, everything having to do with the cats and all this stuff. I don’t know, it just seemed like it’s gotten to Trump and it’s invaded, this brain rot has completely invaded the Republican Party in a way that it’s showing up on the debate stage.

Leah Feiger: Something that we’re going to have to get into tonight is, does that really matter, and is that actually that different from what we’ve been seeing for the last little bit? Let’s start off with Harris. In the weeks leading up to this moment, she’s been riding the high of being the Democratic nominee. The DNC was her victory lap, and if you were watching CNN or MSNBC tonight, this debate was also her victory lap. But there’s also been a lot of chatter about how this honeymoon could be over. Tim, post-debate, where do you think Harris stands right now?

Tim Marchman: It’s hard to say because it was a little bit of an unusual performance, and these very much are performances. She almost came off to me like a counter punching boxer who’s just luring her opponent into making mistakes and tiring himself out and doing stupid stuff, but being very conservative with her own boxing.

Leah Feiger: I like that.

Tim Marchman: If I can extrapolate from what I saw on the TV, it seems like the plan did what it was intended to do. It got Trump really rattled, off his game, impulsive, saying bizarre things that I’m sure a lot of viewers have no frame of reference for. But to the extent that a lot of the punditry leading into this was about how she needed to define herself and define her differences with Biden. I didn’t really feel she did that. There were points where I felt like she was almost running through much more energetically and eloquently and probably effectively the same talking points Biden was struggling to use in the first debate.

Leah Feiger: I would agree with that. A significant part of her responses felt like they were fodder for a campaign ad. They felt like they were clipable 10 second, 15 second viral moments that are probably going to play really well in the coming days and weeks. But if that was the point of the debate, then maybe she did succeed. Did she actually have to distinguish herself that much from Biden in these moments? Was this the stage for that, I guess?

Tim Marchman: There was at least one really important moment where she did that when she was talking about abortion. It’s unimaginable that-

Makena Kelly: Oh, yes.

Tim Marchman: … Joe Biden would talk in anything like that personal and vivid and compelling and unapologetic way. I’m sure she could have gone a lot further. I’m sure a lot of people would like her to have gone a lot further. But that was about as forceful as I think we’ve ever seen a presidential candidate be on the topic, that I can remember at least.

Leah Feiger: It was one of the biggest, if not the biggest policy moments of the debate.

Kamala Harris [Archival audio]: The government and Donald Trump certainly should not be telling a woman what to do with her body.

Leah Feiger: She actually managed to say the word abortion multiple times, which for me, after watching Joe Biden pretend that the word didn’t actually in fact exist, was illuminating to say the least. But again, this was also her topic and Trump peddled the nine-month conspiracy. When asked about talking abortion bans with JD Vance, he said he didn’t discuss it with him.

David Muir [Archival audio]: Your running mate JD Vance has said that you would veto if it did come to your desk.

Donald Trump [Archival audio]: Well, I didn’t discuss it with JD in all fairness.

Leah Feiger: It was incredibly strange. What did you guys think about all of that? The JD Vance of it all alone was amazing.

Makena Kelly: Trump’s position on the abortion issue hasn’t changed in years. He says the same thing over and over again. The conspiracies might be a little different, but it’s really getting at the heart of, I helped get rid of Roe v. Wade so it can go to the states and the states can decide. Well, a lot of the states have decided now, Kansas for one is an example. That argument didn’t work in those states. This obviously doesn’t seem like a winning issue for him, and his team hasn’t been able to pivot into any other argument.

Leah Feiger: No, they certainly haven’t figured out a way to handle this effectively. That was so clear at the debate. Makena, before all of this though, you were following what a lot of influencers and Silicon Valley fans of Trump were saying about how Trump was doing during the debate and during the debate lead-up as well. What are now some of the posts that you are seeing online as a reaction to the debate? What are people saying?

Makena Kelly: First off, so many of the creators that we talked about at the DNC all got these PR packages from Kamala, which was popcorn and candy and cups and all of this stuff that said Hotties for Harris.

Leah Feiger: I’m sorry, I hate that. I hate that. Is that bad that I hate that?

Makena Kelly: No. For me, I did personally feel like it was a little strange, mostly because it just felt like the end game of the brandification of politics of it all.

Leah Feiger: Yeah. Was it sponsored? That’s so weird.

Makena Kelly: Yeah, it looked like just generic popcorn and jelly beans. But it still was really, really strange to see that also ahead of the debate as well. CJ Pearson, who was in our big influencer chart that we did, he posted and sent to me that he was in the Trump war room, influencer war room and had a debate in Philly. I tried to make sense of the picture that he sent and Jack Posobiec was there. There’s a lot of people in this room with their laptops out tweeting. We can talk about what happened with the influencers during and after debate, but I wanted to set that up first to be like this was a big focus for both the Kamala and Trump campaigns.

Leah Feiger: Absolutely.

Makena Kelly: Now, afterwards, I think like we’re discussing right now, Kamala really did a good job at baiting Trump to get all of these phrases like giving illegal immigrants in prison transgender operations.

Donald Trump [Archival audio]: Now she wants to do transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prison.

Makena Kelly: It’s basically become a meme, at least among a lot of the creators that I’m used to following and that I know work with the campaign.

Leah Feiger: Right. Obviously, the one that I think at least caught our attention the most in the WIRED politics Slack room as we were watching in disbelief was the conspiracy and lie that Haitian immigrants were illegally crossing the border into the United States and camping out and stealing and eating people’s dogs, cats, and pets.

Donald Trump [Archival audio]: They’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats, they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.

Leah Feiger: This is not happening. This is in no way happening, but this was a talking point that has been bubbling up for the last 36 hours. JD Vance has been adding fuel to the fire. He has been tweeting about it. Congress. This has been all over. Trump got into it in the debate. That was wild, you guys. That was so wild. It felt like a fever dream.

Makena Kelly: The difference between how it played out online ahead of the debate and how it was received when Trump actually said it, was wild. Because when you look at online, when people were discussing all this conspiracy about the cats and eating them and et cetera, all that, for the most part, it was just like a joke. It seemed like it was mostly silly amongst a lot of these creators that were posting about it. Then just to see it taken so seriously and literally on the debate stage with Trump, I think was the change of perspective that made everything like, what the heck is he doing?

Tim Marchman: Yeah, I have a conspiracy theory about this, which is that Trump was briefed to allude to it, but stay away from it. Because very early in his first statement, he mentioned Springfield, Ohio, very pointedly where the conspiracy theory says this is happening. He looked very smug and self-satisfied as he said that. My base, the people who are on truth social—

Leah Feiger: They’ll know.

Tim Marchman: … they know what’s going on in Springfield. But he didn’t say anything. Then he actually started talking about it after Harris had baited him by mentioning the people left his rallies early, that they were interminable and boring and repetitive. He started visibly getting pretty angry and he just blurts out, he’s talking about how horrible the economy is and how terrible post-apocalyptic America is, and he says, “In Springfield,” he can’t bring himself to say it. He says in Springfield, and then he just says, “They’re eating cats. They’re eating dogs.” It’s so lurid and ridiculous. Then the thing he does after that is, he almost meekly says, “The people on the television said their dog was taken for food.” Just the almost childlike tone of it. It was really this incredible moment. I really got the impression that he knew he wasn’t supposed to be talking about this, I guess.

Leah Feiger: I think you’re right. To me, it didn’t actually come off as childish though. It came off as the grandparent or elderly relative that you’re like, Grandma turn off Fox News. That’s not true. That’s not correct. He felt very old in that moment. He was rambling, he was uncertain. I guess my question here though is, with all these conspiracies he brought up again, like he did in the June debate with Biden, that the Democrats support abortion after nine months, which is unequivocally not true. There were just honestly so many to even get into and list. My question is, does it matter? The internet was taking a lap, the liberal internet was thrilled. Pundits on CNN and MSNBC were like, “This was wild. Harris trounced him, et cetera, et cetera.” I don’t know. This race is not actually about who is more eloquent or who can tell the truth better or more, and that feels a little bit naive at this point. It’s actually about who can mobilize their base. The question is going to be if Trump successfully mobilized his base with his litany of conspiracies tonight. Was he convincing?

Tim Marchman: I don’t think he was especially convincing, but I don’t think he did anything that would probably turn off anyone who’s supporting him. He’s a pretty known quantity at this point. I think these things probably amount to a bit of a wash. It seems like it was a good night for Harris and that at least she’s going to have favorable publicity and press and people will be writing nice things instead of nasty things about her. But I don’t think any of that takes things too much away from the pre-established equilibrium where it seems to me like the main event in the race recently has been RFK dropping out and a ton of those people just going over to Trump. The question is, are they persuadable people who might see Trump as just too much of a lunatic, or are they a part of the elector that’s just not going to vote for a conventional Democrat? I don’t know the answer to that.

Leah Feiger: Fair. Makena, what do you think?

Makena Kelly: When you look at how a lot of the influencers and creators that support Trump, Jack Posobiec, for example, others, what they were posting about afterwards was not super excited about anything that he said. But they just came to the defense of him over the moderators like David Muir and everyone else, and saying that it was a three versus one debate. There wasn’t anything for them to turn into a huge moment for themselves. Instead, when they’re mobilizing the base, the only mobilization Trump was able to get tonight seemed to be defense from people who are already so supportive of him.

Leah Feiger: Right. There were a lot of defensive moments. Another defensive moment for Trump was on the topic of Project 2025. It was brought up like we thought it would be by Harris multiple times, and Trump said he was not involved. There was some good and bad. Obviously, he has been very credibly linked to it, head of the Heritage Foundation, et cetera, et cetera. Makena, can you give us some context on Project 2025, why Harris keeps bringing it up and why Trump’s answer just fell really flat?

Makena Kelly: Sure. Project 2025 of course is this 900 page book coming from the Heritage Foundation and a bunch of experts in that little think tank creating policies for a future Trump administration related to just about anything from health care and abortion to economic policy to LGBTQ rights and things like that. Just everything across the board. It’s become like an encyclopedia for what the Heritage Foundation in that sector of Republicans want.

Leah Feiger: The framework for a possible Trump second term.

Makena Kelly: Exactly. Trump has tried to distance himself from that. But it’s really hard to, when the person who is part of the personnel and everyone involved in this. There’s a lot of folks who work directly with Trump like John McEntee, who the date right stuff guy he-

Leah Feiger: Your favorite.

Makena Kelly: …operates. His job is to solicit people to apply for the administration who would carry out Trump’s will.

Tim Marchman: It’s also weird because I live in Philly and my son is in college and he gets a mailer every day from the Trump campaign. Literally every day for weeks now. On one side it says Kamala is going to take away social security and Medicare, and on the other side it says Trump did not write Project 2025.

Leah Feiger: Amazing.

Tim Marchman: This is everyone on my block pretty much is getting these every single day. Somebody is really, really, really, really strongly investing in this. There’s been some reporting on it in the outside groups that are funding this in several swing states. But it was a little bit weird to see him come up with such a thin answer. The Trump campaign is definitely acting as if they think this is something that’s really harmful to them.

Leah Feiger: All right everyone, we’re going to take a quick break and when we come back more about the Trump-Harris debate. Welcome back to WIRED Politics Lab. Tim, Makena, we have to talk about the fact that Trump continued to deny that he lost the 2020 election. What did you all think about that exchange?

Makena Kelly: The interesting bit that David Muir brought up was how Trump even just a couple of months ago, recently hinted that he didn’t honestly believe that.

David Muir [Archival audio]: You have said quote, you lost by a whisker. That you quote, didn’t quite make it, that you came up a little bit short.

Donald Trump [Archival audio]: I said that?

David Muir [Archival audio]: Are you now acknowledging that you lost in 2020?

Donald Trump [Archival audio]: No, I don’t acknowledge that at all. You did that sarcastically, you know that.

Makena Kelly: Trump had to come back and be like, “No, I didn’t say that. I don’t mean that. I actually think I won.” Which I think put him on, he was just shaky on that, which made him sound not so convinced that what he was saying was true.

Leah Feiger: I think you’re right. Especially already his campaign and team is gearing up to deny results of the 2024 election. His truth socialing over the weekend was very much leaning in that direction. So many former Trump people, Cleta Mitchell, at all that are working with election denial groups across the country. That’s going to likely be a huge issue in the coming months. It was interesting, again, to see that answer be so shaky and so thin.

Tim Marchman: There’s a whole range of answers he gave around that were almost through repetition. Especially if you covered politics and you’ve heard these at rallies and you’ve seen a bunch of these speeches. You get a little numb to them. But it’s strange when you’re sitting there fulsomely defending all the January six riders and talking about how they were peacefully expressing dissent and this and that. Harris made a point at one point that I thought was one of the stronger jabs she threw.

Kamala Harris [Archival audio]: We do not have in the candidate to my right, the temperament or the ability to not be confused about fact.

Tim Marchman: Those were points where that seemed like a pretty reasonable question.

Leah Feiger: No, it was good. It was breaking down the fourth wall. It was truly a look to the camera, is this real moment?

Makena Kelly: Yeah, I think all of that was in her favor. Just being able to look at the camera and say, “What planet is he on?” Because it’s her whole thing for this debate, I think was trying to not only just define herself, but to throw Trump off. He has been so dominating on the offense in so many recent debates and the Joe Biden one and a lot of the Clinton ones, he’s tried to speak over people. On this, he was really put on his back foot. I think as soon as Kamala said something about the people leaving his rallies, he never recovered. He just never recovered from that. He got angry. He wasn’t thinking. I think that was really what led him to making all of these poor judgments in what he said and bringing things up the entire night.

Leah Feiger: It seeped into all of his policy discussions as well. They felt so discombobulated. Earlier we talked about their discussion on abortion and how Harris really hit her notes on that and very much played to the base on that. Were there any other policy moments that stuck out to you both that felt momentous, that perhaps one of them could have weighed in on more or it was strangely done? Anything in that vein.

Tim Marchman: Trump saying nobody thinks about nuclear weapons in the context of Russia and Ukraine was incredible.

Makena Kelly: That was…

Tim Marchman: That was another one where-

Makena Kelly: …wild.

Tim Marchman: …I’m pretty sure he meant it.

Donald Trump [Archival audio]: He’s got nuclear weapons. They don’t ever talk about that. He got nuclear weapons. Nobody ever thinks about that.

Tim Marchman: It’s like nobody knows they have them. But I’m here to tell you that Russia has nuclear weapons and that makes dealing with them when they’re in the middle of a hot war, it makes it quite a conundrum.

Leah Feiger: Secret info from my pal Putin. Yeah, seriously. Oh, that was shocking. That was absolutely shocking.

Tim Marchman: My friend texted me to ask what I think he thinks NATO is. It’d be great in these debates if they would just ask some factual questions. Or pull down a map and be like, we’re talking about Yemen.

Leah Feiger: Very simple questions. Yes.

Tim Marchman: Where is Yemen?

Leah Feiger: Yes.

Makena Kelly: Isn’t that what ruined Sarah Palin?

Leah Feiger: Well, that was her training, remember? That was the whole thing where they were doing all that intensive debate training and she didn’t understand, for example, that World War II had multiple fronts. There were all of these different really wild things. No, but I’m so with you, Tim. I want simple questions for debate maybe next time. Aggressively simple. Makena, what stood out to you policy wise?

Makena Kelly: I think when it came to regulating guns. The thing that surprised me, that I think surprised a lot of people was when Kamala said that she was a gun owner. I think when it comes to talking about and setting herself apart, when Trump says all of this stuff about the Democrats want to take away everyone’s guns and all of this, it seemed to be a big point for Tim Walls. But for Kamala to join in on this as well, I’m interested in hearing how that plays out. Especially with progressives and especially with her background with people calling her a cop for the last couple of years.

Leah Feiger: For sure. Yeah, I’m definitely wondering how closely some folks were listening to that. I know this wasn’t specifically on policy, and we mentioned this a little bit earlier. But can we talk about Trump’s absolute disdain for JD Vance for a second?

Tim Marchman: “I didn’t discuss it with JD.” Is that what he said?

Leah Feiger: Yeah, which seems like, I don’t know, top three policy points that you would discuss with your vice president.

Tim Marchman: I thought that was pretty funny.

Leah Feiger: It’s a meme. It’s a total joke at this point. I loved it.

Tim Marchman: On ABC News, Jonathan Karl asked Vance if he had talked to Trump. Vance for a second tried to dodge it, and then he said that he hadn’t and moved on. Make of that what you will.

Leah Feiger: Incredible. Absolutely incredible. Yeah, Vance was a victory lap pick. It was like an assumption that Peter Thiel was going to just start throwing gobs of money at them. It was definitely a choice, and it’s fascinating to watch that work itself out. We’re going to take a quick break and when we come back, more about the Trump-Harris debate. Welcome back to WIRED Politics Lab. Makena, a lot of the influencers that you’ve been following have been some of the most outspoken people about the war in Gaza and has strongly critiqued Biden and have been slowly starting to strongly critique Harris as well. Did you see any commentary from them about how this was playing out?

Makena Kelly: The one thing that I did see is there was a broadcast channel that I’m in for a meme page and a political meme page. It seemed like that was the only thing that a lot of progressives in that chat and people on the left said that really just didn’t sit right with them. We’ve seen it time and time again with the DNC. Of course, on that last day of the DNC, a lot of these influencers staged a protest right outside because they couldn’t get a Palestinian speaker to speak on the stage at all. I think tensions have been slowly rising, and I’m curious to see how this plays out, especially after this, when this is such a big moment. Now at this point, these people, the people on the left have tried to get a big moment. Whether that was on the DNC stage or the debate stage for Kamala to say something really in support of Palestinian rights. It just hasn’t happened yet, and I know at some point probably it’s not going to look so good. People are going to start saying a lot more stuff and being a lot louder on it.

Leah Feiger: I’m curious when that point is.

Makena Kelly: Yeah. Well, we have, what is it, a little under 60 days or something until the election? The thing is that that moment blows up, there isn’t a lot of time for her to recover.

Leah Feiger: Yeah, I’m sure her team’s thinking about that already. I want to take a quick turn to some of the more relatively wacky moments of the debate. What stood out, the facial expressions, the lines. You think that the things that are already starting to become memes and moments. I know that we went through some of them already. What were some of your favorites? I have to say we started off strong with Harris walking over and shaking Trump’s hand. He just so absolutely did not want to do that.

Tim Marchman: That was probably my favorite moment of the debate. Just as theater. It was well thought out. He clearly didn’t want to shake her hand. He clearly was not used to someone being in his personal space like that. I think we know he’s germophobe. There was just a lot going on there and it was pretty clearly a reaction to some of what went on in the Clinton debates.

Leah Feiger: I was just going to say, obviously when we were prepping for this pod, hours before the debate, Tim, you called it. You were like, there’s going to be something weird with space on the stage. Maybe Trump is going to stand in front of her, ala 2016 and Hillary. There’s going to be something strange. But Kamala totally flipped the script. She got into Trump’s space and that set a tone.

Tim Marchman: It did, and I thought it was tactically probably smart the same way she was setting him off his game by mocking his rallies. He’s a big man and he asserts dominance around him by dominating physical space. You see it in every photo of him. Anything you do that knocks someone off a little bit like that is probably a good idea. It also prevents him from maybe trying to pull that on you when he is so clearly uncomfortable.

Makena Kelly: I don’t want to guess, but so much of Harris’s facial expressions throughout the night felt highly choreographed to me in a way that wouldn’t surprise me. Now, I don’t want to say that this is what happened because I don’t know for sure. But the Harris team is smart enough to know what visual things like her with her fingers on her chin. Or her looking with her eyebrows all winced in pain almost with something that Trump’s saying. How that can turn, not just into Harris of course wanting that viral moment, that viral clip of her saying something, but a meme, an image that will stay within the Zeitgeist for even longer than that clip. To me, it felt like that was definitely something that they had talked about.

Tim Marchman: For sure.

Leah Feiger: To be fair, those are also the expressions that she makes constantly anyway. Even if there was like a, yeah, make sure that those things you already do are definitely happening. I could for sure see that. But the split screen was great for that, this new format. I was like, wow, I’m loving this. Really although I’m not sure that the muting the mics worked out as well this time as it did for the CNN debate. But that was a really good one. Any others? Any other fun, wacky, memorable moments?

Tim Marchman: I was really impressed when Trump started talking about, and I’ll admit, I was looking at my phone or something and I looked up and I heard him say, “Spheres of terror.” I didn’t really catch what the context was. Then when I went to look for it online, people were already making memes out of it. It was one of those things where it’s become completely unmoored from what he was actually talking about. I still have no idea. I assume he was talking about Iranian influence or something of that nature. But I was just thinking it sounded like something in a Fantastic Four comic. It sounded like Dr. Doom would wield the spheres of terror and they’d have to team up with the Silver Surfer to prevent him from using them to enslave Europe or something.

Leah Feiger: Well, now that’s what I hope he was referring to. I actually can’t remember either. But he just has so many little notes like that all the time. It’s like coming up with phrases constantly. But that was a particularly good one. After the last debate, there was such a clear, albeit difficult path forward for the Democrats. Biden just did not have the support as the nominee. I think that there’s a bit of a vibe right now, and I don’t want to call it early, but it really does feel like Harris solidified her spot as a solid contender. She has been doing so for the last couple of weeks, and this debate certainly didn’t hurt that. As you both wisely said at the top of the episode, it’s not entirely clear though that she necessarily won the debate, whatever that means. Where do we go from here? Where do they go from here?

Tim Marchman: I think for Trump, it’s going to be more of the same. We’ve seen him doing this a long time. I don’t think there’s going to be some radical evolution in his personal affect or his policy positions. I think for Harris, there’s probably going to be more legitimate questions about what the differences are between her and Biden. Not just on Gaza, but on a host of issues. While it’s easy to focus on Trump’s many bizarre things he says. When he’s asking a question like, well, you’ve been in power to some, whatever extent of VP is in power for three and a half years. Why haven’t you put any of this into action or influence good things in this direction? Or when he says, your positions have changed. She still doesn’t have really good answers for those or effective answers. I feel that’s possible. You can make substantive policy distinctions with the Biden administration on one hand, and you can workshop a comeback. If someone says, these positions of yours have changed within the last four years. It’s a reasonable question to ask. I think if she doesn’t do that, she’ll be vulnerable to that attack. If she learns how to parry the attack and comes out with some concrete things that are new and responsive to people’s concerns and maybe a little bit less like ’90s DLC than the opportunity economy. Which sounds like you’re going to let everyone play bingo, then she’ll have a way to continue consolidating support and maybe reaching some other people.

Makena Kelly: It seems like this is also a fight over the next couple of weeks over how much we even talk or bring up Biden. Of course, Trump wants to bring him up constantly. In some parts of the debate he was discussing, it sounded like he was talking to Biden and not Kamala.

Leah Feiger: Totally.

Makena Kelly: Kamala every single time Tim, like you said, every single time Trump brought up something about record or something that she’s done in the Biden administration, she just completely pivoted away from that. I’m really curious to see how much of Biden becomes such a talking point or something influential in the election.

Leah Feiger: Yeah. Gosh, I think the next couple of weeks are going to be really interesting. Makena, Tim, thank you both so much for joining our show at such a late hour tonight. You two are the best.

Tim Marchman: Well, thank you for having me.

Makena Kelly: It was great to be here.

Leah Feiger: Go get some rest. Thanks for listening to WIRED Politics Lab. If you like what you heard today, make sure to follow the show and rate it on your podcast app of choice. We also have a newsletter, which Makena Kelly writes each week. The link to the newsletter and the WIRED reporting we mentioned today are in the show notes. If you’d like to get in touch with us with any questions, comments, or show suggestions, please, please write to [email protected]. That’s [email protected]. We’re so excited to hear from you. WIRED Politics Lab is produced by Jake Harper. Pran Bandi is our studio engineer. Amar Lal mixed this episode. Stephanie Kariuki is our executive producer. Chris Bannon is Global Head of Audio at Condé Nast, and I’m your host, Leah Feiger. We’ll be back in your feeds with the new episode next week.