DSR Daily October 7: Republicans are Getting Nervous Ahead of the Midterms

The 52nd Harvard Youth Poll makes it clear: America’s young voters demand change. Corruption and political polarization have jaded America’s youth, but there are even more reasons to be optimistic about America’s future in the hands of this massive voting bloc. Norm Ornstein and David Rothkopf return to break down the poll’s findings and share why the key to winning elections lies in winning over the hearts of youth voters. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Harvard Kennedy School just released its 52nd Harvard Youth Poll and the results are striking: Americans are increasingly losing faith in the promise of a better future. America is at a crossroads with its youth, who are grappling with political and economic disillusionment yet still striving for meaningful change. What does this polling tell us about America’s future? John Della Volpe, Director of Polling at the Harvard Kennedy School's Institute of Politics, joins David Rothkopf to discuss the revelations from their latest poll.

On the DSR Daily for Thursday, we break down reports of a new attack on Iran after the midterms, Meta paying out a historic $25 billion in New Mexico, Trump’s plans to begin construction on his arch soon, and more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Donald Trump just unleashed a panicky string of posts—see here, here, here, and here—in which he frantically urged Republicans to vote by mail early. Amusingly, this comes after he told Republicans for months that mail-balloting is fraudulent to pass his SAVE America Act. Now that his efforts to nix vote-by-mail have flopped, he’s prodding Republicans to adopt it—effectively admitting his attacks on vote-by-mail were a scam to help him rig the election. Mail voting is an essential piece of pre-election-day voting, so his “fraud” nonsense could be discouraging GOP early voting, too. So what does the data say? To find out, we talked to Michael McDonald, who tracks the early vote at the UF Election Lab and on his Substack. He explains why the data suggests Democrats and independents are far more energized than Republicans, what we can extrapolate from it about the election, and how Trump screwed himself on early-vote-by-mail. We also discuss the latest New York Times poll showing Democrats leading by 11 points and Trump at a new low, which suggests the bottom is falling out for him.

"Keep your friends close and your enemies closer." Or is it keep your enemies close and kick your friends to the curb? The Trump administration certainly seems to think the latter when it comes to Ukraine. Between a lifeline deal to buy Russian diesel and Steve Witkoff calling Putin a "humanitarian," it is clear this administration has a fondness for Moscow and contempt for just about everyone else. Andrea Kendall-Taylor, Senior Fellow and Director of the Transatlantic Security Program at CNAS, joins Rosa Brooks and David Rothkopf to discuss why this pivot to Russia is so dangerous—not just for Ukraine, but for the U.S. as well. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices