[Rush Lindell] Jared Kushner, Hakeem Jeffries, a room, no cameras.
[Rush Lindell] You ready for this?
[Reagan] Rush, slow down.
[Rush Lindell] No.
[Rush Lindell] No, I will not slow down.
[Rush Lindell] This is Rush and Reagan, and I've got a story that smells
[Rush Lindell] like the White House hedging its own bet on its own guy
[Rush Lindell] in an election year.
[Reagan] Brought to you by Lear Capital, America's Precious Metals Leader since 1997.
[Rush Lindell] There it is.
[Rush Lindell] Now, Mike Johnson goes on Fox Sunday, brushes this whole meeting off
[Rush Lindell] like it's nothing.
[Reagan] Here's why that matters, though.
[Reagan] If Kushner's quietly building a relationship with the man who'd run the
[Reagan] House under a Democratic majority, that's not nothing.
[Reagan] That's a bet on who's actually in charge come January.
[Rush Lindell] That's a hedge.
[Reagan] Maybe, or it's just Washington being Washington.
[Rush Lindell] Oh, come on.
[Reagan] I'm not saying dismiss it.
[Reagan] I'm saying let's see what actually happened in that room before we
[Reagan] crown it a conspiracy.
[Rush Lindell] Fine.
[Rush Lindell] Let's go find out who was really in that room.
[Rush Lindell] Reagan, sit down.
[Rush Lindell] Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law, sat in a room with Hakeem Jeffries,
[Rush Lindell] just the two of them.
[Reagan] I saw that.
[Reagan] Housing, immigration, cost of living.
[Reagan] That's the reported agenda.
[Rush Lindell] That's not a courtesy call.
[Rush Lindell] That's scouting.
[Reagan] Scouting for what, though?
[Rush Lindell] For divided government.
[Rush Lindell] You don't build a bridge to the other side unless you think
[Rush Lindell] you might need it in January.
[Reagan] The Associated Press piece frames it a specific way.
[Reagan] It says, "Political analysts see this as the White House testing how
[Reagan] it would work with Democrats if Republicans lose the House majority in
[Reagan] November."
[Rush Lindell] Say that slower.
[Reagan] If Republicans lose it.
[Rush Lindell] Oh, there it is.
[Reagan] I'm not saying that's Kushner's motive.
[Reagan] I'm saying that's the read.
[Rush Lindell] Here's my thesis, and I want you to poke holes in it.
[Rush Lindell] You don't send your most trusted operator to build rapport with the
[Rush Lindell] Democratic leader if you're confident you're keeping the gavel.
[Rush Lindell] Confidence doesn't hedge.
[Reagan] Sure, but Kushner's also just a guy who likes solving problems across
[Reagan] the aisle.
[Reagan] He did it on criminal justice reform in the first term back
[Reagan] when nobody thought the majority was in question.
[Rush Lindell] Different era, different math.
[Rush Lindell] This is August of an election year, and the man's counting votes
[Rush Lindell] he might not have and doing it quietly out of camera range.
[Reagan] Maybe, or he's counting votes he might need for something specific.
[Reagan] Housing policy doesn't require a majority flip to matter.
[Rush Lindell] Fine.
[Rush Lindell] Small concession, but three topics: housing, immigration, cost of living.
[Rush Lindell] Those are exactly the issues Democrats think flip suburban districts.
[Reagan] That part I won't argue.
[Rush Lindell] Progress.
[Reagan] But the meeting wasn't the only thing making noise this week.
[Rush Lindell] No, it was not.
[Rush Lindell] Because the second that leaked, Hakeem's people started talking.
[Reagan] And not everybody on that side was thrilled he took the meeting.
[Rush Lindell] Oh, the left did not take this well, not even a little.
[Reagan] Mediaite ran the headline itself, "This guy needs to go."
[Rush Lindell] That's not a headline.
[Rush Lindell] That's a eulogy.
[Reagan] And buried in there is a detail from The New York Times.
[Reagan] A mutual friend set the whole meeting up.
[Rush Lindell] A mutual friend, like this was a dinner party, not a sit-down
[Rush Lindell] with the Speaker-in-waiting's family.
[Reagan] The Times read it as evidence Trump's own allies expect a Democratic-led
[Reagan] House.
[Rush Lindell] Which is the same read we had 10 minutes ago, except now
[Rush Lindell] it's coming from Jeffries' own side eating him alive on Twitter.
[Reagan] So he had to answer it.
[Rush Lindell] Oh, he answered.
[Rush Lindell] Jeffries put out a video.
[Reagan] Forbes covered it.
[Reagan] He says the meeting was about the affordability crisis.
[Rush Lindell] Affordability crisis, sure.
[Rush Lindell] Two guys who've never worried about a grocery bill in their lives
[Rush Lindell] talking affordability.
[Reagan] Fair.
[Rush Lindell] But here's the part I actually like.
[Rush Lindell] He goes further, says the Trump cartel won't get a pass.
[Reagan] Trump cartel?
[Reagan] That's a phrase he's going to hear for a while.
[Rush Lindell] It's theater.
[Rush Lindell] He's trying to have it both ways.
[Rush Lindell] "I'll sit down with Kushner, but don't you dare call me soft."
[Rush Lindell] It's the oldest move in the book, and it rarely survives contact
[Rush Lindell] with reality.
[Reagan] Can you actually do both, though?
[Rush Lindell] No.
[Rush Lindell] No, you cannot.
[Rush Lindell] You either took the meeting or you didn't, and everybody saw the
[Rush Lindell] report.
[Reagan] So he's managing his left flank while the right-
[Rush Lindell] Is having a completely different reaction.
[Rush Lindell] Johnson's out there acting like none of this happened.
[Reagan] While Jeffries is putting out damage control videos, Johnson's over on Fox
[Reagan] doing his own kind of spin.
[Rush Lindell] A totally different flavor of spin.
[Rush Lindell] Wait till you hear what he told Doocy.
[Rush Lindell] So Doocy corners Johnson on the meeting, right?
[Rush Lindell] And Johnson doesn't touch the substance, not one word.
[Reagan] What does he say instead?
[Rush Lindell] He says Kushner hedges bets, his words, then pivots straight to, "You
[Rush Lindell] better not bet against the House Republicans."
[Reagan] Wait, he calls it a hedge?
[Rush Lindell] A hedge on his own guy.
[Reagan] That's not a deflection.
[Reagan] That's a confession with extra steps.
[Rush Lindell] Newsweek's got the whole exchange, and Johnson tosses in this number.
[Rush Lindell] He says the midterms come down to about 19 competitive seats.
[Reagan] 19 seats?
[Rush Lindell] 19 out of 435.
[Rush Lindell] That's the entire ballgame according to the speaker himself.
[Reagan] Okay, but slow down on the word choice.
[Reagan] Hedges bets.
[Reagan] What does Johnson actually saying about Kushner there?
[Rush Lindell] He's saying the White House's own son-in-law is playing both sides of
[Rush Lindell] the table.
[Reagan] Right, and you don't say that about your own team unless part
[Reagan] of you believes it.
[Rush Lindell] Exactly, Reagan.
[Rush Lindell] That's the tell.
[Rush Lindell] You don't call your ally's move a hedge and then tell the
[Rush Lindell] country not to bet against you in the same breath.
[Reagan] Unless the bravado's doing the work the numbers can't.
[Speaker 3] Exactly.
[Speaker 3] It's like a poker player yelling, "I've got the winning hand," while
[Speaker 3] he's quietly sliding chips back across the table to cover his own
[Speaker 3] bet.
[Reagan] You can't do both.
[Reagan] Either you believe the hand or you're hedging it.
[Speaker 3] Right.
[Speaker 3] And here's what gets me about the 19 seats line specifically.
[Speaker 3] That's not bravado.
[Speaker 3] That's a guy doing math out loud.
[Reagan] It is oddly specific for a man who just told Doocy the
[Reagan] whole thing's a lock.
[Speaker 3] If it's a lock, you don't need to count seats.
[Speaker 3] You just say, "We win," and move on.
[Reagan] Counting to 19 is what you do when you actually think it's
[Reagan] close.
[Speaker 3] So which is it, Mike?
[Speaker 3] A lock or 19 seats you're sweating?
[Reagan] Can't be both, and that's the whole tell in one press conference.
[Speaker 3] All right.
[Speaker 3] So we've got Kushner hedging in a private room and now Johnson
[Speaker 3] hedging out loud on camera without even realizing he's doing it.
[Reagan] Two different hedges, same family, same week.
[Speaker 3] So who's actually right about the odds here?
[Speaker 3] Because trust me isn't a number.
[Reagan] Let's go look at what the actual numbers say.
[Speaker 3] Sure, pause.
[Reagan] Sure, pause.
[Reagan] Here's what the polling actually says.
[Reagan] A Reuters/Ipsos survey from August has registered voters favoring Democratic candidates for
[Reagan] Congress 42% to 37.
[Speaker 3] Five points, not a landslide, but it's a lean, and it's the
[Speaker 3] wrong direction for the Speaker who just told Doocy, "Don't bet against
[Speaker 3] us."
[Reagan] It's more.
[Reagan] A separate Reuters/Ipsos poll put Trump's approval at 33%.
[Speaker 3] 33.
[Reagan] Lowest of his presidency.
[Speaker 3] So one in three.
[Speaker 3] That's not a stumble, Reagan.
[Speaker 3] That's a floor falling out from under the guy whose coattails Johnson's
[Speaker 3] entire majority is riding on.
[Reagan] It's a snapshot, not a prophecy.
[Reagan] Polls in August have moved plenty by November.
[Speaker 3] Sure, but Kushner doesn't sit down with Jeffries because the vibes are
[Speaker 3] great.
[Speaker 3] He sits down because somebody in that building saw these same numbers
[Speaker 3] and started hedging.
[Reagan] That's the theory.
[Speaker 3] It's not a theory, Reagan.
[Speaker 3] It's arithmetic.
[Speaker 3] Speaking of hedging against numbers you don't like, my buddies at Lear Capital are doing something I've genuinely never seen them do.
[Speaker 3] What's that?
[Reagan] They're selling the one ounce silver American Eagle below spot price, below
[Speaker 3] what silver's actually trading for, and Lear covers the shipping and the
[Speaker 3] taxes.
[Speaker 3] Below spot?
[Reagan] That almost never happens.
[Reagan] Never.
[Speaker 3] Spot doesn't even cover minting the coin, shipping it, or dealer overhead.
[Speaker 3] So buying it spot is already a good deal.
[Speaker 3] This is below that.
[Speaker 3] Limit one per person, new customers only.
[Speaker 3] Shipping's free and fully insured by Lear, and it's a 24-hour offer.
[Reagan] www.rushcoinoffer.com.
[Speaker 3] Now, back to Johnson's floor falling out from under him.
[Reagan] Right.
[Reagan] The approval number and the generic ballot both moved against him in
[Reagan] the same month Kushner picked up the phone.
[Speaker 3] And Johnson stood on Fox and didn't mention either one.
[Speaker 3] 66%, Reagan.
[Speaker 3] Write it down.
[Reagan] Decision Desk HQ through The Hill put Democrats at a 66% chance
[Reagan] of flipping the House, a snapshot from Friday.
[Speaker 3] Two out of three.
[Speaker 3] That's not a coin flip.
[Speaker 3] That's a lean.
[Reagan] It's a probability, not a promise, but it's the kind of number
[Reagan] sitting on somebody's desk in the West Wing.
[Speaker 3] And Johnson's out there on Fox saying, "Absolutely," like he's got the
[Speaker 3] deed to the building.
[Reagan] Probabilities move, Rush.
[Reagan] 66 isn't 90.
[Speaker 3] Sure, but nobody sends the son-in-law across the aisle over a lean
[Speaker 3] they like.
[Reagan] You send him over a lean you're worried about.
[Speaker 3] There it is.
[Reagan] Here's my pivot.
[Reagan] Kushner sitting down with Jeffries makes a lot more sense next to
[Reagan] 66 than it does next to absolutely.
[Speaker 3] Say that again slower for the people still defending Johnson.
[Reagan] The White House can read a forecast.
[Reagan] Johnson can read a teleprompter.
[Speaker 3] Oh, that's mean.
[Speaker 3] I like it.
[Reagan] It's not mean.
[Reagan] It's just one of them has to answer for the majority in
[Reagan] public.
[Reagan] The other just has to protect the guy who does.
[Speaker 3] So Kushner's hedging Trump's bet, and Johnson's stuck holding the microphone.
[Reagan] That's the split.
[Reagan] The family protects the asset.
[Reagan] The speaker protects the narrative.
[Speaker 3] Two different jobs.
[Reagan] Two very different jobs, and only one of them has to look
[Reagan] a camera in the eye and promise the majority holds night after
[Reagan] night, whether he believes it or not.
[Speaker 3] Right.
[Speaker 3] And if the model's got Democrats at two-thirds odds, that promise is
[Speaker 3] doing a lot of heavy lifting for a man who won't even
[Speaker 3] say the number out loud.
[Reagan] Especially when the family isn't behaving like it believes the promise.
[Speaker 3] All right.
[Speaker 3] So the math says two-thirds Democrat, and Johnson says absolutely Republican.
[Speaker 3] Somebody's not telling the whole story.
[Reagan] Or hedging in public and hoping nobody runs the numbers out loud.
[Speaker 3] Dead man.
[Reagan] We did.
[Speaker 3] We did.
[Speaker 3] So go pull the clip, the Doocy one.
[Speaker 3] I wanna hear exactly how Johnson said absolutely, the tone, the pause,
[Speaker 3] all of it.
[Reagan] Because the hedge isn't in what he left out.
[Reagan] It's sitting right there in what he said.
[Speaker 3] Play it back, Reagan, word for word.
[Speaker 3] Doocy sat him down and asked it straight.
[Speaker 3] "Can Republicans hold the House if that Iran war is still going
[Speaker 3] in November?"
[Reagan] And Johnson didn't blink.
[Speaker 3] "Absolutely."
[Speaker 3] That's the whole answer.
[Speaker 3] One word, chin up, camera ready.
[Reagan] One word doesn't erase everything we just laid out, though.
[Speaker 3] No, but it plays great on Fox.
[Reagan] Convenient word to have on hand.
[Speaker 3] Oh, it gets better.
[Speaker 3] Same Fox sit down, Al Jazeera picked up the part that doesn't
[Speaker 3] make the highlight reel.
[Speaker 3] Same speaker admits it would be helpful if the war is actually
[Speaker 3] wrapped before anybody votes.
[Reagan] So he wants it over.
[Speaker 3] He wants it over.
[Speaker 3] You ready for this?
[Speaker 3] Watch the bit.
[Speaker 3] "Absolutely, Republicans hold the House," unless it's not, in which case, quote,
[Speaker 3] "Would be helpful if it wraps first."
[Reagan] You can't run both lines in the same breath and call it
[Reagan] conviction.
[Speaker 3] That's my whole point.
[Speaker 3] You don't get to tell Peter Doocy, "We've got this," and then
[Speaker 3] 30 seconds later admit you're rooting for a ceasefire to save your
[Speaker 3] majority.
[Reagan] To be fair, wanting a war to end isn't exactly a scandal.
[Speaker 3] Still, wanting it to end before an election specifically because you think
[Speaker 3] it helps you at the ballot box isn't quite the same as
[Speaker 3] statesmanship, Reagan.
[Speaker 3] It's a guy checking the weather before he commits to the picnic.
[Reagan] Fine.
[Reagan] But notice what he's doing.
[Reagan] "Absolutely" is for the base, the applause line.
[Reagan] "Would be helpful" is the part he only says once Doocy's already
[Reagan] got him talking.
[Rush Lindell] Right.
[Rush Lindell] One line for the cameras, one line for the record, and nobody
[Rush Lindell] clips the second one for the 6:00 news.
[Reagan] Because the second one is the honest one.
[Rush Lindell] Exactly.
[Rush Lindell] Johnson knows the war is a variable he can't control, and he
[Rush Lindell] knows it cuts against him if it drags on.
[Rush Lindell] So he hedges out loud, on Fox, in real time.
[Reagan] Sure, but he's not the only Republican hedging on this war.
[Rush Lindell] Oh, here we go.
[Reagan] The Senate did its own dance on Iran war powers weeks before
[Reagan] any of this.
[Reagan] Key Republicans flipped their votes on restricting it.
[Rush Lindell] Wait, Key Republicans flipped their votes?
[Reagan] Yep, we'll get to that.
[Rush Lindell] Which, hold that thought, because that's the part that actually tells you
[Rush Lindell] what the party believes when the cameras aren't rolling on Doocy.
[Reagan] Exactly.
[Reagan] Public certainty, private math.
[Reagan] Same movie, different theater.
[Rush Lindell] And that's where we're headed next, what the people actually writing the
[Rush Lindell] checks think is gonna happen.
[Rush Lindell] So, the Senate, late June, they vote down a measure to rein
[Rush Lindell] in the President's power to keep fighting in Iran.
[Reagan] Right, and that's not the strange part.
[Rush Lindell] The strange part is one day earlier, the votes weren't there for
[Rush Lindell] the White House.
[Reagan] Key Republicans just moved.
[Rush Lindell] Overnight.
[Rush Lindell] One day you got Senate Republicans wobbling on giving Trump a blank
[Rush Lindell] check for the war, and the next day it's a lockstep no.
[Reagan] Somebody made calls.
[Rush Lindell] Somebody always makes calls, Reagan.
[Reagan] But that's the pattern for this whole episode, isn't it?
[Reagan] Public certainty that shows up exactly when it's needed after a night
[Reagan] of private scrambling.
[Rush Lindell] Line it up.
[Rush Lindell] Kushner's in a room with Jeffries.
[Rush Lindell] Decision Desk's got their number.
[Rush Lindell] Johnson's on Fox telling Doocy the Republicans hold the House no matter
[Rush Lindell] what.
[Reagan] And weeks before any of that, the Senate itself flinched and unflinched
[Reagan] within 24 hours on the actual war driving the polling.
[Rush Lindell] It's the same White House running two plays at once.
[Rush Lindell] Behind the curtain, they're hedging everywhere.
[Rush Lindell] Kushner's meeting, whatever happened to move those Senate votes.
[Rush Lindell] In front of the camera, it's all, "Absolutely, we're fine.
[Rush Lindell] Don't bet against us."
[Reagan] I'll give Johnson this much: I think he actually believes it.
[Rush Lindell] You think he believes his own applause line?
[Reagan] I think a lot of these guys talk themselves into the number
[Reagan] they need to be true.
[Reagan] But believing something and getting ready for the other outcome are two
[Reagan] different muscles.
[Rush Lindell] And Kushner's the guy exercising the second.
[Reagan] Kushner's not in that room with Jeffries because he's an optimist.
[Reagan] You meet with the other side's leadership when you think you might
[Reagan] need them, not when you're already counting your majority.
[Rush Lindell] It's the whole story tonight.
[Rush Lindell] Confidence on the mic, insurance in the room next door, and a
[Rush Lindell] speaker who'd rather not talk about which one he's actually banking on.
[Reagan] Whether that insurance ever gets cashed, we find out in November.
[Rush Lindell] We've got final thoughts on all of this right after the break.
[Rush Lindell] So here's where we land, Reagan.
[Rush Lindell] Kushner shaking hands with Jeffries.
[Rush Lindell] The Senate flips its own vote in a single day, and Johnson's
[Rush Lindell] out there telling Doocy "Absolutely" like he's got a signed contract from
[Rush Lindell] God.
[Reagan] Nobody has that contract.
[Rush Lindell] Nobody has that contract.
[Rush Lindell] Everybody in this town is quietly building a second option while they
[Rush Lindell] smile for the first camera they see.
[Reagan] I'll say this plainly.
[Reagan] I don't think Johnson's lying.
[Reagan] I think he's hoping out loud, the way anybody does when the
[Reagan] alternative is too uncomfortable to say on camera.
[Reagan] Whether that's the same as knowing, listeners can decide for themselves.
[Rush Lindell] Look at her, leaving the jury out.
[Reagan] That's the job.
[Rush Lindell] Fair enough.
[Rush Lindell] All right, that's the show.
[Rush Lindell] If you liked it, hated it, wanted to yell at me, subscribe,
[Rush Lindell] leave us five stars, and tell one friend who still thinks politics
[Rush Lindell] is boring.
[Reagan] One friend.
[Reagan] That's the ask.
[Rush Lindell] Tomorrow, we're back on this, because if Kushner's making more calls, we're
[Rush Lindell] gonna know about it before Johnson does.
[Reagan] See you then.
[Rush Lindell] Don't bet against us.