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Joining us this morning is Sean Spicer, host of the Sean Spicer Show and the former White House press secretary during the Trump administration.
Mr. Spicer, thanks for being here with us.
We're talking about campaign 2024.
Obviously, there's only five days to go.
So what's your assessment of how this all ends on Election Day, if it ends on Election Day?
Yeah, I mean, look, I'm actually really bullish on this.
Obviously, I support President Trump and the Republican ticket.
But when you look at the averages of where the polls are in all the Battleground states, it's not just the edge that President Trump has.
It's the trend that's going in his direction.
So you look not just at one poll, but in the last several polls in each of these battleground states, and the wind is at President Trump's back.
And frankly, if you look at the Battleground State Senate races as well, everything from Wisconsin and Michigan to Pennsylvania and Nevada and Arizona, each of those same thing.
There's not one race in those Battleground Senate races where Republicans aren't moving in the right direction.
Now, Greta, I'm not saying every one of them is going to get over the finish line.
I hope they do.
But I think that, you know, I'd rather be going to Election Day as a Republican with the wind at our back than trying to hold back an insurgent.
What do you think of the remarks made at the Madison Square Garden rally and the former president's reaction to them?
Did it hurt his campaign?
No.
First of all, they weren't remarks.
It was a comedian who told a bad joke.
And I think, by and large, every Republican that I know says it was a bad joke.
A comedian got up four hours before President Trump got up and said a joke that fell flat because it was stupid, right?
That's what it was, a stupid joke that went over very poorly because it wasn't funny.
And I think sometimes that's the risk you take with comedians.
That being said, I don't know a single person outside of Jon Stewart who said, you know, hey, you know, it wasn't funny.
Conversely, you know, juxtapose that to President Biden, who is the current president of the United States, who literally said the supporters of President Trump are garbage.
That's it, full stop.
There's no question about it.
I know the White House is trying to parse some of the words, but as somebody who has a little bit of experience of garbling words and saying things and living at that level, he screwed up.
And instead of trying to make it a grammar issue, he should have just said he was sorry.
But here's the thing, Greta, I actually think he believes it, right?
He campaigned in 2016 saying he got in the race because of Donald Trump.
He announced his reelection because he said the threat of Donald Trump.
This shouldn't be surprising to anybody.
But the bottom line is that four days later, us talking about a comedian at a rally and not the current president of the United States really explains where the media is in the current environment.
The candidates are making their closing arguments.
There are some who say that the former president's rhetoric is too dark.
We heard that from Nikki Haley.
And I want to play for our viewers and have you respond to Megan Kelly's remarks about the former president's rallies.
Trump was not well served by those around him last night.
It wasn't a Nazi rally, all that's nonsense.
But I'm telling you, even for me, and I voted for Donald Trump last week, it was too brotastic.
Okay?
It was.
You're trying to win an election in which you're hemorrhaging female voters.
Maybe when you present in front of hundreds, thousands at least, at Madison Square Garden, you clean up the bro talk just a little so you don't alienate women in the middle of America who are already on the fence about Republicans.
Do they have no women advising their campaign?
Is there no actual woman sitting behind the scenes, coming up with the guest lineup and saying, let's just have a word with the guys who are going to be speaking about this isn't the bar.
This isn't their living room.
This is a campaign.
This is politics.
We're trying to get him elected.
We don't need to rally the base or guys anymore.
And it's not helpful, even if we do want to rally the base or guys, to go full off-color insults to different racial groups and so on.
I get it.
Trust me, nothing that was said offended me.
I'm almost unoffendable.
But I understand how this plays, especially with women.
And it was an effed up choice.
Sean Spicer?
Well, look, obviously, Megan's got a huge audience.
I respect her point of view on this.
And it can't hurt to have more women out there.
I thought it was great that Melania was speaking.
The campaign is surrounded by a bunch of people who have data that tells them who they need to reach and the messages that work with them.
I don't think every speaker was great, but I thought it was an unbelievably iconic event at Madison Square Garden with some speakers.
I mean, this was literally in terms of the conservative world, this was like our Woodstock.
You think about the people that were there.
Robert F. Kennedy, Tulsi Gabbard, Melania Trump, Dr. Phil.
It was pretty unbelievable in terms of a lineup.
But look, I think all in all, that was a great rally that got worldwide coverage.
It really, and at the end of the day, what are most people paying attention to?
It's Donald Trump.
He focused on his record, the concerns that we have as a nation, the contrast between him and Kamala Harris, especially when it comes to the economy and border security.
Number one and number two issues in polls.
So look, Donald Trump, I think, is going to be headed for a big victory on Tuesday night.
I think we've got to keep our foot on the gas and keep running through the tape.
But at the end of the day, you look, Greta, at a state like New Hampshire.
Right now, I don't know that we'll end up winning it, but you got a brand new poll showing him up 0.4 of a percent there.
That wasn't considered a battleground state weeks ago.
My state here in Virginia, we have one poll now showing us down two.
This is a state that Joe Biden won by 10.
So over and over again, as I said, the wind is at Donald Trump's back.
In every single battleground state, poll after poll, the wind is at Donald Trump's back.
So they're clearly doing something right.
You talked about the crowd at Madison Square Garden, the worldwide event.
What about the thousands that gathered here in the nation's capital to hear the vice president talk at the ellipse?
Good for her.
I thought it was great.
I think it was somewhat awkward that the backdrop was the White House and you had a current sitting president, her boss, feet away in the White House and he wasn't invited.
He could literally have walked down and been there in five minutes.
It was completely secured by the Secret Service.
Why wasn't Joe Biden invited?
I mean, I think, frankly, it was a recitation of all of her talking points.
It was, I mean, great.
This is politics.
I'm, you know, I'm glad to see her out there engaging with the American people, but it was the same speech I've heard a million times.
More than anything, I think it was extremely awkward that Joe Biden, her own boss, who was feet away, wasn't invited onto the stage as the current sitting president.
You said when you were talking.
By the way, had he been invited, maybe he wouldn't have made the garbage comments on that Zoom call.
You made, when you were talking about the Madison Square Garden, you said that there's data out there that the campaigns have of who they still need to reach.
Who is that that they still need to reach?
My guess is that it's low-propensity voters, people who don't tune into cable television every day, people who are working hard to put food on the table for their family or themselves, trying to pay the rent, don't necessarily tune in to cable news shows every day or read the mainstream legacy media outlets.
And so they're trying to find surrogates or outlets, which is why I think President Trump's media strategy of really going on a lot of new media, independent media, podcasts, things like that has been brilliant.
These are where people are at.
If they're a driver, maybe a truck driver or an Uber driver or a part of the gig economy, and maybe they're listening to podcasts when they have a break because they can't have time to come home and watch appointment television.
This has been great.
So they're reaching them.
And you think about all of the outlets.
I was on Sunday night clicking around online.
I was actually out at a family event and I was just clicking around at different sites.
They were all carrying that rally live and the thousands of people on each one.
And I thought to myself, like, this is brilliant, right?
This isn't just about trying to make sure that cable news carries it.
They've got all sorts of different channels connecting with their audiences.
We'll go to Paul in Naples, Florida, supporting the former president.
Hi, Paul.
Welcome to the conversation.
Yeah, hi.
Actually, I'm glad to speak to two different hosts.
I've only called in one time and it was good.
But what I want to say real quick and two different things is people forget to think that the most important thing that we have is our children.
The children are our pot of gold.
That's the most important thing between men and women.
They should always think with having kids, that's the most important thing.
That's what makes you happy.
Okay, on that note, women that are being left out, they're not being left out.
They're just not talking about how important they are.
But without women, we wouldn't have kids and we wouldn't have a family.
We wouldn't be happy.
The other thing I want to say, with all our resources that we have under our feet as we hear it, all this gold, natural gas, and other resources, why aren't we using that to pay off our deficit?
Why can't we take, I'll guarantee you, if you take Democrats, Independents, and Republicans and put them together, they would vote for that if that money could go towards paying off our deficit.
It's a no-brainer.
All right, Paul, let's see.
Let's get a response.
Sean Spicer.
Yeah, so first of all, I'm not entirely sure on the first comment what you mean about women.
Clearly, they're a massive demographic in this election that are being really targeted and tried to turn them out.
So I think both sides are working hard for that vote.
Secondly, on the energy piece of this, look, you heard President Trump day one, drill, baby, drill.
I think he gets it.
We were energy independent when he was president.
He continues to recognize the importance of fossil fuels in our current economy.
So, yeah, it's important.
And look, I will say this with respect to the death and the deficit, and I'll take a hit on my own party on this.
I think that this is an issue that has not gotten the attention it deserves.
It is probably the greatest existential threat that our nation faces in terms of our long-term viability.
I wish both parties paid more attention to our debt and deficit.
And with all due respect, I do get the point that you're making on the energy.
But I wish, look, this isn't just about driving up revenue and saying, okay, let's get more energy, more revenue, and then we can spend more.
That's the problem in Washington.
You just tell them there's more money, they'll spend more.
We need to start looking at the other side of the ledger and saying, are we spending efficiently and effectively?
And I think universally the answer is no.
But the problem is politicians on both sides aren't rewarded for actually fiscal discipline measures.
More are rewarded because they increased spending of some sort.
Sean, you said earlier that you're bullish on the former president winning on this election.
If he doesn't, though, what do you think is the message that would have resonated with voters that they would choose the vice president?
You know, here's what I would say to you, Greta.
If you look at the polls, right, President Trump, as I said, I feel bullish.
I feel like that the wind is at our back in every one of these polls.
But there's not one of the seven, even, and I'd add Virginia and New Hampshire in that mix, eight and nine, that were outside the margin of error one way or another.
And when you get down to the final two, three weeks of a campaign, mechanics matter.
It's that ground game.
And I think we did this when I was at the RNC.
We looked at how we were operating as a party, some of the digital efforts, research efforts, get out the vote efforts, early vote, absentee vote.
We're going to be able to look back and see if there were deficiencies there.
But the reason I'm answering the question is I don't know that it's a messaging thing as much as it is a mechanics issue and a logistics issue.
At the end, when it's this close, the question is, did you do your job overall?
And it may be that there were one or two states we came up short, and that was a bigger problem.
So I don't want to get in front of Tuesday night until we know the results.
But like I said, more than anything, I think I actually hope that when we win, that we still stop and reflect on what we did well and what we can improve.
By the way, CNN out with a new poll yesterday, Harris has a narrow edge in Michigan and Wisconsin while she and Trump remain tied in Pennsylvania.
This is with likely voters showing a tied vote in Pennsylvania, 48-48.
In Michigan, 48 of likely voters saying they would support the vice president to 43% for the former president and 51 to 45 in Wisconsin.
What do you make of those poll numbers?
Well, I mean, look, as I said, everything's within the margin of error.
If you look at real clear politics, Pennsylvania, Trump up three, Trump up one, tie tie, Trump up one, Harris up two, Trump up three, Trump up one.
You mentioned, what's the other one?
Michigan.
Let me get to that real quick.
I've got Wisconsin here, Trump up tie, Trump up one, Trump up one, Trump up one, tie, tie, tie, Trump up two.
Michigan, and this is just literally reading off real clear politics.
I'm not cherry-picking anything.
Michigan, Trump up one, Trump up one, Trump up one, Harris up five, Harris up four, Trump two, Harris three, Trump one.
Look, average-wise, as I said, he's up, but it's all within the margin of error.
So you can go find a poll that shows her up a couple points.
You can find one him up a couple points.
But I think overall, what you need to look for in the final days is a trend.
Where's the race going?
So even if you look at a poll, and as I said, the mistake I think a lot of people make, especially in the media, is they'll look at one poll and say, okay, it's a snapshot.
It's a photograph.
Part of what you need to know is it's like snapshotting two cars going down the road.
You see two cars.
You don't know which one is overtaking the other.
Are they going the same speed?
So if you're going to cherry-pick a poll and say, okay, CNN says this, where was that poll a week ago, two weeks ago, three weeks ago?
And that's what you need to start looking at is the trend moving in one direction or the other.
Pat in Walton, Kentucky.
Hi, Pat.
I have two things that I want to say.
When Kamala has her speeches, I don't hear her ever.