Chuck Schumer discusses strategies for winning elections (Part 2)

Mississippi. I was always eager to win in the South. We had won in Georgia two years before. No one thought we could do that. And Scott had been rejected by the incumbent, Senator Hyde Smith. He had been nominated to be the first African American federal judge in Mississippi in a century. And she blocked him. And I went to him and said, you got to run. I actually had he and his father, I served them lunch in my house in Brooklyn. And, you know, they haven't declared his election at this point, but they're counting the votes. He's ahead by 1700. A lot of the remaining votes are provisional ballots, which usually go Democratic. And he may make history and be our ac. You had a few misfires if you're bringing up recruitment. Yes. You wanted Janet Mills, the governor of Maine, to be the nominee. The Democratic primary voters in Maine did not want that. Same with Haley Stevens in Michigan. Yeah. I mean, in the overall math. Do you feel good about your recruitment or. Oh, yeah, you have some regrets and look. No, I. I feel very. You don't even regret Haley Stevens now. No. The bottom line is, after she turned and endorsed Mike Rogers, we knew from the beginning we had to win Michigan. And Michigan hates Trump because of the tariffs, and with Canada in particular, et cetera. And once Haley Stevens lost to Abdul, we put $60 million in to help Abdul, and he's very appreciative of that. We had to win Michigan, and my North Star is winning the Senate. Okay, let me zoom out just a little bit. Okay. I appreciate you talking about your very hands on approach to recruitment, the three Cs, that strategy. I want to talk about what just happened on Tuesday and how much you think the actual candidates mattered and how much of an affirmation we should think of this as for Democrats, because every analysis I've seen of this midterm election concludes it was a referendum on Trump, his party, on tariffs, on deportations, on the war in Iran. And let's just be really honest, the Democratic Party in the weeks leading up to this election, deeply unpopular. Our Polling showed only 28% of voters were satisfied with the party. My colleague put it this way, the only people less popular than President Trump are Democrats. So.