This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker. Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour, I'm David Remnick. One of the big changes in our politics, and I don't think we've really gotten our heads around it yet, is to change in how and where people get their information. You know the top line here. Very real declines in people watching the nightly news and reading the newspapers. And in their places come a much more scattered, much more siloed universe of social media feeds, TikTok explainers, podcasts, newsletters, and all the rest. Now I don't think it's unfair to say that most of these outlets, not all but most, whatever their virtues, are not exactly obsessed with fairness and accuracy in the way that the best traditional journalism outlets are, what Dan Wells should be. And yet there's no denying the power, even the relatability of many podcasts, whether it's Ben Shapiro on the right, Joe Rogan wherever he might be on a given day, or on the left, someone like our guest today, Jennifer Welch. Welch came to political podcasts in a kind of roundabout way. She had a successful career as an interior designer, and she co-starred in a reality show on Bravo. But since 2022, she and her co-host Angie Sullivan have been pushing political buttons and getting millions of fans on the podcast called, I've had it. And that's Jennifer Welch's daily state of mind, furious. I've had it with white people that triple-trapped, that have the nerve and the audacity to walk into a Mexican restaurant, a Chinese restaurant, an Indian restaurant, go to perhaps their gay hairdresser. I don't think you should be able to enjoy anything but cracker barrel. Her frustration is not only with MAGA. Welch has gotten particularly contentious in interviews with establishment Democrats, like Cory Booker, and Rama Manual. When she takes real advantage of a certain surprise factor that a white woman in her 50s from Oklahoma has emerged as one of the most provocative voices on the left today. I spoke last week with Jennifer Welch, co-host of the podcast, I've had it. So you have one of the biggest podcasts out there. And as you know, there are hundreds of thousands of podcasts. And their uncle apparently has a podcast at this point. How did you conceive of this show? Where does it fit in? What is it? My friend Angie and I were on a reality television show in 2016 to run 2019. Our politics seeps through a little bit, particularly mind-desk in the show because that's what was the hook for the Bravo executives, like their liberals in Oklahoma. Right, where you're from. Right. And I'm in the city. So the show gets canceled. And I go back to being an interior designer. And then I'm doing national projects. So that was great fun. And I'm just booming. And then there was the post-COVID boom where everybody comes out of quarantine wanting to redecorate everything. And my kids were like, you know, you still have a lot of people that follow you that are interested in the show. You should do a podcast. So I tell Angie this and we decide to do it. And the premise was during the Biden administration, which was, I've had it. I've had it with gender-revealed parties. I've had it with over-celebrating children. Why are we going to kindergarten graduations? Why? So there were these relatable grievances that initially I think everybody likes trash talk right. And we look, my co-host and I, look somewhat mega-coded. Through mega-coded because of where you're from. The blonde hair, some Botox from time to time. And the Southern accent. Yeah. Right? So it's kind of Fox-coded, I would say. And I've always been a die-hard political junkie. I was raised in the Bible belt by two progressive atheists, which is a very, very strange upbringing. Was political discussion a big part of your upbringing in Oklahoma? Yes, with my mother. Who was pretty left, right? Very left. My mother is a voracious reader. She was a closet atheist for many years because if you came out of the closet as an atheist in a place like Oklahoma, it's about as bottom of the barrel. I mean, it's social death for you. Total social death. And so she and I would have all of these conversations about, I remember the first time I ever asked my mother, what is gay? Why would somebody be gay? I'm like six years old. And my mother would say, well, Darlin, all you need to know is nobody in the right, damn mind, whatever. Choose to be gay in the middle of the Bible belt. That would be insane. It is not a choice. So this type of critical thinking juxtaposed with the rigid evangelicals that I went to school with that were constantly trying to recruit me was a really interesting upbringing. You've got this podcast now with the background that you've got. What do you see as its distinguishing feature? What's it about? We moved on from the petty grievances and we have an additional podcast now called Ihip News, which is short for I've had it podcast news. We have so many people in the middle of America, blue dots, if you will, that have a different world view about American politics than no offense. You coastal elites do or people inside the beltway do. And there is a part of beltway politics that is too civilized that doesn't understand the grit and the fangs that will draw people in the middle of the country into the fight. And you're trying to give at least as I listen to it. Give voice to that sense of frustration. Some of your recent episodes on your podcast have these names and not all of them will be able to make it on conventional radio. No country for magma men, new year same assholes. Ring out the bullshit, marry grift miss fascism but stupid and finally all the presidents morons. I think that's a different mood say in pod save America. Yes, this is the era of FU politics and dark woke. Which dark woke. Okay, dark woke is a reaction to you have the purest woke people who are policing what everybody say up in everybody's business, which is similar a bit to conservatives being up in everybody's business. Dark woke for me is we are fighting for good and for equality and for social justice for everybody, but we don't mind saying FU. You have to know what you're up against and you have to be ruthless. Give me some examples and tell me who your allies are in that. Well, some examples would be we have to go after these magma men, one example would be Jesse Waters. This man talks incessantly about masculinity. Joe Biden is not masculine because he sucks on soup. What kind of man sucks on a straw? He goes on and on and on so much about the idealized man and that's a part of fascism, this propelling this form of toxic masculinity. Why are you so obsessed with men, Jesse Waters? What's all that about? Why are you so obsessed with trans people? Why are you thinking about genitals all the time? Kind of flip the script. So when you look at the guys and it's almost all guys on Pod Save America, do you look at them as very 2016, very 2008, very Obama and you've left that behind? I see the situation as being so dire right now that I don't see any of these people as competitors. I see the whole group as people of building a media ecosystem that is pro-democracy and if people that are still stuck in the Obama era need to go listen to Pod Save, I know that they are pro-democracy and anti-fascist. But you think it's a form of self-suiting almost? Yes. Yes. I think that they're... And delusional. Yes. Explain that to me because I would bet if we're being honest with each other that on public radio there's a lot of that too. There are some commonalities between the center left and the far right that can no longer be ignored. You can look at the electorate and you can say, you're being lied to. These people are lying to you. The center left movement, the Hillary Clinton's, the certain people in that media echo chamber are still lying to you because they prioritize corporate interest over the interests of the people. And that is what has left the vacuum for well-meaning people to just vote against the status quo. And this has been an evolution for me because I was a very good MSNBC liberal. That's where I got my marching orders. That's where I felt like I was intellectual and I lived out and I was the most liberal woman in Oklahoma City. And I see the error of my thinking and not thinking even outside of that box. Be specific. What were the errors? Because I know that you're obviously very, very tough on the likes of Huckiem Jeffries, Chuck Schumer. Give me a sense of what you think their sins are and what distinguishes your politics from say the, you know, the more supportive voices that you do here on PodSave America or the like. The error of my way was probably voting for Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders. There's a condescension to corporate democratic politics with the very long answers. You probably saw where I asked Cory Booker. Do you think Benjamin Netanyahu is a war criminal? It was a yes or no question. It was a very long answer. Here's where I would get into a conversation with you. Some things are a yes or no answer. Some things aren't and some things actually are complicated. Some things do have a complicated history. That's not necessarily both side or is immoral, the other derisive terms for it. Is that just weakness in your eyes or what? I do think that some answers are more complex. But when you have somebody like Cory Booker who has presented himself to all of us as standing for the marginalized, standing for humanity, standing for civil rights. You ask him a question about Benjamin Netanyahu who has a warrant out for his arrest for being a war criminal. When you see that answer being duplicitous, this is very damaging to the Democratic Party. Jennifer Welsh is co-host of the podcast. I've had it and will continue in a moment. I'm Mandy and I'm Melissa and this is Moms and Mysteries. We're two Florida Moms obsessed with true crime. From infamous cases like Ellen Greenberg to shocking Florida stories like the Dan Markelle killing. With 55 million downloads, we bring you new deep dives every Tuesday and Thursday. Listen to Moms and Mysteries on Apple podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Rammick and I've been speaking today with the co-host of the Popular Political Podcast. I've had it. Her name is Jennifer Welsh. Even if you aren't a regular listener, Welsh very well may have popped up on your social media feeds with stinging rebukes of politicians on both sides. Her progressive politics are not unique but her style and her sense of how to connect with listeners is pretty unapologetic, pretty in your face and very profane. Where Michelle Obama famously said, when they go low, we go high. Welsh says, you want to go low? We're going to go lower. I'll continue my conversation with Jennifer Welsh. Joe Rogan is the leading podcaster, not only in this country but in the world and by a lot. This is a guy who started out not with politics in mind but rather with UFOs in mind and UFC fighting and suddenly politics and big thinkers and dark web people and and and started coming to his show and it became even more important, even more influential. One of the biggest lingering questions about Kamala Harris wasn't about this policy question or that. It was about why the hell she didn't manage to go on Joe Rogan. I know you don't listen incessantly but I wonder what your thoughts on Joe Rogan and how you think about him and what influence it might or might not have on what you do. These voices are out there everywhere and on the right they have a massive, massive media ecosystem. The Democrats are too structured. They need to go on all of these podcasts. Kamala should have gone on Joe Rogan and allow herself to not be so disciplined. The reason that Joe Rogan and a much smaller podcast I've had it are taking off so much is because this is the way people speak. The news where you're just being reported to it's kind of aged. It feels somewhat antiquated. We've become more informal in the way that we live and to combine this with my former profession I still do it interior design. Think about back in the 50s the kitchen your guests never saw it. It was a very formal way of life. Now the kitchen is the nucleus of the house and everybody hangs out at the island. As a culture we become less and less formal. You see that in architecture and you see that in the way we consume news. There's this idea that when you're listening to a podcast or two people having a conversation that you know them and they're right in your ear and it feels intimate versus the presentation of corporate news. What I grew up and I still like it and I still watch it. Do you? Yeah, I do. Do you think the New York Times is a reliable purveyor of news because it's certainly the dominant newspaper and probably news gathering organization in this country? I do think they do really good work. There has been some sane washing headlines pertaining to covering what is actually happening right now that I think is not just a New York Times problem but a media problem in general. I saw online, imagine if we covered what was happening in the United States right now, the way we cover what happens in dictatorships in Africa or the Middle East. More outraged in a sense. Right. It would be more realistic as to what's happened. I think the media has been very complicit because of the corporate ownership of it and it's been the soft sell of this fascist. I agree. I'm not sure. I agree. I'm not saying so. In the sense, I get that critique and I hear it all the time. I'm in a corporate media. This week's cover of the New Yorker is Donald Trump amidst lots of explosions, obviously Venezuela, drinking from a gigantic barrel of oil and the oil is coming all over. A more straight up the, you know, the wazoo political cartoon. You can imagine by Barry Blit. There it is. And yet I go to one panel discussion after another and get yelled at by one comedian podcast, usually comedian podcast is about the corporate media and they're the truth teller. I don't know if it's as simple as all that. I think you're correct that there are outliers, but it seems like since Fox News, there has been a trickle down effect of a weakening of journalistic integrity across the board. You had Rama manual. Oh, yeah. Rama manual is pretty clearly either thinking about or already running for president and you just let him have it. Let's listen for a second. We were really self-uncatch table issues. We weren't really good about the family room issues. I disagree with you. I disagree with you. Okay. The only room we got is only room we were really well was a bathroom and that's the smallest room in the house. That is such bullshit. That is total bullshit that is buying into the right wing media narrative. And I'm so sick of Democrats like you selling out and saying this. You know who talks about trans people more than anybody? Maga. Kamala Harris talked about home ownership. She talked about kitchen table issues. Trump's over there, drone and on about Hannibal Lecter. Are you kidding me? Yes. You put it right between his eyes. Why? When I heard him buy into the narrative that the right wing defines the left wing by by being trans obsessed or bathroom obsessed when they, the right wing, are the people who ran on this for him to play Kate to that narrative. And when he said it, I didn't always going to say it. That was, I felt the adrenaline like come up in me. And I have friends in Oklahoma who have trans children and to go back to what my mother said, nobody in their right mind chooses to wake up and think, she know what? Today, I'm going to have with the conservatives. I'm going to switch genders and I'm going to go try to be a D1 tennis player. That's not what this journey is. And for the Democrats, we have to be the party of equality. And even if these mega people don't understand what transgenderism is, that's okay. You don't have to understand it, but we're not going to bully them. We're not going to pick them up and throw them under the bus. And the rights that are available for me need to be readily available for those people. And I would even go a step further. Maybe they need a little bit more love and a little bit less throwing under the bus. So when I hear Democrats do this, it really pisses me off. And that's why the Democrats lose because average voter sniffed that duplicity out. Do you accept the argument that I hate the word, but I'll use it anyway, that wokeness got to a point where it did hurt the Democrats on a whole other range of issues and their efforts to get elected? I accept that what we're going through right now is a backlash from a lot of that. I remember on my Instagram feed after Kamala Law, somebody wrote, I hate being white, you know, just very histrionic about the whole thing. And I thought, oh, fuck, God, say this is ridiculous. Of course, you still don't even get the point on the far left. It can go too far, too woke, which is why I think we have to go dark woke. Don't get mired down. They call me a wine mom all the time. Yeah, what is that? And why aren't you more pissed about it? So I was interviewed by the aforementioned New York Times and they asked me, they refer to me as the wine mom. And I definitely was at one point. I remember my kids were really little. I was like, God, I can't go through another day sober. I need to have a few glasses of wine. Whose kids were alive, right? So, but between you and me and your listener, I do think it's reductive to refer to me as a wine mom. And I do think you would never refer to Joe Rogan as a wine dad or a whiskey dad. I do think women oftentimes get defined in a parental role where men never do. But here's the difference between being woke and dark woke. Where this comes from is all the people that are pro-democracy. I'm not going to pitch a fit and say, quit calling me a wine mom. That's sexist. And you think that would alienate a potential listener? I don't care about alienating listeners as much as I do is this helpful. I think part of your show is almost cathartic. That's exactly right. I'm going to get this off my chest. And I tune in so I hear you doing it with me so I feel less lonely. That's exactly right. And I also think when you are falling prey to abuse and what this government is doing to us right now is abusing us, we are seeing it every day with ice raids, with God just Stephen Miller in a news clip is abusive as I'll get out, right? And we need a sense of community. And I liken it to my husband is in recovery from opioid addiction. That was an incredibly painful, isolating, horrible thing that I went through. And I found myself at an Allen on meeting. I found myself with these group of people who were experiencing the same type of gaslighting and abuse that one suffers from loving and addict. And it depersonalized it for me. It made me realize, oh, what I'm perceiving as I'm not levable or if I just did this or if I just did that then maybe he might be sober that there is an actual playbook that a lot of addicts do because it's addiction. Similarly, when you get to IHIP news, we're all experiencing this trauma and we're being gaslit and we're being propagandized and you feel like you're going crazy. And so I'm pairing your show to an Allen on meeting in a sense. But in the sense of community that you realize you can go there and go, oh, God, I'm not crazy. And I think a lot of people don't realize how isolated Americans in the middle of the country are. What I worry about is the other thing is exposing people and myself to contrary opinion, not the same opinion. Am I wrong too? Sometimes I'll be at a gathering or whatever it might be. And everybody's saying the same damn thing. That concerns me too. I see your point. I think that I approached the podcast with and I mentioned this a lot with my experience in Oklahoma, which has a Republican supermajority. The last time we had a Democratic governor, we were ranked 17th in the country in education. Next we've had a Republican supermajority in the state, the governor, the state house, the state senate and the state supreme court. We have fallen from 17th in education to 50th in education. No, it's grim. Are you getting listened to though in Oklahoma? Yes. When I go home and I go to Oklahoma City Thunder games, you wouldn't believe the amount of people in Oklahoma City. And all my good team, God, they're so good. They're even better than the next. Love. Oh, yes. The next fans are so salty. Were you too mean to Eric or Kirk and was your timing, Lousey? No. Help your cause to call her, particularly in that moment of aftermath, a grifter and a person who weaponizes her gender to demean women. Yes, because that's what she did. If people are out trying to fundraise off of his death and the message that she's sending to women, to marry younger, breed immediately, it is a very dangerous message. So I double down on that. And I think her message makes women less safe. We've got an election coming up in a year. Who do you like and who do you not like for 2028? How's Gavin Newsom looking to? Okay. Your female listeners will appreciate this. And this is what we get to talk on podcasts, but not corporate news. He's very easy on the eyeballs, which is a nice component. I've had a... He looks like a dastardly senator in a movie, doesn't he? He does. He does. A hair cut, that whole thing. A lot of central casting. Yeah. I like his fight. I like how he relentlessly trolls Trump. Yeah. I think with the base, he's going to have the same problems that Clinton and Kamala did granted. He is a white male and historically they seem to do better in the electorate than women. Yeah. But seems to be the history of the president. Much to my... To my... Much to my sugar. Yeah. But he has time to clean all of this up. But he recently said he opposed a billionaire tax. And I think he's going to have a very hard time if he doesn't really get in the trenches with where the base has moved. And I think that's going to be what's most shocking for the Democratic establishment candidates is how much the base has moved away from corporate dims. So who does that leave you with? I'll tell you, I love Rokana. I don't think he's going to run for office. But somebody who I think can be interesting is JB Pritzker. He's a billionaire. And a real one. A real billionaire. He is Jewish, which he has an opportunity to speak to what a lot of people in the Democratic base have issues with with Palestine. If he can call what is happening, a genocide, if he can call Benjamin Netanyahu a war criminal, he would be a credible messenger to... Those are litmus tests for you. I hate the word litmus tests. But I'm realistic in the sense that I believe that we have to call what we're seeing. Realistically, you cannot gaslight people about it. Would you have called LBJ or Richard Nixon more criminals? Probably. I mean, I think that American foreign policy has been problematic for a long time. And I've had a great awakening about this. But as I see what happened with Venezuela, when I saw that they were killing fishermen, I had to be really objective and honest. We didn't really do anything about what George W. Bush did in Abu Ghraib or the CIA black sites. Obama's drone program. Remember, I love Obama. I'm super nostalgic about him. But if we are really to be honest about American foreign policy, these provocations that Trump just did, they're not new. It seems to me that the people that you're looking at are Rokana, AOC, the new mayor of New York. Is that the kind of area you're talking about? Yes, I have. Economic populism from a democratic view. Yes. The last gubernatorial race that we had, we had our governor who was running for a second term, Kevin Stitt, Maga, right wing, Christian nationalist, says, I dedicate every square inch of the state to my Lord and personal savior, Jesus Christ. And then you had Joy Hofmeister, who ran against him. He was a former Republican switch to Democrat. And she ran as Republican light. And Kevin Stitt kicked her ass. And I'm curious when you get these Democrats that can run in red areas the way Andy Bush shared it. And you get them to run on a populist message that use faith to say, your faith may tell you to bully those kids. But Andy Bush shares Casey said, I will not bully these trans kids. Tell them to go in Texas. Exactly. Yeah. Can we get people in the democratic party that speak more to more Americans? And I think an economic populist message is something that you could see triple Trumpers crossover as we did in the New York City mayoral race. You have one in 10, Trumpers voted for Zoran. That's pretty significant. But what I'm asking you, can Oklahoma ever become purple or blue? Maybe I'm an optimist. But I do think if somebody ran in Oklahoma and went to rural Oklahoma and said, you have been lied to. Look at what the Republican supermajority got you. Look at what the Republican supermajority got herald him. Herald him is one of the richest Oklahoma's big billionaire oil guy. And I think if they really spoke to people and said, we see you. Forgive me. Doesn't your language on your show, does that invite or alienate people who are as it were red? If I'm honest, it probably alienates them. But I'm not a politician. I'm not trying to get more. You're not by the way. You're not running for anything. No. Oh, God no. No. You told Karrist Wishing you'd rather make your living on your back than as a politician. I would. That's a pretty good term to say. They need a populist truth teller to go in to these places because here's the problem where the Democrats have messed up. They would drew from a 50 state strategy. And what you have is an electorate that gets more and more radicalized versus having robust campaigns. And can the Democrats win immediately? No. But look at the seeds that Bernie Sanders planted. I believe during the primary of 2016, Bernie won Oklahoma against Hillary. I know these people and they're earnest and well meaning they need an off ramp to get off of this Republican party bullshit lie of trickle down economics, of scapegoating marginalized people, of this massive wealth gap that we have. So if you take somebody who says I'm going to fight for you, I believe not might not happen the first election. But if there was footing in the state of people running based on facts and for Oklahoma's over the course of a couple election cycles, I think you could see change. Jennifer Welsh, thank you so much. Thank you. Jennifer Welsh's host of the podcast, I've had it along with Angie Sullivan. That's the New Yorker radio hour for today. 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