Flood of questions and water (09-25-2024--Hour2)

[00:00:04] [SPEAKER_01]: Let's go on!

[00:00:05] [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much for listening to this podcast.

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[00:00:28] [SPEAKER_01]: Alright, let's head over to the phones and chat with our pal Mark Starling to the west out in the mountains of North Carolina in the Ashville area.

[00:00:37] [SPEAKER_01]: And Mark, welcome!

[00:00:39] [SPEAKER_00]: Good afternoon, Pete, how are you sir?

[00:00:41] [SPEAKER_01]: I am, well I haven't been caught on to cover video in an undercover video talking about sex field or drug field sex parties during the COVID pandemic

[00:00:52] [SPEAKER_01]: and no posts on New Africa discovered so far.

[00:00:58] [SPEAKER_01]: I feel like I am doing alright.

[00:01:00] [SPEAKER_01]: Man, sounds like you are batting a thousand, I mean?

[00:01:02] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, right.

[00:01:05] [SPEAKER_01]: So, alright, so Mark is the morning guy on WWNC in Asheville.

[00:01:10] [SPEAKER_01]: What has been the reaction, dare I say what's the mood?

[00:01:15] [SPEAKER_01]: But what's the reaction in the Asheville area to the Mark Robinson story?

[00:01:22] [SPEAKER_00]: You know, strangely enough, from the actual camp, you know the local campaign circuit, not really seen a whole lot.

[00:01:32] [SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, obviously I put the question out to my listeners in the morning and I got some really interesting responses.

[00:01:38] [SPEAKER_00]: Some responses that I don't know that I was necessarily expecting as far as the numbers went.

[00:01:43] [SPEAKER_00]: Most people seem at least that I heard from seem to be on the side of he,

[00:01:51] [SPEAKER_00]: absolutely needs to defend himself against these.

[00:01:56] [SPEAKER_00]: And if he is being truthful and none of this is him, he needs to provide that evidence.

[00:02:03] [SPEAKER_00]: Whether or not it was going to change their vote doesn't matter, right?

[00:02:08] [SPEAKER_00]: They basically said we're still voting for him because there's no way we could cast a vote for Josh stuff.

[00:02:14] [SPEAKER_00]: And then you also had the camp that said this is all garbage, we know it's all garbage.

[00:02:20] [SPEAKER_00]: They basically say how come it's another P story?

[00:02:24] [SPEAKER_00]: They come up with something more original.

[00:02:27] [SPEAKER_00]: And I thought that was kind of an interesting reaction obviously, you know, throwing back to the Russian P tape story from the 2016 election.

[00:02:35] [SPEAKER_00]: But you know, I really think people's heels are so dug into the ground right now.

[00:02:41] [SPEAKER_00]: And I don't know, I think Mark Robinson is making a little bit of headway in the sense of continuing to talk about his policy and trying to ignore this.

[00:02:51] [SPEAKER_00]: But I don't think it's going to work.

[00:02:54] [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I do understand that he apparently has retained counsel as of today from what I understand.

[00:03:00] [SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, would he retain counsel if he knows he's guilty?

[00:03:09] [SPEAKER_01]: Well, he or he's retained the lawyers in order to try to investigate the source of these what he claims to be, you know, false claims.

[00:03:20] [SPEAKER_00]: Well, and you know what I guess the other part of this story is to me that really makes me scratch my head is that he apparently turned down resources that were offered to him.

[00:03:30] [SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's why people who were supporters and said, hey, look, we've got the tools.

[00:03:34] [SPEAKER_00]: We've got the investigative skills, we've got the time, and we really do this for you.

[00:03:39] [SPEAKER_00]: We want to help prove you innocent. That's how much we believe in you and he turned them down.

[00:03:45] [SPEAKER_00]: And I have to believe that that's probably because he knew what they were going to find.

[00:03:50] [SPEAKER_01]: Right. So that's possible also it's possible that people who gave that information to the news outlet that reported it,

[00:03:57] [SPEAKER_01]: which I believe was WRAL, that they were not informed. They were lying. They were spreading rumors and the media outlet was happy to, you know, publish their rumors or lies.

[00:04:11] [SPEAKER_01]: Like that's, and this is part of the problem that I have with a lot of the media performance in stories like this, which is that I can't trust them because on stories that I know,

[00:04:24] [SPEAKER_01]: the background on that I see them get wrong and then I see them quoting anonymous sources, you know, people familiar with the matter.

[00:04:32] [SPEAKER_01]: And they're not telling us where the information is coming from. Now that you're just asking me to believe you based on my perception of your credibility and then you're not going to get that.

[00:04:43] [SPEAKER_00]: So that's the way you, not after, you know, and this is what I think we were all shouting about, you know, during the Russia Russia situation.

[00:04:53] [SPEAKER_00]: Right. It was that if this is not real, you do realize there are going to be consequences to this.

[00:05:00] [SPEAKER_00]: And I think we saw what those consequences were with the debate with ABC. I mean, at their ratings went down 12%. After the debate.

[00:05:08] [SPEAKER_00]: You know, and I think this falls along in that same category that listen, when I heard that the stories were coming out, I wasn't surprised that there was stories coming out from up a research.

[00:05:17] [SPEAKER_00]: But immediately when it was seen in that was reporting it, I think like you, I just had to go, ah, hold on here. We're going to pump the breaks.

[00:05:25] [SPEAKER_00]: Right. Let this one let this one kind of marinate a little bit. Let's see where we end up because I'm just not willing to get burned by seeing it.

[00:05:35] [SPEAKER_00]: And I think listen, I don't think Mark Robinson is in a real good spot right now.

[00:05:40] [SPEAKER_00]: Well, that's an understatement.

[00:05:42] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, this stuff is real. And in fact, all of this did happen. Any opportunity he had to redeem himself is gone now.

[00:05:53] [SPEAKER_00]: Right. I've been in touch with some folks within the state GOP. If you want to call them operatives or sources, whatever you want to call them.

[00:06:02] [SPEAKER_01]: People familiar with them, how do you?

[00:06:04] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, if you will. And they say that there's more on the way.

[00:06:10] [SPEAKER_00]: And some of the stuff that's on the way may even just fall outside of the political realm and could be kind of incriminating.

[00:06:19] [SPEAKER_00]: So like, you know, I just think everybody's going to have to hold their breath and see what happens here.

[00:06:25] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I've been told by multiple sources that the GOP knew about all of this stuff prior to the primaries.

[00:06:35] [SPEAKER_01]: So I've heard rumors though that they will, I've heard it said that they knew of stuff. What stuff?

[00:06:42] [SPEAKER_01]: Nobody would ever tell me specifically what stuff they would just say stuff is out there. And you know, like that doesn't to me.

[00:06:52] [SPEAKER_01]: That is not a persuasive argument to say that especially if people are backing another candidate in a primary where they are at another candidate in the primary.

[00:07:01] [SPEAKER_01]: You know, you're trying to persuade me not to vote for your opponent by telling me that there's a whole bunch of dirt that's coming out on the guy.

[00:07:07] [SPEAKER_01]: But you won't tell me what the dirt is even like off the record then no. Like I can't.

[00:07:13] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I can't take that seriously.

[00:07:17] [SPEAKER_00]: It is certainly, it is certainly a time when you realize if you wake up and you go, hey wait a second. How did North Carolina become the Jerry Springer Show of politics 2024?

[00:07:27] [SPEAKER_01]: I kind of feel like we've been down this path though. I feel like we've been pursuing this path for a while, you know?

[00:07:34] [SPEAKER_00]: Well, I mean listen, the whole cow barbecue thing I believe is what started to downfall, Pete.

[00:07:39] [SPEAKER_01]: Well, let me see no, I mean we had Mike easily going way back Mike easily.

[00:07:45] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, all his his corruption. I mean that guy lost his law license for crying out loud.

[00:07:52] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I mean we had a speaker of the house that went to prison so kind of feel like we've been on this path for a little bit.

[00:07:58] [SPEAKER_01]: Speaking of paths though.

[00:08:00] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, trajectory if you will.

[00:08:02] [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, well that's fair. Yeah, and there's been an acceleration maybe.

[00:08:07] [SPEAKER_01]: So speaking of paths and trajectories and acceleration you guys people don't realize this, but Western North Carolina actually usually gets hammered with these types of tropical storms that we're seeing with

[00:08:20] [SPEAKER_01]: Heline and so you guys are I guess preparing for what could be a pretty significant event what with

[00:08:27] [SPEAKER_01]: landslides, mudslides and slope failure in such.

[00:08:31] [SPEAKER_00]: So if you remember back a couple of years ago we had a tropical storm Fred or actually even a tropical storm it was the

[00:08:37] [SPEAKER_00]: Remnant of tropical storm Fred that came through. It killed six people up in the Haywood County and Jackson County area is silver.

[00:08:46] [SPEAKER_00]: That area.

[00:08:47] [SPEAKER_00]: We are looking at something that is potentially even going to be worse than that.

[00:08:51] [SPEAKER_00]: I think one of the things that I know you guys are weather channel affiliators well and some of the things that raised

[00:08:57] [SPEAKER_00]: Stageic and I talked about this morning is that is so significant is that even when this storm makes

[00:09:02] [SPEAKER_00]: landfall and it hits it if it hits at a category three when it gets to Atlanta it will still be at hurricane status.

[00:09:11] [SPEAKER_00]: At least that is that's what the projection is right now that makes things on whole lot worse for Western North Carolina

[00:09:16] [SPEAKER_00]: And then specifically you put us on that northeastern side of the storm which is really kind of the drop zones for all bad things.

[00:09:24] [SPEAKER_00]: We really got a kind of a situation on our hands up here for sure. So we've kind of activated all you know all hands on deck or as we used to say all turkeys to the ramps.

[00:09:36] [SPEAKER_00]: And really having to you know really kind of having to have to to muster some resources here and prepare for the worst.

[00:09:43] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, unfortunately it looks like five to twelve inches of rain for us here in Western North Carolina.

[00:09:48] [SPEAKER_00]: We've already had I see in the upwards of four inches to five inches of rain just in the past three days so we are super saturated already.

[00:09:57] [SPEAKER_00]: You add in some winds and some high winds with that and I think you're in for a real we're in for a long long couple of days.

[00:10:04] [SPEAKER_00]: Right. So the sleep at the radio station for me next year.

[00:10:08] [SPEAKER_01]: Right. And so for people who aren't aware like the saturations a big deal because all of the water runs down through all the creeks and stuff and then as it drops in elevation it picks up speed.

[00:10:20] [SPEAKER_01]: And so putting more and more water into that basin creates like catastrophic results with you know massive amounts of water that build velocity as they race as it races down the mountains.

[00:10:35] [SPEAKER_00]: And it folks if folks want a reference point and I think I'm getting the year right. I believe it was 2004 that they had those catastrophic floods here in Western North Carolina.

[00:10:46] [SPEAKER_00]: Our station I think was it was the last media entity left on the air that made it all the way through the storm and there's some there's some pictures online that you go to you know if you go to whatever search engine of choices and just look at ash still floods of early 2000s and it's pretty significant.

[00:11:03] [SPEAKER_00]: I mean built more village you know for as well known as it is.

[00:11:07] [SPEAKER_00]: You end up with six and eight feet of water in some parts of built more village to the point where stores are ruined you know flood mitigation and all this stuff so really kind of a bad situation the only.

[00:11:17] [SPEAKER_00]: Right spot we were kind of seeing right now is that the rivers were really really low before we got all this rain so thankfully we weren't dealing with.

[00:11:26] [SPEAKER_00]: The rivers that had normal levels and then we got five inches of rain on top of it now the hurricane coming in.

[00:11:31] [SPEAKER_00]: The rivers were really low so hopefully that will help mitigate a little bit of the flood.

[00:11:36] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah Mark Starling morning guy up in ashville appreciate your time stay safe mark get some sleep.

[00:11:42] [SPEAKER_01]: You got it my friend have a great day.

[00:11:44] [SPEAKER_01]: Hi buddy that is Mark Starling at WWNC in ashville you know stories are powerful they help us make sense of things to understand experiences stories connect us to the people of our past while transcending generations.

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[00:12:50] [SPEAKER_01]: All righty so mark Robinson's campaign put out a statement uh believe this was yesterday.

[00:12:59] [SPEAKER_01]: Or this morning as I have said from the beginning the claims from CNN are salacious lies.

[00:13:05] [SPEAKER_01]: I will not let these attacks distract us from sharing a better future for our state and I'm glad to be able to bring Jesse Benal and his team on board to investigate where and how these false smears originated.

[00:13:19] [SPEAKER_01]: I am confident that Benal law group will leave no stone unturned and enable us to use every legal means to hold CNN accountable for their lies.

[00:13:30] [SPEAKER_01]: In the meantime my campaign remains laser focused on the issues at stake in this election.

[00:13:36] [SPEAKER_01]: Jesse Benal partner at the Benal law group put out a statement here along with it who said my team and I are looking forward to getting to the bottom of CNN's claims and we will bring all our resources to bear in getting to the facts.

[00:13:53] [SPEAKER_01]: Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson his family and the voters of North Carolina deserve nothing less.

[00:14:02] [SPEAKER_01]: WSOTTV dot com reporting on, um, yeah well this is from the associated press. They just republished the piece.

[00:14:11] [SPEAKER_01]: The AP reports that Mark Robinson said that he has hired this law firm.

[00:14:17] [SPEAKER_01]: The announcement comes as more North Carolina Republicans disturbed by last week's report said that if Robinson can't formally refute the accusations quickly.

[00:14:27] [SPEAKER_01]: The GOP should shift its focus to competitive in state races.

[00:14:33] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I think they're way ahead of you on that.

[00:14:35] [SPEAKER_01]: The money has already been drying up. The staffers have been quitting.

[00:14:40] [SPEAKER_01]: Things are not looking good for Mark Robinson's campaign, but honestly at this point I'm actually a little bit more concerned at the personal level for his family.

[00:14:52] [SPEAKER_01]: Because this kind of stuff yes it's difficult for the individual who is the target or is the candidate or the victim or the perpetrator or everyone to call it.

[00:15:02] [SPEAKER_01]: But the person is the subject of these stories that's one thing. It's always harder on the families always so we hope that if it's true, if it's not true that this law firm can actually produce some sort of evidence

[00:15:44] [SPEAKER_01]: to validate that. But we'll see.

[00:16:15] [SPEAKER_01]: Friends, family, even yourself. Don't miss out on spreading the joy with gifts that support North Carolina based small businesses just visit simply ncgoods dot com slash Pete and check them out that simply ncgoods dot com slash Pete and thanks for being a part of simply ncgood story.

[00:16:35] [SPEAKER_01]: I did get a message from Bob.

[00:16:38] [SPEAKER_01]: On the email. It's a Pete mail and he has had his Robinson prove a negative.

[00:16:45] [SPEAKER_01]: I don't think he needs to prove the negative.

[00:16:49] [SPEAKER_01]: I think he needs to at least present some evidence something.

[00:16:56] [SPEAKER_01]: He's got to give people some reason like a flat out denial. I understand.

[00:17:02] [SPEAKER_01]: But I think that's why you hire a law firm as he now has done to try to track down some piece of information that would cast doubt.

[00:17:14] [SPEAKER_01]: He needs reasonable doubt, you know.

[00:17:17] [SPEAKER_01]: And so far there hasn't been any production of any evidence that would provide that reasonable doubt.

[00:17:26] [SPEAKER_01]: So I know that the national media and even local and state media, they keep talking about up ballot impact that there would be some sort of an up ballot effect.

[00:17:37] [SPEAKER_01]: In other words, we'll mark Robinson.

[00:17:40] [SPEAKER_01]: Drag down Donald Trump in North Carolina and they're you know Democrats a media but I repeat myself.

[00:17:46] [SPEAKER_01]: They are they are hopeful that this can happen. They are wishing that this happens.

[00:17:50] [SPEAKER_01]: This wish casting you know in the form of well this might happen that would be something we have never seen before.

[00:17:59] [SPEAKER_01]: You know campaigns at the top of the ballot can drag down races below them.

[00:18:06] [SPEAKER_01]: It doesn't go the other way up. I'm not aware of that ever happening like anywhere.

[00:18:12] [SPEAKER_01]: But what do I know? I'm just a radio host.

[00:18:14] [SPEAKER_01]: So while there's all the speculation about whether this can hurt Donald Trump or not, I am less interested in that.

[00:18:21] [SPEAKER_01]: As I am in the impact on the down ballot races because historically that does happen.

[00:18:28] [SPEAKER_01]: That happens a lot.

[00:18:30] [SPEAKER_01]: People will vote in a race at the top of a ticket and then they will not vote in any of the races below it.

[00:18:39] [SPEAKER_01]: And like almost I'm trying to think this through and like almost a best case scenario for the Republicans assuming Robinson you know is going to lose here.

[00:18:53] [SPEAKER_01]: Best case scenario is that people leave it blank and then keep voting that you get this turnout for Republicans for they vote for Donald Trump.

[00:19:02] [SPEAKER_01]: They leave it blank. The governors race they leave it blank.

[00:19:07] [SPEAKER_01]: Or they vote for Stein or Mike Ross by the way, there is another candidate Mike Ross libertarian.

[00:19:13] [SPEAKER_01]: You can vote for and then they go on and vote for other races down ballot next one being Lieutenant Governor.

[00:19:22] [SPEAKER_01]: And that's how weatherman the Republican versus Rachel Hunt the Democrat who refused to debate how weatherman right she wouldn't.

[00:19:33] [SPEAKER_01]: Well depending on who you believe she either agreed to a debate and then backed out or just never agreed to do a debate regardless she's not doing any debates with how weatherman.

[00:19:44] [SPEAKER_01]: And maybe that was because they knew all of this stuff was going to be coming out and so they don't have to do anything just let the media do.

[00:19:50] [SPEAKER_01]: Well I was going to say do the work but do more of the work for their campaigns they don't have to do anything except keep sending out media stories and asking for money and buying more advertising right that's it just air war just bombard North Carolina in the air war with ads you know on TV.

[00:20:13] [SPEAKER_01]: And you know on digital platforms and so the down ballot races that's going to be a problem right now the ten statewide elected races you've got I'm going to go off the top of my head and I'm sure I'll leave one of these out but.

[00:20:30] [SPEAKER_01]: You got governor lieutenant governor attorney general secretary of state agriculture commissioner.

[00:20:38] [SPEAKER_01]: Department of Public Instruction the superintendent.

[00:21:10] [SPEAKER_01]: And.

[00:21:12] [SPEAKER_01]: He got more votes than anybody.

[00:21:15] [SPEAKER_01]: So like if you're if you're talking about up ballot impacts would he have had an up ballot impact no like I said this is not a thing you know maybe it becomes a thing maybe we see that this time for the first time ever.

[00:21:28] And so I think that's a big question.

[00:21:28] [SPEAKER_01]: My concern is more about the races down ballot because you lose like in the attorney general's race if baby Jesus wins a K. H F Jackson right.

[00:21:41] [SPEAKER_01]: You can you can guarantee that you are still going to have then this adversarial relationship between the legislature and the attorney general's office.

[00:21:53] [SPEAKER_01]: And he's going to not defend laws he's going to probably look at collusive settlements like Josh Stein has done right he's going to use the slush funds that Roy Cooper helped to establish for the AG's office when they sue an industry they get a bunch of money and then they do let out to.

[00:22:10] [SPEAKER_01]: And so there's a very non-profits that just so happened to all be of the left.

[00:22:15] [SPEAKER_01]: Like there's a major problem and so and it seems to me that the North Carolina Republican party in the general assembly leadership is either unwilling or unable.

[00:22:26] [SPEAKER_01]: To reign that stuff in but this is my concern with the council of state races that are down ballot the biggest one is.

[00:22:35] [SPEAKER_01]: Because Lieutenant Governor doesn't really have a lot of authority to have a lot of power but the attorney general does like to me that's the biggest concern now that you're going to have the blast radius from Robinson.

[00:22:48] [SPEAKER_01]: And hurting Dan Bishop hurting because he's the Republican running against Jeff Jackson.

[00:22:56] [SPEAKER_01]: The Democrat so you're going to have that kind of an impact down ballot further down ballot though you've got state house and senate races they have a super majority right now the Republicans do in both chambers will they be able to maintain it well.

[00:23:14] [SPEAKER_01]: The problem is when you have so many seats to defend it's harder to defend so many seats.

[00:23:21] [SPEAKER_01]: So when I was a kid my grandpa died with Alzheimer's and before he died by mom and my dad and all of us really helped take care of them as he got progressively worse.

[00:23:29] [SPEAKER_01]: 40 years ago there were no treatments and not much support for caregivers and family things are different today because of the work of so many people including the Alzheimer's Association of Western North Carolina.

[00:23:40] [SPEAKER_01]: It's a great organization with awesome people they've got huge hearts I've been a supporter for like 25 years this cause means a lot to me I participate in the annual walk to end Alzheimer's and I am leading a Charlotte team this year.

[00:23:54] [SPEAKER_01]: It's called Peats Pack you can sign up and join the team and walk with me it's on October 19 at truest field in uptown sign up at alz dot org slash walk and then just look for my team.

[00:24:06] [SPEAKER_01]: Peats Pack and there's also a link in the podcast description here also I'm going to be emceeing the Gastonia walk on October 5 so make a team and join us or make a donation to help me hit my goal I would really appreciate it there are a bunch of other walks around the Carolinas and you can go to a lz dot org for all of the dates and locations we are closer than ever to stopping Alzheimer's.

[00:24:29] [SPEAKER_01]: And if you can help us get there we would really appreciate it will you come walk with me for a different future for families for more time for treatments this is why I walk.

[00:24:40] [SPEAKER_01]: So Brianna Cramer at carolinajournal.com does a story about the Republican super majority in both the house and senate which has enabled the legislative branch she says to execute measures without the democrat governor's approval for the past two sessions by overriding his vetoes.

[00:24:59] [SPEAKER_01]: Tite races though could slam the door shut on republican productivity during the 2025 long session if the party fails to win key toss up districts in this election.

[00:25:11] [SPEAKER_01]: In the latest Carolina journal poll out on Thursday the Republican lead has all but disappeared in the generic ballot for state legislature which.

[00:25:23] [SPEAKER_01]: The generic ballot is it has some limitations because candidates matter campaigns matter right.

[00:25:31] [SPEAKER_01]: In August the generic Republican advantage was 2% the parties are now tied though at 46 so it's it went from a two point spread to tide but when you include the margin of error on the 2%.

[00:25:46] [SPEAKER_01]: Then it's it's still tied I view anything in the margin of error as tied.

[00:25:52] [SPEAKER_01]: In the poll results from urban voters and independence have seen net shifts towards a generic democrat since August at 24% of urban voters and 11% of independent voters switching.

[00:26:08] [SPEAKER_01]: I would submit that's probably the comalajaris effect.

[00:26:11] [SPEAKER_01]: That's after they swapped around right after the coup.

[00:26:15] [SPEAKER_01]: While the senate remains in a safer position to maintain a super majority the house is holding on by a threat which we knew because you know they didn't have the super majority until Trishikatham flipped parties so.

[00:26:28] [SPEAKER_01]: She has to win reelection and the house has to hold every single district that is winable for democrats because these districts were winnable for them two years ago.

[00:26:42] [SPEAKER_01]: And they were winnable some of them were winnable two years prior to that despite all of the the whining and crying about redistricting and jerry mandering and such.

[00:26:53] [SPEAKER_01]: They have had winnable races and they just haven't performed for whatever reasons.

[00:26:59] [SPEAKER_01]: Andy Jackson director of the Civitas Center for Public Integrity said it's a little easier this year compared to 2022 but it is no me by no means assured.

[00:27:12] [SPEAKER_01]: Republicans can retain their super majority in the senate if they win at least two of five toss of districts.

[00:27:22] [SPEAKER_01]: They got a win two of the five toss up so that is a very attainable goal for the senate super majority.

[00:27:29] [SPEAKER_01]: The key race is there there are three of them in the rally area and then there are district 42 in Charlotte or outside Charlotte this is the district that was held by Rachel Hunt who is now running for lieutenant governor.

[00:27:47] [SPEAKER_01]: This is the district that includes on the eastern side it's got part of Matthews up there and then on the sort of western side is pineville and then it kind of dips down to the state line captures wedding tin right in the center of it is rain tree that's this district.

[00:28:04] [SPEAKER_01]: During the 2022 midterm elections Republicans won two senate seats that were Democrat leaning.

[00:28:14] [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so that's not jerry mandering Democrats had them they had the advantage in these two districts in the Senate and they lost them.

[00:28:22] [SPEAKER_01]: They also picked up Republicans also won seven Democrat leaning house seats and Republicans won every toss up seat in both chambers.

[00:28:35] [SPEAKER_01]: I mean they just ran the board okay that enabled them to gain their super majority after the 2022 election Republicans then control the senate 30 20.

[00:28:46] [SPEAKER_01]: And they control the house 71 49 and then when Trishor Katham switched parties that gave them the 72nd seat and that gave them the super majority right so the more wins they racked up last time means.

[00:29:05] [SPEAKER_01]: They have to defend more seats now that are Democrat leaning seats.

[00:29:13] [SPEAKER_01]: And so the down ballot impact of the Mark Robinson story the Robinson affair right that.

[00:29:21] [SPEAKER_01]: Has a real potential to break the super majority.

[00:29:26] [SPEAKER_01]: So after all of the campaigning because think about this this was what the Democrats campaigned on this was their big messaging push was to break the super majority.

[00:29:36] [SPEAKER_01]: It hashtags and everything man they did everything to let people know that they needed to control the legislature going back to 2020 they had to break the super majority.

[00:29:48] [SPEAKER_01]: Why so they wanted control of the legislature so they could draw the maps so they could draw the redistricting maps so they could Jerry Mander to put themselves in the best position to get towards a super majority I don't think they could.

[00:30:04] [SPEAKER_01]: But they they couldn't do it they didn't do it in 2020 2022 they got waxed.

[00:30:12] [SPEAKER_01]: The last election they got waxed they lost all of these leaning seats all of the toss up seats they lost them all.

[00:30:18] [SPEAKER_01]: But now Republicans have to defend way more seats that are leaners and toss ups so it's going to it's going to be a heavy lift made even heavier now by Mark Robinson.

[00:30:31] [SPEAKER_01]: All right that'll do it for this episode thank you so much for listening I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast.

[00:30:39] [SPEAKER_01]: So if you'd like please support them to and tell them you heard it here you can also become a patron and my Patreon page or go to the peatcalinner show dot com again thank you so much for listening and don't break anything while I'm gone.