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PODCAST

The Playbook Podcast

POLITICO’s Jack Blanchard and Dasha Burns bring their fresh insight, analysis and reporting to the biggest story driving the day in the nation’s capital.

news politics

All Episodes

11:33

August 4, 2025: The mess with Texas

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/08/04

Today, you can find Texas’ Democratic state legislators in Illinois, New York and Massachusetts. Where you won’t find many of them is Texas. That’s because they fled the state yesterday in an attempt to deny Republicans the quorum needed to enact a new partisan gerrymander ahead of the 2026 elections. The implications extend far beyond the Red River, with resonances for the balance of power in Congress, Democratic jockeying for 2028 and the potential weaponization of government depending just how

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52:12

From 'The Conversation': Rep. Sarah McBride Won’t Be...

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/08/03

Freshman Rep. Sarah McBride (D-Del.) is the first out transgender member of Congress. Within days of her election this past November, she faced attacks from Republican colleagues who tried to draw her into a public conflict. Nevertheless, McBride has continued to find ways to forge ties across the aisle. In this week’s episode of The Conversation, Rep. McBride tells POLITICO’s Dasha Burns why she has prioritized bipartisanship: “Every person in this country goes to work in a workplace where there

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14:30

August 1, 2025: Liberation Day, Part III

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/08/01

With the markets closed and the August 1 deadline having passed overnight, President Donald Trump followed through on his pledge to impose a wave of new tariffs. But Trump is far from finished. The president announced that in one week, he’ll raise tariffs on more than 60 nations, including a number of close U.S. trading partners. Playbook editor Zack Stanton joins contributing author Adam Wren to discuss what to expect today and in the days and weeks to come.

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15:41

July 31, 2025: Joe Biden’s next act

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/31

For more than five decades, Joe Biden led an incredibly public existence. But now, in his post presidency, he’s entered a quieter, lonelier stage of life. He’s staffed by only one or two aides and Secret Service, holed up for hours at a time in Delaware working on his memoir with a new ghostwriter and racing against an aggressive form of prostate cancer while undergoing treatment. Most Democrats would prefer he keep a low profile. But what does Biden want? As he reenters the news cycle — both with a

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9:48

July 30, 2025: How to gerrymander your way to a House...

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/30

We’re halfway between the usual once-in-a-decade redrawing of congressional maps. So why are we talking about redistricting in 2025? As the White House looks for ways to keep its Republican House majority in the 2026 election, it’s pressuring red states to shift their maps and squeeze out a few more GOP seats. And that risks setting off a redistricting arms race, with big red and blue states threatening to one-up each other and remake the 2026 electoral map — literally. Playbook’s Adam Wren and Zack

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14:38

July 29, 2025: Trump’s turning point on Gaza

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/29

For a decade, President Donald Trump’s MAGA movement has bulldozed through GOP orthodoxy on everything from the national debt to immigration to trade to Russia. Now, there are fresh signs that it could be careening toward its last standing shibboleth: The U.S. special relationship with Israel. With the humanitarian disaster in Gaza sparking global outrage and a public split between Trump and Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, Playbook’s Adam Wren and Dasha Burns check in on what’s animating the

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14:29

July 28, 2025: JD Vance’s stealth-mode approach to...

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/28

Vice President JD Vance’s first six months in office have been an exercise in stealth. Yes, he has a very public role. But to understand how Trump’s Washington truly works, you need to pull back the curtain on how Vance has approached his job — and what that tells us both about the MAGA’s present and its future. Adam Wren and Dasha Burns go inside the inner workings of the Trump White House and share their reporting. Plus, President Donald Trump’s Scotland trip continues as he prepares for a meeting

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50:32

From 'The Conversation': FDA Head Marty Makary on...

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/27

Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Martin Makary is getting lobbied by the MAHA movement to restrict food dyes and ultra-processed foods, as well as by the food, agriculture and pharmaceutical industries to reduce government oversight. “We want to go bold and there are a lot of things to do,” Makary tells POLITICO’s Dasha Burns. “But we also want to find common ground and work incrementally.” At the same time, he says, “The amount of pressure I feel from industry or other branches of

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11:40

July 25, 2025: Trump goes all-in on the midterms

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/25

Today, even as President Donald Trump heads to Scotland, his attention lingers stateside — and maybe not for the reason you assume. Trump has fully invested himself into the coming midterms, with high stakes both for his political project and for himself. Looming over it all are the ghosts of 2018, when Trump’s Republicans lost the House and handed the gavel to a new Democratic majority that went to work stymying his agenda and launching investigations into his conduct. What did he learn from that

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10:37

July 24, 2025: Trump’s Epstein crisis explodes

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/24

It’s the biggest story in Washington: Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal dropped a bombshell report that Attorney General Pam Bondi briefed President Donald Trump in May and told him that his name — among many others — appeared multiple times in the files from the Jeffrey Epstein investigation. Now, the White House’s Epstein problem has grown into a full-blown crisis and entered a new and potentially more damaging phase. Playbook’s Adam Wren and Dasha Burns unpack it all — the spin, the lines of

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12:48

July 23, 2025: The Epstein crisis reaches escape...

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/23

For more than two weeks, the Jeffrey Epstein saga has blotted out the sun in Washington. But it’s only now — with the House heading out for a monthlong recess as GOP leaders adjourn the chamber rather than allow a floor vote that would hasten the release of the Epstein files — that the storyline is threatening to break out of the bubble and follow congressional Republicans back to their districts, nudged along by gleeful Democrats. Playbook contributing author Adam Wren and chief correspondent Dasha

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10:19

July 22, 2025: The questions that could decide 2026

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/22

With no new enterprise journalism published recently on the “Epstein files” front, President Donald Trump’s allies are catching their breath. Democrats are riding what could be a sugar high, having already cost the House GOP some votes this week. But as the aperture widens, are Republicans actually finding themselves in better shape than conventional wisdom would suggest ahead of the 2026 midterms? Playbook contributing author Adam Wren and chief correspondent Dasha Burns talk through that and two

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10:40

July 21, 2025: Dems close the ‘attention gap’

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/21

As the Epstein storm bears down on the White House, some of the same dynamics that contributed to the president’s rise to power now threaten his administration. Among them is the attention economy, which has utterly transformed American politics — and which Trump's innate grasp of helped him secure a second term. Now, with 2024 behind them, have Democrats fully absorbed one of the lessons of their defeat — and is the Epstein story an example of just how much things have changed? Playbook

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42:04

From 'The Conversation': Sen. Eric Schmitt on being a...

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/20

Missouri Sen. Eric Schmitt is a lawyer, former state attorney general and a skilled navigator of the old — and new — wings of the Republican Party. He also has another title: White House whisperer. Schmitt joins POLITICO’s Dasha Burns to talk about his closeness with the Trump administration, driving the Senate’s $9.4 billion rescissions bill, his involvement with passing Trump’s “big, beautiful bill,” his belief in Medicaid reform, the controversy over the release of the Epstein files and what he

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9:46

July 18, 2025: Trump, Epstein and ‘another wonderful...

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/18

The longtime friendship between Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein came in for a close-up in a much-anticipated Wall Street Journal report last night that detailed a long-ago “bawdy” birthday greeting the future president sent to the future convicted sex offender. Immediately, Washington was ablaze with chatter — about the reporting, about the White House’s response and about the story’s potential to reunite the deeply fractured MAGA movement that had recently seemed so divided over the

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11:16

July 17, 2025: Trump’s Epstein woes go mainstream

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/17

The Jeffrey Epstein news cycle is here to stay. And that’s increasingly frustrating President Donald Trump, who has grown accustomed to being able to exert control over the news cycle for much of the past decade. There’s a policy side to this, of course, as a number of prominent Republicans and MAGA figures are calling for a special counsel to investigate the files and the DOJ’s handling of them. But there’s also a pop cultural aspect to this, as the story has spilled over into the zeitgeist

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10:57

July 16, 2025: Trump’s Epstein conundrum

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/16

There’s a glut of action from Republicans throughout Washington — from new economic messaging from the White House to a big rescissions vote in the Senate to a new crypto bill in the House. But the big topic of conversation in D.C. continues to be the DOJ’s non-release of the Jeffrey Epstein files. That’s frustrating President Donald Trump, who has grown accustomed to being able to change the topic du jour when it doesn’t suit him, as POLITICO White House reporter Megan Messerly tells Playbook

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15:43

July 15, 2025: A political Bizarro World

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/15

What do Republicans need to do to outperform expectations in the coming midterm elections? According to new polling obtained exclusively by Playbook, the answer may in part rest in touting their support for a facet of Obamacare. Meanwhile, Democrats see a split among progressives in a major House primary today in Arizona, and the party seems to be sounding somewhat MAGA-fied when it comes to the Jeffrey Epstein files. What’s going on? Contributing author Adam Wren and chief Playbook correspondent

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16:29

July 14, 2025: Why Trump’s Epstein headache won’t go...

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/14

For years, prominent voices from Trump world have agitated for the release of all files in the case of Jeffrey Epstein, the wealthy and well-connected financier and convicted sex offender who died by suicide in prison. Which is a big part of the reason why the blowback is so ferocious to last week’s announcement from AG Pam Bondi that no further documents will be released in the case. If they thought that would end the story, they were wrong: Trump’s hyper-loyal base isn’t satisfied with the

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65:21

From The Conversation: Trump's Border Czar Tom Homan

The Playbook Podcast ·

2025/07/13

Tom Homan, Trump’s border czar, is a longtime immigration law enforcement official now tasked with helping implement the administration’s massive deportation campaign. In a wide-ranging interview with POLITICO’s Dasha Burns, Homan explains what will be done with the $170 billion recently passed by Congress to help the effort, defends the tactics of ICE agents, and has a message for those who say undocumented farmworkers should be spared. “People who say ‘don't arrest workers,’ they don't understand

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2,085 results

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