Gen Z Influencer Explains the Biden Disconnect
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Hi, I'm Tara Palmieri. I'm Puck's senior political correspondent, and this is Somebody's Gotta Win. Thanks for tuning in. I hope you had a great Juneteenth. On this show, I have Link Lauren, a real live Gen Z political influencer. He has about a half a million TikTok followers. That is more than the Biden-Harris TikTok campaign account.

He started as a content creator who tried to get interviews with primary candidates in the GOP primary. And it was a little bit awkward considering they were so anti-TikTok. But he is a savant. He knows how to make these candidates, most of them older baby boomers,

quite likable on camera. And then he moved over to the RFK Jr. campaign and he helps him amass more than a million TikTok followers. It's huge, especially in a time when most people are getting their news on TikTok. So Link has some real power. He has a lot of great stories and he left the campaign and now he's back to being a political commentator and content creator. I, of course, asked him for advice because my TikTok account is struggling. You can follow me at Tara Palmieri at

But first, I want to tell you about a race in Virginia. Donald Trump, of course, is trying to flex his political metal. Bob Good, he is the chairman of the House Freedom Caucus and may no longer be a member of Congress because he committed the cardinal sin of crossing Donald Trump. He endorsed Congress.

Ron DeSantis in the primary. How dare he, right? And then he went on to endorse Donald Trump. But that wasn't good enough. Donald Trump accused him of stabbing him in the back and campaigned hard for his primary challenger, John McGuire. And this is Bob Good. He is a right-leaning congressman. It's not like you could call this guy a rhino or, as they say, a Republican in name only. But right now, he's down about 400 votes in his district, the 5th District of Virginia, which is a reliable Republican seat.

And about $15 million have been spent on this race to take Bob Good out. It's absolutely incredible. Such a waste of money when you think about it for Republicans who are on the defense to keep the House, especially in those seats in New York that they need to hold on to. They certainly don't need to be wasting money on a race in Virginia in a safe Republican seat. But Trump, of course, was trying to send a message, do not cross me.

It didn't help Bob Good either that he had another enemy in Kevin McCarthy. He was among the group of rebels that ultimately voted Kevin McCarthy out of his speakership. Some are interpreting the results as a sign that Trump doesn't quite have the influence that he used to have, perhaps not in the same way that he was able to take out Liz Cheney. And others are saying, this is what happens when you cross Trump. You cannot be right wing enough. Well, we shall see what happens for Bob Good. He's holding on, but it's not looking so good for him.

Link, thanks for coming on the show. Thanks for having me. First of all, I want to thank you for the time you gave me yesterday teaching me how to actually use my TikTok account properly. I have been lagging in followers. I think I have about a thousand followers on TikTok compared to my other followers.

Instagram, Twitter. It's kind of pathetic, but you gave me some confidence and showed me how to use a green screen, which is super exciting. I was having the time of my life talking to you yesterday. I mean, just watching someone who's on CNN, a professional journalist who's been in the game, try to use TikTok was so entertaining because it's very confusing. If you're opening TikTok for the first time and trying to use all the effects, God,

help you because it is very confusing for the first time. Yeah. I also misspelled Joe Biden. I spelled Jor because I was like, I don't have time to do this. I'm trying to treat it like it's Twitter where you just fire something off and look for the best because you were like, stop trying to make it perfect. This isn't some sort of video that you're going to hold on

on for the rest of your life. Because you're just starting out on TikTok. You said you had a thousand followers. I'm like, okay, don't let perfection be the enemy of productivity. Like, don't worry about having this TikTok video be perfect. Like you need to be throwing stuff out there to see what sticks until you get that first 10, 20, 30,000 followers and then figure out how to use it and what you want, you know, to curate it and look like, but yeah, no, you were way overthinking it. And then I was like, well, maybe she's so overthinking it. She misspelled Joe Biden, but it happens to the best of us. That's

So it was fine, honestly. And I got engagement. No, you did get engagement. And then what I was cracking up about was you sent me your video and you're like, how do you like the video? I said, I love it. It's great. But what is that two second pause? And you said, well, I had to breathe. Am I not allowed to breathe? And I'm like, no, TikTokers don't breathe. When that light is on, you just go for your life. You don't get to breathe. But that was hilarious to me. You're like, I had to breathe. But actually, I've realized that they do breathe. They just hit pause.

And then they breathe. Right. And then they do something else. And then we go, right. Yeah, exactly. I was like, oh my God, are you breathing? I'm like, exhale. I learned how to use the pause button, which was crucial. I've just been uploading like pre-produced videos that I was making on CapCut or that people at Puck were helping me make. I've got a great producer, Ryan Jones, who's been helping out.

But I really feel like to be native with TikTok, you just have to do it all the time. And like you said, don't be afraid of it. Treat it like it's Twitter. Yeah, I try to post every day, you know, at least once a day, seven days a week. And so it's great because then I can get millions of views each week. I have about half a million followers. So if I'm posting every day, you're reaching a lot of people. You have influence.

but it is tough in the beginning because you don't see progress, right? You'll be posting for weeks, months, and you're like, why am I not growing? Why am I not seeing progress? And then once you do, you get that positive reinforcement, Tara. I promise it will come, but I think your career is doing pretty damn well without TikTok. It's the last frontier for me. I really need TikTok. Listen, if that's where everyone's getting their news and you're doing such a great job, you have half a million followers. You have more followers than the Joe Biden...

campaign account. Yes. It's funny when I could really post all the time before I was working on the Kennedy campaign, when I was just posting constantly, I was doing about 20 million views a month on TikTok. So I was reaching a lot of people, which was great because then other candidates were like, well, we want to film with you. And it only takes 90 seconds. This is so much better. We don't have to sit down with someone for

from Pup for 30 minutes. We can do a TikTok and reach these people. And so I did, you know, get some animosity from like serious professional journalists when I started going on the campaign trail because they were like, who the hell are you? You're from TikTok. We don't know what that means. What's going on? Especially when I was, you know, going to all the Republican events in like Iowa and New Hampshire, there was definitely some animosity from journalists I respect and look up to. Well, that's ridiculous because honestly, I admire you. I really do. You're a content creator.

You're crushing it. You're 25. You actually created the RFK brand on TikTok. He has like over a million followers now, thanks to you, basically. We had a great team and we did turn him into the original TikTok candidate. Now Trump's on TikTok and he's dominating. And it's genius that Trump has joined TikTok because there's so many disaffected Biden people, so many conservatives, independents on TikTok. And I actually wrote an op-ed at the end of September after...

the debate at the Reagan library. I was still out in California. It was the morning after the debate. And I wrote this op-ed about how Nikki Haley and Vivek went back and forth during that debate about TikTok. And Nikki Haley said, we can't use TikTok. TikTok's not safe. And then her own daughter's on TikTok doing dances and doing the renegade. So I didn't take what she said very seriously. And so I wrote this op-ed about, look, you have to meet young people where they are. So if

Biden has this army of influencers. I mean, it's literally like the DNC's army of influencers. And you can look at the FEC filings and go through all of that. If they're reaching your kids and they're reaching young people, then the GOP needs to get on and adopt this as well. And so I kind of took that strategy with Kennedy and it was just like post more, post more. I would text...

Bobby stuff and be like, Hey, you should stitch this and maybe say this or do that. And some things he would do some, he wouldn't, but I can't take all the credit because we had a really great digital team. That's great. I love how you're like, yeah, I just text Bobby, tell him what to post on Tik TOK casual, you know, funny actually, when he went to film with Nicole before the VP announcement, he

there was this video I said, you know, you should respond to this and say this because there was a video, this girl was looking for, you know, an alternative looking for an independent candidate or something. I said, you said you should stitch this and say this and we can edit to edit it together. Just text it back to me. And so he did it, but it was at like Nicole's property. And I'm thinking, well, it already leaked. Everyone already knows she's a, the VP candidate, but yeah, no, I would throw out ideas. Some of the team would take some, you know, they wouldn't. Um, but I was also doing like X,

And I mean, we increased TikTok engagement 1400% during the time I was there. And then on X, it was about three times. I took over X and then I think that first month it was like 70 million impressions and the next month it was over 200 million. So you kind of get out what you put into it. Yeah, I reported this a few months ago that before Trump joined TikTok, that it was becoming increasingly more MAGA, way more

Republican independent leaning. And I was wondering, is it just outrage content, but two to one more pro-Trump content and providing content? And it's probably growing every single day. I mean, just look at the numbers. Oh, how many followers does Trump have? And he's only put up one post, like five million. Yeah. Who knows? And this was in days. Biden has had an account for six months. And like, of course, his team will say, oh, well, you know, it's not really him. It's his campaign. There's a differentiator. But I don't know.

Yeah. I think they're giving themselves some separation because, you know, he does, he said he would sign that Tik TOK band. So he is giving himself some separation, but I was on a show recently on news nation with Leland bitter. And we kind of got into it as well because he said something about, Oh,

well Biden's on Tik TOK and all of this. And I'm like, so Biden joined Tik TOK the day of the super bowl. And then almost exactly one month later, after he got his ass handed to him and got eviscerated in the comments. Now he's pro banning Tik TOK right now. Biden's like, yeah, I'll find the Tik TOK ban because,

a majority of Gen Z millennials don't support Biden. So I think he thought he was going to join TikTok or the campaign. I don't think Biden is thinking this. I think the people around Biden, the strategists are thinking, let's join TikTok and we can reach millions of young people. But millions of young people are saying they don't want Joe Biden. Right. So he's not resonating with them. Why is that, by the way? I mean, you're more conservative than I think than most. Do you think that most of Gen Z is conservative?

I think most of Gen Z is in this populist sort of independent lane. And I sort of hit that nerve in my content as well. I mean, the reason I think Trump is doing so well on TikTok is people are on TikTok, a majority of them, because they're distrustful of the MSNBCs of the world, of the mainstream media. So they're going to TikTok.

to get their news. I mean, a TikTok creator like me who posts regularly, you might be reaching more people than a nightly show on MSNBC, right? But is it like the dark corners of Reddit or the dark web? Is it like that kind of conspiratorial? I feel like TikTok is the mainstream. I mean, I'm the least conspiratorial person, Tara. You know me. I'm very boring and vanilla. I mean... No, I've been watching...

Watching your content, I think it's great. I really do. But I just sort of wonder if they don't trust the mainstream. Like, what is it about the content creators at TikTok? Well, it's one that I think they don't trust the mainstream media. I think even when it's something like, let's say something more recently, like the Hunter Biden laptop.

Oh, that was Russian disinformation. But now they're using the laptop. The FBI is using the laptop in court as evidence. Yeah, that's confusing. Listen, I always thought that should have been used. Yeah. And so you have people going to TikTok looking for their news. I also say it's a generational thing, right? Gen Z, only 9% of Gen Z watch traditional TV news on a daily basis, which means 91% are

I'm not. I mean, a majority of my peers have never turned on a nightly news show. And for the bookers who book me, thank you. But most of my peers just don't watch nightly news shows. And so they're going to TikTok. They don't think it's weird to go to TikTok. They're not like, oh, we're going alternative and we're going outside the box. They're like, no, this is just where I get my news. They don't know that it was different 10 years ago. We don't have a Walter Cronkite anymore. So I think...

it's just normal for them to go to TikTok. Maybe you are the Walter Cronkite of TikTok. Well, it's funny. Amaryllis, when I got to know Amaryllis, for people who don't know who's the campaign manager on the Kennedy campaign, she'd always text me and call me and be like, you're the Anderson Cooper of Gen Z. Like you're TikToks, you break down the news. I'm super fair to both sides. You have that white hair. Yeah, exactly. Um,

Yeah, so I break it down. I welcome everyone on my page. I always say from the left, the right, the middle, all across the political spectrum. And I think that's why I was able to grow on the platform because a majority of the influencers on TikTok who are covering the news, they're either all the way to one side or all the way to the other. And I was always trying to find ways in my content where we could come together as Americans with shared values.

And even if you look at a lot of the polling now, it's like a majority of Americans support harsher immigration or a stricter border, all of that. So when I do videos on that, I don't feel like it's alternative or it's some right wing thing. I feel like a majority of the country is actually in lockstep with me and a lot of the things I'm covering. You're kind of breaking all the rules because first of all, you're a journalist who also worked as a political staffer, right? And you're not really supposed to do that. I know George Stephanopoulos did that and he kind of broke those norms and there are

are some journalists who worked in politics before they became journalists, but you've sort of been flowing in and out of it in a way. You're sort of swimming. You're like an influencer meets journalist meets staffer. And another thing that you sort of broke in is that if you're the staffer, you're not really supposed to outshine the candidate, right? You're never supposed to get ahead of the principal. But in a lot of ways, you are central to the RFK campaign. Yes, I'm treading lightly here. It was interesting because...

I worked quietly on that campaign for six months, right? I didn't say I worked on the campaign. I was just quietly doing my work 18 hours a day, seven days a week. And it was the campaign kept saying to me, I remember Amaryllis being like, well, go out there and be a surrogate. Like the way you say things, the way you communicate, you can explain this so clearly you can reach out to Gen Z. And so I thought, okay, I'll go out.

and be a surrogate. But I had put a lot of that TV stuff on hold. Right before I joined the campaign, Fox was being really great to me. They had me on Outnumbered. And I was going on more shows. And then I went quiet because I just wanted to really work and give my all to the campaign. So then when I came out as a surrogate, I didn't know all these shows were going to want to have me on. It wasn't an intentional thing. But I know you had expressed... I think you even told one of our mutual friends at the time that

I was going on shows and working and yeah, I, it just wasn't something I sought out. They were saying, go be a surrogate, go talk to Gen Z, go talk to people. What did I say to our mutual friends? You told Megan, there's one person who's really working. I can tell who's working and it's late because I always pick up my phone and was responsive. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was like, there's somebody on that campaign you can reach out to. He's always working. He's got, he's hustling. Yeah. They were lucky to have you. How did

the Republican candidates react when you walked up to them and tried to interview them or tried to help them with TikTok? This is interesting. So it varies candidate to candidate to give some context. And a lot of this, if you saw the Washington Post profile, Taylor Lorenz did a lot of this backstory is in there. But I was really covering a lot of pop culture and not so much news. I was always like, I don't know if I want to talk about politics online and all of this, even though, you know, in high school and even in middle school,

I would host town halls with all the schools in my area and we would talk about issues once a month. And it was always something I was interested in. This isn't like I just popped up and decided to be interested in these issues. But my breakout moment sort of came last May because I was covering the coronation, which was really big for content. May 6th was King Charles coronation. And then Caitlin Collins did a town hall with Trump on CNN that I'm sure all of your listeners will remember. Yeah. Caitlin was wearing white and...

And it was kind of heated. And then the CNN viewers were very apoplectic. They were melting down. They're like, oh my God, they platform Trump and they shouldn't have platform Trump. And so the next morning I decided just to set my phone up and do a video. And I did a recap of the debate. And I said, look, I know a lot of you guys are upset. You think why is CNN platforming Trump? Trump is the leading candidate for president. He's a former president. I

want my political candidates on every single network, right? I want them on Fox. I want them on CNN. I want them reaching everyone. We need more information, not less. And I said, that was my first time ever saying in a video, I welcome everyone from all across the political spectrum. That video went pretty viral on TikTok in a way I didn't expect because TikTok had been very, very hyper partisan and very pro Biden. And so the fact that I was being fair to Trump and saying, of course he deserves to have a town hall on CNN. He's Donald Trump. What are you talking about?

And I said, we can't live in our own silos. We can't live in our own little world. And then the next night, Anderson Cooper said the exact same thing. He said, we can't live in our own silos. We can't live in our own world. So in the month of May, I got about 32 million views because I was getting all this royal content. And then I started doing politics. And then Dylan Mulvaney had all the Bud Light stuff. And so I was a common sense voice breaking that down.

And the Kennedy campaign was the first campaign to reach out to me. A man named Rob Lucero reached out to me. He was head of telefundraising. And he said, I watch your videos. Would you ever be interested in coming over and filming with Bobby? And I'm like, sure. And I was going to LA anyway. And he gave me two dates. I said, this date works. And so that was June 23rd. Bobby was the first time I pulled out my phone and just filmed with a candidate. And that was the night he also gave me his number and was like, stay in touch. And then

then Vivek Ramaswamy I went to Iowa the first week of July and filmed a bunch of content with him that went very viral Vivek was so gracious so kind super accessible but

But then you get to people like Mike Pence, who I waited around for two hours for in the hot sun. And he showed up, looked me up and down and they were like, no, we're not going to film with you. This is TikTok. We can't do TikTok. We don't trust TikTok. And even like Nikki Haley, you reach out to Ken Farnasso or the people around Nikki Haley. Hey, look, I'm reaching millions of young people who have no idea who Nikki Haley is. Don't know she's running. This is early on in the primary. Are you interested? Does she have 60 seconds to film a quick video? Right.

Oh no, we won't even open a TikTok if you send it to us. This is what Ken tells me at the time. We can't even open a TikTok. Oh my God. It's spyware. I guess it doesn't work with her neocon stuff. Yeah. She's like, I won't open a TikTok if you send it to me. And so some of the candidates were great. I actually was really trying to get in touch with Doug Burgum, but it was kind of murky on who he had around him. And they weren't people I really knew and I would research and reach out to them. And

And I met Doug Burgum. I was in the arena in Milwaukee when he was doing his walkthrough for the debate. And so I met Doug Burgum and he had just hurt his foot or his Achilles or something. And there was some drama around that. And so when I reached out to them, I thought, look, people really, if they don't know Nikki Haley, Gen Z, they really don't know Doug Burgum, but why don't we film? Does he have 60, 90 seconds? Let's film a quick video.

And so it's interesting. Some of the GOP candidates like Vivek, super accessible. I remember after he joined TikTok, someone on his team called me and was like, how should we format this? We don't know how to use TikTok. It's very confusing. And so I always...

We'll give a vague props for having me come on the campaign trail and film with him. But some of the other GOP candidates were resistant. I think Trump has now blown the lid off of that. If Trump's on it, then all of you minor candidates and wannabes should definitely be on TikTok. But here's the thing. They're spending a lot of time trying to talk to Gen Z. Is Gen Z even going to go out and vote?

That's the question. Well, that's my thing too. And I actually tried to explain this. Not to say that we shouldn't try, but it's a real question mark. Well, there is a big difference between virality and electoral success, right? You might be the most viral person, have a super viral video. Number one, is it getting out of that online echo chamber, right? Is Gen Z going to show up on November 5th to actually vote? Are they going to vote early? I think the most tried and true bellwether group that shows up to the polls, they're baby boomers, they're seniors, they're my parents.

So they'll always show up to vote. And they're the ones who are watching mainstream media, a majority of them. And so you kind of still need the mainstream media. I don't love this idea of only being an online candidate or a podcast candidate. But it is great if you're trying to reach a certain demographic. Getting out the vote is another thing y'all are going to have to deal with in September, October.

in the beginning of November. Yeah. I mean, I think it's interesting because traditionally Republicans have won over seniors, right? That's their thing. Joe Biden, thanks to his age, is starting to win over seniors. Well, he's also hosting pickleball tournaments and he's going to be hosting bingo nights. And so he's definitely doing this push. You know, in Virginia,

Biden is struggling in Virginia. If you look at 2020 versus now, Trump has really made headway in Virginia. I think they're tied in a recent poll in Virginia where they used to be, what, 10 points apart. And so I know Biden's going to be hosting events in Virginia for seniors, pickle

ball, bingo games. So if you're out there looking for a sugar daddy or sugar mama and you're young, go to these bingo nights with Biden. If you're a single senior citizen, maybe still go to the bingo nights and find someone. It should be very interesting to see how they turn out. Yeah. So this has become an advantage for him. Whereas Republicans, I think Trump won 52 percent of seniors in the last election. And Biden, though, won 65 percent of

young voters, 18 to 25. And that helped him beat Trump in 2020. Right. But this time around, Trump has taken like a substantial share, it looks like, from Biden's control over Gen Z and African-American voters. So this may be the only way for Biden to even it out is to go after the older voters while Trump goes after the younger voters like you. I mean, if you were going to vote tomorrow, who would you vote for? Well, it's interesting. I knew you were going to ask me this question. And I've been real careful not to opine yet and say who I'm going to vote

Obviously, I'm fresh off the Kennedy campaign. And I'm also cautious because I'm really enjoying getting back into covering politics and just covering these news stories and covering both sides. But I will make a video in the near future on who I'm voting for and why. So I think I'm just going to save that for myself. Oh.

you're going to break it on TikTok. You won't break it on my podcast. Because if I don't say Bobby, it's going to say RFK advisor, not voting for Bobby. Then Liz Smith's going to go make a clip and push it around with her DNC influencers. So, you know, I'm just not going to play that game today.

Okay. Well, for everyone who doesn't know who Liz Smith is, she is working for the DNC right now. She's like one of the top operatives and her job essentially is to take out RFK. So if I say anything disparaging about Bobby, Liz Smith is like at the computer foaming at the mouth, waiting to make a clip and push it around. So yeah, I'm just not going to play those parlor games.

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It's interesting for RFK. He's in the middle. He's got Trump on the right, Biden on the left, both coming at him from both ends. That's a pretty unique place to be. He's polling pretty well. I think he's above 15% or at 15% in three national polls. If he hits four, he could possibly argue that he deserves to be on the CNN debate stage next week. But they are also saying that it needs to be a candidate who could get 270 electoral votes ostensibly. You could have the best polls in the world. You can be on every ballot.

I don't see Biden stepping on a debate stage with Bobby Kennedy. I just don't see it happening. I don't think they're going to do that. I think it'd be great for ratings. I think it'd be great for my generation to see a three-person debate. There hasn't been one since 92 with Ross Perot. I think it would be great entertainment. It would be a great practice of democracy. I don't

I don't think Biden's going to get on the debate stage with Bobby. I just don't see it. And he'll probably say, well, I don't want to platform Kennedy's views and his views are out there. I'm not going to platform him. I mean, I don't think Biden has even...

mentioned Kennedy once. I don't think he's ever mentioned his name once ever. And that seems to be a very deliberate choice, even though he's hosting events with his family members. Well, timing is everything in politics. So whatever they've got on RFK, they're holding on to it, right? I won't be there when the bomb goes off on them.

I left right before the brain worms and I won't be there when October surprises hit either, but I wish them well. So much of it is public because he had that really intense divorce and they had, you know, discovery. I think they went to trial. I don't know much about any of that. I obviously didn't discuss the inner workings of his divorce with him when I was on the campaign. So I don't know. I also think.

Kennedy supporters, like I have such love for the Kennedy supporters. I forged great bonds with them on the campaign trail. You mentioned being, you know, one of the most public faces on the Kennedy campaign. I'd be doing my own meet and greet next to Bobby and his meet and greet. You know, he'd be doing a selfie line. I'd be doing something like, I freaking love the Kennedy supporters. I don't think they're going to be swayed

the diehard supporters by any mainstream media hit piece, right? Short of shooting someone on Fifth Avenue, I don't think these really ardent, strong Kennedy supporters are going to leave him, right? They've already stuck with him through being this outsider Kennedy renegade character for years. Well, you know these supporters, so who does it hurt? Does it hurt Trump or does it hurt Biden? I would say a majority of them would go to Trump or not vote.

would be my guess or write in. It's tough because I think it'll be pretty even. And it's funny, you look at one poll and he's taking a little from Trump. You look at another, he's taking more from Biden. I think everybody's kind of over trying to figure that out. We'll just see when it gets closer to the election. But I

You know, a lot of people who were interested in the Kennedy campaign, they were Trump people and maybe wanted to look at someone new. And I also think... Was it about the vaccines and stuff like that? Well, I think early on in the campaign, Bobby had a lot of views that really played well with that base, right? He was like, he decided he wanted to build a wall. He wanted a strong immigration policy. There was a point on the campaign trail where he talked about a 15-week

abortion. And then the campaign said he misheard the question, not going to get into all of that. And so there were times where, yeah, he probably was pulling a lot from Trump, but I'm sure they're going to bring out a lot of the environmental stuff or whatever they have, you know, so who knows how, you know, the chips are going to fall. I would just think the Kennedy name alone would confuse some Democrats that they're

at the very least. You mean like ones who aren't paying attention and just see Kennedy? Yeah, low information voters. It's tough. I mean, that's up to Liz Smith and the DNC to make sure people know by November 5th who he is. But I think there are voters who might see Kennedy, sure. So if he

would take from Trump, then they might as well not kill him. They might as well keep him alive if that's what they're seeing. I think different polls are showing different things and they might be showing different things in different states, right? They might be showing in this one battleground state, he's taking a little from here and this state he's taking from here and this demographic he's pulling from this. So I think they just really don't know. I think also when you have someone like Elizabeth Smith and her people, they're

they're collecting a check, right? So they have to keep their lights on. They have to keep a roof over their head. She has to, you know, feed her kid. So she's going to do her job regardless. She's smart operative. I'm sure she can figure it out. What I'm saying is it's like when you are being paid

whatever you're being paid in the FEC filings, you're going to continue to do your job, right? So she's not going to take her foot off the gas trying to eviscerate Bobby, even if the polls are showing whatever. She's going to keep going. Unless propping him up helps. Yeah, but they're clearly still not doing that. So...

you know, I wish him well. He's just so much of an X factor. I don't even care about those games. I remember like on the campaign when, you know, some of those like oppo dumps would come or they would do this or they would take clips of me. Cause I was the only other person doing interviews. I was doing, you know, interviews for Nicole before she was doing interviews. And so they would take clips of me and they would move words around and play all these games. I don't really care. I mean, they can do whatever they want. I think a lot of the

really lives and dies on the internet. It doesn't break through to the mainstream media anyway. And Bobby's not on the mainstream media that much to begin with. So I just don't really see it making an impact. Were you ever concerned that he's a spoiler? No, because I always feel and believe to this day, Joe Biden is the ultimate spoiler. I mean, Joe Biden just has incredibly low approval ratings. I've never met a single person who's like a happy-go-lucky Bidenian.

Biden supporter, right? I know people who are voting for Biden because they don't want the alternative. But I definitely think Joe Biden is the ultimate spoiler in this election. I mean, you go to any party when there are no cameras around and talk to high level Democrats, they will tell you, oh my God, I can't believe they're running this guy. Why are they running him? They should have done this in 2019 and 20. They should have reared young talent in the party. You guys could have built up like an Amy Klobuchar. You could have reared

a new crop of Democrats, but instead you push Joe Biden through who'd been around for five decades, right? Without really any hallmark accomplishments. So they've made their bed and they have to lie in it. We'll see what happens. How do you sell Joe Biden to Gen Z? You don't. You go and you try and win over seniors, baby boomers. I don't think Biden's going to make any headway with Gen Z. I think a lot of young people...

are very upset with Biden post-October 7th. You can see, you know, we have a lot more protests, a lot more marches in the street for Palestine, Gaza, a lot of Gen Z's are upset with Biden. So I don't see them coming back to him. I think they might stay home and not vote, but I don't think Biden's resonating at all with young people. And he's not making an effort to either. I mean, you're going on, who's this guy like Jay Shetty? And there's some podcast of people they've, you know, brought to the White House for Biden to talk to and do podcasts with.

Biden needs to go on like call her daddy. Biden needs to go on the dumb blonde podcast. He needs to be going. I know this sounds wild and people are going to say, what is this guy saying? If Biden really wants to reach these cohorts, he needs to go and meet them where they are. Biden needs to sit down and do a tick tock live with the hottest people on tick tock. Right. But he's not doing any of that because he can't do extemporaneous conversation. He really struggled. I feel like.

I feel like he is doing a lot of those things, though. I see him on TikTok. In some ways, I mean, the mainstream press is a little annoyed with him because they're demanding positive press, but he's not really giving access to us. And he does spend a lot of time doing things with influencers rather than mainstream press. Yes, he has a few influencers.

Some of whom have collected checks from the DNC or DNC associated groups. So he did do something recently where he met some influencers. And they also had this woman, Morgan McNaughton, who the White House hired from pallet management, which managed a lot of those pro Biden influencers. Now she literally works for the White House.

So obviously they're trying to reach Gen Z and to reach young people through TikTok. It's certainly not breaking through terror because I would be the person to know. I think if Biden wants to reach young people, he needs to meet them where they are and get proactive. But I think they're done with him. I think they're over it. So they're just not going to go out and vote? Or do you think they're going to vote for Trump? Here's what I think. I think they're

two groups. There are Gen Z's who are going to go vote for Trump just to piss off Biden, right? They're even in the street chanting that in New York when Biden did the fundraiser with Lizzo. Even though they know that Trump would probably be even more pro-Israel than Biden. You would have to ask them. But then there's also this group

that look at Trump as a modern day rock star, right? Like Trump's at the UFC games. He's posting with Logan Paul on TikTok. Trump's this guy that the mainstream media is out to take down and the weaponization of the DOJ. I think a lot of young people who maybe feel disenfranchised feed themselves than Trump. And I know to a lot of the mainstream journalists, veterans in the industry, they don't understand that. But I'm just telling you how Gen Z feels. And you can even look at the data Trump is gaining with Gen Z, gaining with black voters, gaining with Hispanic voters,

this is a big problem for Biden. And you've got all these strategists around you and can't find your way out of it. So maybe it's just your candidate. You know, you can put lipstick on a pig every day, but you can't make Biden a great candidate. They like outrage content a lot. It feels a little regressive. I don't know. I don't know. What do you mean by outrage content? You think like Trump is...

fomenting outrage content or what do you think? Yeah, I think so. What I see online, honestly, it's just a lot of young people who are stressed financially, right? If there's a guy who they think is going to put more money in their pocket, who's going to help them get into a home. I mean, the thought of owning a home and having equity in a home is such a distant fantasy for Gen Z. I think if there's a candidate who says he can help them with that, then that's who they're going to gravitate toward, right? It's all about the money, money, money. And

It's really pretty simple. I mean, millennials, we didn't have it so easy either. We graduated into a recession and we weren't even thinking about owning our own homes. It was like, are we going to get jobs with benefits? You know what I mean? Right, exactly. I think also a mistake Biden and Kamala have made is they constantly go out there and try to gaslight young people into what their top issues are, right? So number one, they're trying to buy young people by forgiving these student loans. So they're trying to get young people to like them because of that. So

Second, you have Kamala who's gone out multiple times on record and said, young people's top concern is climate. Young people have climate anxiety. They're more stressed about the climate than anything else. I read thousands of comments and have met thousands of young people in the last year alone going to conventions and going to events.

I've never met a single young person who says climate is their top issue going into this election. But I think Biden and Kamala know they can't run on the economy. They can't run on inflation. They can't run on immigration. So they're trying to gaslight the public into thinking climate's your top issue. I think a lot of young people, they're worried about mother nature. They love mother nature, but they also want to eat, right? So if a candidate can give them more money in their pocket, that's who they're going to vote for.

All right. Well, this was interesting. Thanks so much. I feel like I've also learned a lot again, and I think I'm going to hit that pause button and try another video again. I'm going on CNN later. I also, yeah. Before you go on CNN, film a TikTok. The one piece of advice, you just can't care too much. Would you film it from like inside of the... Well, I just meant at home before you head over there to film, you know, unless you're doing like a remote hit at home. Yeah. I think if you're going over there, you could also show the behind the scenes footage.

I don't know if Gen Z people on TikTok care to see the behind the scenes of CNN. I don't think a lot of young people on TikTok... Do they hate it? I don't know if they want to watch CNN. Gross. I mean, if you ask Gen Z if you know who Anderson Cooper is, I think...

A lot of them won't. I mean, I just don't see it, right? I think the youngest person on CNN is Caitlin Collins, which is great, right? She resonates with millennials. And I just don't think a lot of young people are watching these mainstream networks. But definitely, film more TikToks. The one piece of advice, though, is care less.

Hair less. Be careful. Is my hair perfect? Do I look okay? Do I have something in my teeth? Do a quick check and then film because all the minutiae you might stress about, the audience probably won't pick up on anyway.

So don't stress over it, but do spell Joe Biden properly. I'll do a little dance though, right? Just a dance. Should I start? I've never once done a dance. No, I've never once done a dance. Yeah, no, definitely don't do that. All those years of dance classes and I can't even use them. Thanks, Link. This was really fun. I'd love to have you back on. For sure. I'd love to come back on soon because I have some exciting things up my sleeve. I'll have to come back.

That was another episode of Somebody's Gotta Win. I'm your host, Tara Palmieri. I want to thank my producers, Christopher Sutton and Connor Nevins. If you like this show, please share it with your friends, rate it and subscribe. If you like my reporting, please go to puck.news slash Tara Palmieri and sign up for my newsletter, the best and the brightest. You can use the discount code Tara20. I'll be back on Tuesday.