Welcome to Next Up. Nexters, I'm Mark Halperin. Thank you for joining. I'm the editor-in-chief of the live

interactive video platform two-way and your guide, as always, to everything that's next up in politics,

media, and beyond two great guests today. Really super interested to talk to Michael Caputo,

a longtime advisor to President Trump who worked on health policy

and has advised people like RFK Jr. and Dr. Oz tells us his story. Michael will share

what it's like to go both through cancer and cancellation at the same time. It's an incredible

story. And I'll, spoiler alert, Michael's come

through it in great shape, but it is a harrowing story, and he'll share that with us. And then we're

going to talk about the Democratic Party's challenges and opportunities with former Arkansas

Senator Mark Pryor, who has got some pretty good perspective on how the Democrats can fight back,

having lived through the glory days when his dad was a senator from Arkansas, and now his state and so many other red states are so solidly red.

So they'll be here in a moment.

But next up, first up, my reported monologue.

I'm super excited about this one.

And I'm going to do my best to not piss you off, but to maybe try to help educate you. And we're going to do it all through the prism of what I call the Gavin Newsom puzzle.

Gavin Newsom is on a ride.

And all week I've been talking here and on two way about how Gavin Newsom is now the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination.

And people's reaction to that has been, I shouldn't say I'm surprised or shocked, but disappointing

to me because so many of you consume political media to get angry or to argue with me

when I'm trying to tell you some facts.

I think I've got a pretty good perspective on what is important about why Gavin Newsom is doing well.

And so I'm going to ask you, come with me here, listen, use this as an opportunity to maybe learn if you think I'm right.

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