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

The Playbook Podcast

POLITICO

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3.9 • 699 Ratings

🗓️ 21 July 2025

⏱️ 10 minutes

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Summary

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 contributing author Adam Wren and chief correspondent Dasha Burns talk it through.

Transcript

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0:00.0	presented by BP.
0:07.3	Hello, I'm Adam Wren.
0:09.2	And I'm Dasha Burns.
0:10.4	It is Monday, July 21st.
0:12.7	And this is the Playbook podcast.
0:14.7	Happy Monday.
0:15.9	Happy Monday, indeed.
0:17.4	And without further ado, the big story driving the day is, yes, once again, Epstein adjacent.
0:23.6	But this time, it's all about how Democrats are seizing the moment and narrowing the gap in the
0:29.4	attention economy. In particular, Dasha, I've seen Democrats appear on conservative-leaning
0:35.3	podcast, particularly within the last 72 hours.
0:39.1	Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg appeared on the Barstool Sports Show to present a, quote,
0:45.0	lib of the year award.
0:46.8	Burgeoning Texas Democratic star James Tala Rico went on the Joe Rogan experience.
0:52.2	Pretty big get there for both of them.
0:55.0	And Rahm Emanuel set the talk with Megan Kelly today at noon. And while there's a general trend of foot,
1:01.3	Democrats are doing this specifically on the topic of Epstein as well. And Republicans are taking note.
1:07.7	I talked to GOP kingmaker Steve Bannon, who told me that the hosting of
1:13.0	Tala Rico shows that Rogan is trending back to his progressive roots. But he did take attention
1:18.5	and noted that, quote, Pete and Roe Kana, he's referring to the Democratic Congressman,
1:23.9	who's going on a number of these conservative coded podcasts, that they quote, get it, he told me.
1:29.4	We also know that Kana's just generally been a big fan of appearing on podcast anyways.
	...

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