Hi, this is Julia from Accomil Annoy, and today I finished my 30th year as an educator.

And to celebrate it, I'm treating myself to a shot of some really expensive whiskey.

This podcast was recorded at 1.10 pm Eastern time on Wednesday, June 8th.

Where are the beverages in here?

Things may have changed by the time you hear this. Okay, here's the show. This is so good.

I want to know what kind as a bourbon enthusiast myself.

Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Asma Khalid, I cover the White House.

I'm Don Gagne, National Political Correspondent, and I'm Dominic Amantiner,

a Senior Political Editor and Correspondent.

Former President Donald Trump has been an omnipresent factor in elections in state after state

this year, endorsing GOP candidates up and down the ballot. And sometimes it seems that he is

taking revenge against an incumbent that he believes is disloyal. Other times he is boosting

unknown Trump-esque candidates competing in a very crowded field. But I think the key political

question that a lot of us have had is, are these endorsements working? And now that we have gotten

a few primary races into the season, we can actually begin to take stock of that question.

Dominico, there were more primary races last night, and it does not seem like Trumpism was the golden ticket.

Well, yeah, I mean, there were a lot of candidates who tried to wrap themselves in the politics of

President Trump, you know, in South Dakota, one accusing another of not being Trump enough,

despite this candidate having been somebody who had previously been endorsed by President Trump,

she was promoting Trump's election lie, this challenger, and it didn't work out for her.

And it didn't work out for a lot of candidates who are like that who have tried to jump on the

sort of golden ticket, you know, lightning rod, whatever you want to call it, in a lot of different

...