Hey, pull up a chair. It's Hacks on Tap with David Axelrod and Mike Murphy.

Hello everyone. I would like to take this opportunity to sincerely apologize for a statement that I made yesterday at my town hall.

See, I was in the process of answering a question that had been asked by an audience member when a woman who was

extremely distraught screamed out from the back corner of the auditorium, people are going

to die. And I made an incorrect assumption that everyone in the auditorium understood that, yes, we are all going to perish from this earth.

So I apologize. And I'm really, really glad that I did not have to bring up the subject of the tooth fairy as well.

There you have it, Mike Murphy. Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa,

uh, in one of the great acts of political, uh, self-immolation I've seen lately. She had a town hall meeting on Medicaid and the cuts that

Congress is considering in Medicaid. Someone shouted out, people are going to die. She said,

we're all going to die. She might have been able to finesse that or explain it. But instead,

she doubles down the next day, man, you've done a lot of Iowa politics.

I don't think a lot of Iowans are going to love that.

Well, no.

I mean, and she did it with this weird hostage video choke shot thing, you know, looking into her phone, walking around.

The Senate Majority Leader Thune, I think, still has Dr.

Feel Good on retainer.

It might be time for the Senate helpers to help the good senator find her compass back to sanity.

So, you know, I don't know how to explain it, but it's embarrassing. And she's a

interesting person. And I don't, I don't know how to unpack what's going on in her mind

other than she doesn't like being yelled at a town in all meetings. But hey, well, you're

going to get used to it. Yeah, I was going to say, you're on that train, get ready to hear a whistle.

Liz Smith, one of the great consultants in the Democratic Party, a consigliary to some of the most promising young politicians in America.

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