S6 Ep32: It's "Messing With Me Mentally" (with Ashley Parker)
The Focus Group Podcast
The Bulwark
4.8 • 2.6K Ratings
🗓️ 4 April 2026
⏱️ 52 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Iran War has been going on for a month, and it’s deeply, DEEPLY unpopular. Plus, we get reactions from swing voters on the characters inside the Trump administration who they like (like Marco Rubio), or REALLY dislike (listen to find out). Atlantic staff writer Ashley Parker returns to the show.
By Ashley Parker:
The Wrath of Stephen Miller
Pre-order Sarah’s book, How to Eat an Elephant, coming in September!
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Focus Group podcast. |
| 0:10.9 | I'm Sarah Longwell, publisher of the bulwark. |
| 0:13.6 | And this week, it is clear that the war in Iran is taking a toll on the American psyche. |
| 0:18.6 | We're about a month into this war. |
| 0:20.3 | And I think it's clear from our focus groups |
| 0:21.8 | that there's a certain mental architecture |
| 0:24.5 | to why Americans are so on edge |
| 0:26.9 | and why there are polls showing Donald Trump's approval rating |
| 0:29.7 | at 33% or 35% right now. |
| 0:32.2 | We're going to get to that in a bit. |
| 0:34.0 | My guest today is Ashley Parker, |
| 0:37.2 | staff writer at The Atlantic and one of their most prolific |
| 0:40.0 | White House reporters. Ashley, thanks for coming back. Thanks for having me. So as much as Trump's |
| 0:45.1 | stock is going down, not every swing voter sees the cast of characters in the Trump administration |
| 0:51.0 | equally. There are some they think are clowns and some they |
| 0:55.0 | really think are adults. There's sort of a strange new respect for Marco Rubio happening. |
| 0:59.9 | We're going to talk about both in this. But for our listeners who are not in this business, |
| 1:04.5 | what is your life like right now, like covering this White House? Like, did the Warren-Iran |
| 1:10.6 | like upend your day-to-day life in terms of how you're covering the White House? |
| 1:14.5 | Or just talk about you for a second reporting on this? |
| 1:17.7 | Yes. |
| 1:18.6 | So, I mean, there's two ways to answer that. |
... |
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