Rep. Sarah McBride Diagnoses Congress

The Congresswoman from Delaware joins us to talk

One of the most enjoyable parts of my job is getting to see a bit behind the curtain when we bring elected representatives onto the show. I’m the one on our team who is in touch with their staff, coordinates schedules, confirms topics, and manages all the details of bringing them onto the show.

In the nearly seven years I’ve worked for Pantsuit Politics, I’ve developed a pretty good radar for the various elements that make a guest exceptional. Sometimes a guest is smart and engaging in the interview, but difficult to work with in any number of ways behind the scenes. Sometimes the guest and their team are amazing, but they just don’t have the right conversational skills to be good on a podcast. Sometimes, often, everything is smooth and good, but we still don’t find that certain je ne sais quoi of charisma and chemistry that makes a great show.

Very, very rarely do I finish a raw cut of an interview and think, “Wow.” I could count those times on one hand. Today’s guest did that for me.

Rep. Sarah McBride, who represents the entire state of Delaware, hit every mark for me. She’s smart, funny, relatable, passionate, caring, insightful, gracious, inspiring, and manages to sound like a normal human being through it all — a skill that is obnoxiously rare for our elected officials. Plus, she and her team were a delight to work with from start to finish.

She joins Sarah and Beth today to discuss her experience in Congress, the stakes around the shutdown, working with her colleagues across the aisle, and, outside of politics, her amazing connection to Taylor Swift.

This is a fabulous conversation with a fabulous woman and you won’t want to miss it. If you’re feeling burnt out on Congress (and who among us isn’t), Rep. McBride will bring you some hope that good work is still being done by good people on the Hill. -Alise

Want more Pantsuit Politics? Subscribe to ensure you never miss an episode and get access to our premium shows and community.

Episode Resources

• Sarah McBride Congressional Website

• Sarah McBride Instagram

Episode Transcript

Beth [00:00:10] This is Beth Silvers, you’re listening to Pantsuit Politics and we have a very special episode for you today. It is our 10th birthday as a podcast. We’ve been celebrating all year, but this is the marker. This is the moment that we have been around for 10 years. That is coinciding with elections taking place all over the country. We’ll be back on Friday to talk about the outcomes and some of those races. And we are spending this special birthday episode in conversation with Representative Sarah McBride of Delaware. As you’ll hear, Representative McBride is smart. She is funny. She is incisive. And she is gracious. It is an amazing mix of skills that she brings to discussion. We talk about the government shutdown, we talk about what is going on with Congress, and I think that she really lays down some markers that explain why this Congress has been particularly disappointing and what we need to be looking out for as we think about the next Congress. So we are delighted to welcome Congresswoman Sarah McBride today.

[00:01:07] Before we do, I just want to tell you that we have been here for 10 years, able to make the work that we make the way that we make it because of support from listeners. And we try to honor that support by making lots of extra episodes in order for you to have a sustainable news habit where you pay attention to what’s going on in the world, but you don’t feel extremely depressed and despondent because of it. One important component of that daily news habit is Good Morning that Sarah makes four mornings a week, Monday through Thursday. She gives you what you need to know about the news in under 10 minutes without any panic, without any doom scrolling, just clarity and a whole lot of fun. It’s part of our paid subscription at $15 a month along with the More to Say episodes that I make and our weekly spicy bonus episode. That means that you have seven premium episodes every single week in exchange for your $15 a month of support. And that support keeps our work sustainable. It helps us upgrade our equipment as we expand our video options. It helps us pay our team and treat them fairly.

[00:02:11] So if you’ve been thinking about upgrading and supporting our independent podcast that has remained purposefully and intentionally small and as analog as we can be in the podcasting space, now is the time to do it. And if you’re already a paid subscriber, we just want to say thank you so very much for your support. We hope that you’ll be with us a long time. We hope you feel the return on your investment is very, very high. Go to pantsuitpoliticshow.com to upgrade or learn more. And without further ado, Congresswoman Sarah McBride. Representative McBride, thank you so much for joining us here at Pantsuit Politics.

Sarah McBride [00:02:57] Thanks for having me. Excited to join.

Beth [00:02:59] I know that your schedule is packed and busy, but also, is it weird that the House is just not hanging out together right now?

Sarah [00:03:08] It’s just not. I think that was a full and complete sentence.

Beth [00:03:10] The House is just not.

Sarah [00:03:11] It’s just not.

Sarah McBride [00:03:12] The Democrats have been going back. We’ve been searching for Republicans there for 40 days now and they are nowhere to be found. I mean it’s appalling quite frankly. How are we supposed to reopen government if the House itself is shut down? They want to what’s called jam the Senate. They pass their partisan budget and left town to try to say to the Senate take our healthcare cutting, Donald Trump sucking up to budget or not and shut the government down. That’s bad faith. It’s cruel. But also I think what’s clear is that the cherry on top for Mike Johnson in keeping the House shut down is the fact that he has a disingenuous excuse not to swear in representative-elect, and it’s ridiculous that it is still elect. Representative-elect Adelita Grijalva. So that they don’t get to the 218th signature on the Epstein discharge petition. That is not a talking point. That is truly at play for them. And everything we hear behind the scenes is that that is as much of a motivator as their partisan negotiating tactics.

Sarah [00:04:30] To what end? I mean, this feels like both its own shocking event and also the culmination of this very powerful party controlling the House, the Senate, and the presidency, and the leaders of that party taking a very weak position, which is to not do anything as article one institution of our Constitution. I really thought at the beginning of this second Trump term (probably said it on this podcast) I don’t anticipate people giving away their own power. But that is absolutely what the GOP leaders have done and the representatives have done. They’ll do whatever he says and nothing more and nothing less and I just can’t fathom It. They can’t keep the house out of session forever-- or maybe they can. I don’t know. Maybe I should anticipate that.

Sarah McBride [00:05:29] What is happening, what has been happening not just over the last 40-some days with the House being out of session, but what has been happening over the last 10 months is an absolute travesty of constitutional proportions. The Constitution is set up on the premise that each individual branch will check the other in pursuit of not only the public good, but maintaining that branch’s power. And Republicans in Congress, time and time again, have demonstrated a willingness to both ignore the public good and shirk their responsibility in protecting Congress’s power, all in an effort to suck up to Donald Trump. This president clearly is so insecure, he is unable to have anyone around him, but yes men. He’s surrounded by them in the White House. And my guess is that when Donald Trump met with Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer in the Oval Office just before the shutdown, that may very well have been the first time Donald Trump was in a room in the last 10 months with anyone who said no to him.

Sarah [00:06:43] Yeah.

Sarah McBride [00:06:44] And the Republicans in Congress are doing his bidding time and time again. On top of that, one of the most jarring things about being in Congress, (I’m new, I got here in January) is to see genuinely up close in real life the degree to which Republicans in Congress are part of a cult of personality around this man. You go on the floor and we’re debating healthcare and the Republicans put up these-- you can put a poster board up behind you on the floor. And we’ll put up a poster board and it’s like working families looking over bills or doctors and nurses. They’ll put their boards behind them and it’s Donald Trump gazing off into the distance with fireworks behind their head. It is so pitiful up close to see grown ass adults just time and time again debase themselves at the feet of Donald Trump.

Sarah [00:07:42] I really respect-- look, we’re all like-minded. This course of three, we’re on the same page, but I really respect your relationship with your constituents. And the three of us are in this world and in the news and in politics of it all and are horrified, in my opinion, rightfully so, by all of this. But what are you hearing in Delaware? What are you hearing from people? Is this getting through from people who are not highly attuned to news and politics? Are people at least upset by this cult of personality and how it’s playing out across Congress?

Sarah McBride [00:08:25] I said when I ran for the House that I was willing to work with anyone who was going to work for me to help Delaware and that I would stand up to anyone who I believed was hurting Delaware. And obviously the last 10 months have required me to time and time again stand up on behalf of my constituents. Before I just get to what I’m hearing from them, to the earlier conversation, the cult of personality that surrounds this man, and my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, their willingness to hurt their own constituents, their willingness to turn their backs on their own constituents, the Affordable Care Act disproportionately benefits and covers people in red states. The ACA plans that have these enhanced premium tax credits disproportionately are in red States. The complete disregard for their own constituents, their own constituent’s wellbeing is absolutely appalling. And it’s one more example of what is supposed to temper abuse of power in our government. It’s the fierce defense of a branch’s own power and defense of your constituents. And in both instances, Republicans have abdicated on both fronts.

[00:09:56] What I hear from my constituents is people are outraged. Everywhere I go in every part of my state, I represent more people in the house than any other member. I represent, of course, the entirety of what is objectively the greatest state in the history of the union. Kentucky’s a Commonwealth, so I can say that without a competition. I represent the entire state, urban, suburban and rural areas, and so I’m out there and I’m talking to people who are Democrats, independents and Republicans, people who voted against this president in the last election and people who voted for this president in last election, and yes people who didn’t vote at all in the last election. And people are outraged. I hear from farmers every single week who are outraged at the impact that this administration is having on farmers in my state, which is the largest industry in my State. Every single day I hear from health care providers, doctors, nurses, CNAs, pharmacists, everyone across the health care industry, and of course, patients, about the attacks on health care.

[00:11:07] I don’t know that everyone can always point out the exact specific policy all the time, but they know that this administration, Republicans in Congress, are cutting health care. And of course they know about the masked men in streets. They know about be attacks on diversity. They know about the consolidation of power that we are seeing by this administration. And people are outraged by it. And time and time again, what I hear from my constituents is keep fighting, keep fighting, keep fighting for us. Thank you for standing up for us. I hear that from people who I think are like-minded, similar to the three of us. But I also hear it from people who say, I voted for him in the last election because I thought he was going to lower costs. But that’s clearly not what he’s focused on. In fact, not only is he not spending much time on lowering the costs, he’s actually doing things that raise prices for us. So keep standing up, keep fighting for us, someone needs to. And I imagine that that’s what my colleagues are hearing, Democratic colleagues are hearing when they’re out in their community. I don’t know if my Republican colleagues are because they’re so insulated from any kind of real people.

Beth [00:12:19] Well, I think the mood around me about Congress has gotten pretty fatalistic. That people run as cowboys and pirates. They’re going to go in and fight everybody and stand up for the common man. And then they get there and they put on suits and go to fancy parties and make a lot of money and don’t do much. And so I’m wondering how you combat that nihilism and how you think about doing what you were elected to do when the leadership literally doesn’t have your branch in session during a crisis moment.

Sarah McBride [00:12:57] I think that one of the problems in this moment that we face is that there is this crisis of hope in this country. And I think part of the fuel of Trumpism is the growing belief, frankly, perhaps the long-standing belief, that government can’t function, that government cannot deliver, that government isn’t going to make your life better. And I think that that contributes to Trumpism in two ways. The first is that when government doesn’t solve your problems, you grow angry, you grow frustrated, and you’re often sicker, poorer, and more hungry because of the lack of help. And Franklin Roosevelt in 1944, he said, necessitous people are not free people. People who are hungry and out of a job are the things that dictatorships are made of. And so I think, one, that anger from a lack of action by government fuels Trumpism. But then the second thing that it does is when you lose faith that government, that politics can be a form of progress, you then turn to politics as a form of entertainment. And Trump scratches both of those itches. He scratches the itch of the anger and he scratches the itch of entertainment. When I went to Congress, I had been in the state legislature for four years. I had been in national advocacy before that. So I thought I had a sense.

[00:14:34] Similar to the cult of personality dynamic, the thing that struck me when I got there and I had to crash course in it during the orientation with the bathroom stuff, there are enough people in Congress. It might not be everyone, it’s certainly not everyone, it might not even be a majority in the Republican caucus, but there are enough people who treat Congress like it’s a reality TV show. I used to think it was I’m going to use the strategies of reality TV to gain attention and that is in pursuit of power or fundraising. But what I’ve actually realized is that for some of these folks, the pursuit of attention is actually an addiction. One of the most common things I hear from people, from my colleagues is that person was so normal when they got here. And the thing that’s happening for a lot of these people is they get there, they’re normal, they do something, they stand on principle or they do something and it gets them a lot attention. And the thing we know about social media is that social media is addictive, right? You post a picture online and it gets a lot of likes, that’s a dopamine rush and that’s addictive. But that situation is like a cigarette, it’s like puffing a cigarette. When you go viral nationally, that is a hit that is like the most powerful drug and it is instantly addictive.

[00:16:16] And so these people then once super addicted to that attention, they are willing, like anyone who struggles with addiction, to perform behaviors that are both not only self-debasing, but have collateral damage for others in pursuit of that high. So I’ve just spent a lot of time diagnosing some of the problem in congress. But I think we have to be crystal clear about what’s at play. A lot of it is so fundamentally human in both simple ways, disturbing ways, and tragic ways, but also in ways that I think you have to understand what’s at play with these people to understand how we move forward from it. We have to more cognizant of electing mature, wise, healthy, healed human beings to Congress because we have a lot of people there who just aren’t well. And that’s not a criticism of them, but they have a of unprocessed trauma and they are destroying the country in pursuit of destructive behaviors that from their trauma. So, one, we have to be mindful of that and the people that we elect. Two, we to elect people who are serious, who understand that governing isn’t always fun. It’s not always easy. It’s always fair. But if we are going to have any chance of not just winning back power, but making it work to inoculate this country to Trumpism itself and deliver for people, then we have to send people to Congress who aren’t just performers. That is important. They have to be performers, but they have to be doers as well. And I think that that’s on all of us as voters because I think the easiest thing in this moment, too, is to want people to fight in ways that feel viscerally comforting to us but aren’t necessarily constructive in moving the ball forward.

Sarah [00:18:35] That’s exactly what I was going to say.

Sarah McBride [00:18:36] That requires us to fight hard and fight smart. And that’s not easy, and it’s not fair, and it not always fun, and it’s not always comforting. But the stakes are too high for us to prioritize our own comfort and our own sense of just like visceral enjoyment. The stakes are to high to prioritize that over serious substantive doers, and that’s what we need more of in Congress.

Sarah [00:19:05] Yeah, that’s exactly what I was going to say. Look, the addiction is not only on one side. I was just reading New York Times piece about how these ads in New Jersey and in Virginia involve a lot of Trump attacks. And there was a-- I don’t remember who it was. I feel it was like Salinda Lake or somebody like female democratic strategist that was like Trump is crack cocaine. Attacking Trump is like crack cocaine, so that language of addiction, that’ll be hard to break. This dependence on making him the villain, feeling like we’re righteous good people because we’re on the side of light, and goodness, and empathy. And I wonder, we’re in this cycle with each other where you have people that perform in a way to get a reaction, and it feels like you’re not a good person if you don’t react righteously and that feels a certain psychological need we all have to feel like we’re doing the right thing and being good people and posting right and donating to the right charities and posting our outrage about all the right newsworthy topics on Instagram within the short 24 hour period, you know what I mean? I think that’s the other part of this energetic exchange. And getting to the good serious work of governing feels so difficult because if you stand up like you and say, okay-- I particularly want to talk about your emphasis on the word it’s not always fair. And say we just have to do the hard work. But how could we do the hard work when they’re acting like this? That’s what we get all the time. How could you talk about this when they are acting even worse? It just feels like this cycle we can’t break.

Sarah McBride [00:20:57] I think that that’s right. One of the things that I’ve been talking about the last 10 months is, like I said, we have to fight hard but fight smart. And we consistently make Donald Trump the main character, which just plays into his hands. And to your question earlier about my constituents, we have done a much better job of making our constituents the main characters and making Donald Trump a supporting character. We can go after what they’re doing and the attacks that they’re inflicting on our health care, on our economy, on prices, on democracy, on rights. We can do that in a way that centers the people we represent, the flock we are defending, the family we are representing, not in a ways that just plays into his hands and feeds the sense by the very people that we have to convince, those Trump-tolerant individuals who we need if we are going to build a large, diverse, working-class coalition to win back power that we don’t suffer from Trump derangement syndrome. Whatever, you can roll your eyes at it, but that’s the perception. In politics, you have to grapple with perception, even if it’s not real. And so I do think that we have to do a much better job of re-centering our constituents, which I know is at the heart of what we’re doing.

[00:22:13] It’s why we’re outraged by Donald Trump, but we have to make them the story, not this man who feeds off of attention. Look, again, we are in a competitive attentional economy, we have to be more competitive in winning attention. And I think a lot of times it will go well. The way to get attention, the way to breakthrough is to scream and shout and be outrageous, and go run to where the fire is and Trump is the fire. I think that there is another way. I think that regardless of what you think of his politics or his policies, the tactics that Zohran Mamdani is using in New York are incredibly effective tactics, both from attentional perspective, but also from an actual political perspective. Because the way you break through on social media is you have to tap people’s curiosity. And the easiest way to tap curiosity is to be outrageous. It’s to yell and to scream, to say extremely outrageous things, and that goes viral. And that actually works for Republicans. It doesn’t work for us. And that is an unfair double standard, but that is also the reality. What has managed to do is to successfully employ three kinds of politics. One is just the hyper focus on the politics of affordability. Two, it’s what I’ve been calling the politics of Ted Lasso, to be curious, not judgmental. Going out and showing people--

Sarah [00:24:04] Maybe he does give Ted Lasso and I had never put that together before. You’re really right about that.

Sarah McBride [00:24:09] Yes. To be curious. The first video that went viral was him having good, respectful, common ground finding conversations with Trump voters. And then the third is the sort of politics of Mr. Rogers, right? A sense of a neighborly commitment to our community and our place. Trump does it with America first. Mamdani is doing it with a New York first kind of campaign. But what he’s done is he’s combined all three of those things. And that middle one in particular has the capacity to break through online because the other way to tap people’s curiosity, one is to be outrageous. The other is to just place something in front of them that they don’t usually see. And what he did is he placed in front of the public something we don’t usually see, a progressive Democrat having a respectful dialog that is finding common ground with a Trump-voting New Yorker. That taps our curiosity. It taps our curiosity in a way that breaks through and in a way that break through that’s not counterproductive to our brand because it’s communicating that we care about everyone, that we are listening to everyone, that we’re a curious coalition, not a judgmental coalition. And that is replicable, whether you are in a blue area, a red area or a purple area.

Beth [00:25:31] Another impressive part of what he’s doing is that he looks like he’s having fun and there’s just not enough fun around politics. I was especially impressed by his ad during Survivor with actual Survivor contestants. It was just so fun. And to me, it said, I see a whole bunch of people who aren’t watching TikTok all day, right? I see broader audience than what a lot of democratic messaging feels targeted to. And I want to ask you about in connection with-- I mean, you did a real feat this year. You got legislation through this Congress around family leave. And I was so impressed as I started to learn the details of that work, because it felt to me like you were saying, hey, I see a different audience than often we are targeting our messaging to. I see people in towns that have maybe one big employer and both spouses work there. So will you talk a little bit about that legislation and then bigger picture like about that approach. Despite the president saying he thinks we don’t really need any more laws from Congress, there is a lot of work to do, simple things that would help families with real pain points.

Sarah McBride [00:26:38] So I got into politics after my experience as a caregiver myself to the man who would become my husband, Andy, as he battled what originally was and what we hoped was just going to be a cancer that he could overcome, but what ended up being a terminal cancer. It was the most formative experience in my life, the most impactful. And while Andy ultimately died from that cancer, throughout that experience and up until his last breath, he and I, we both knew how lucky we were. We knew how luck he was to have health insurance that would allow him to get care. And we both know how lucky both of us were to have flexibility with our jobs that allowed him to focus on the full-time job of getting care and me to focus on the whole time job of caring for him and loving him and marrying him, and when his cancer turned out to be terminal, to walk him to his passing. And I ran for the state Senate and I eventually ran for Congress because I don’t believe that in the wealthiest, most developed nation on earth at that time and that ability to get care should be a matter of luck. And I was really proud here in Delaware with bipartisan support to pass our comprehensive paid family and medical leave program, which is going into effect on January 1st of next year.

[00:28:11] People are going to be able to get partial wage replacement when they’re taking leave to welcome a child into their family, as they struggle through a serious illness, or as they take care of a family member struggling through a series illness. And when I was in Congress, I joined with a Republican to introduce legislation to say that our national FMLA law, which provides job protected leave, unpaid unfortunately, to many workers across this country who are taking leave for various life events, including welcoming a child into their family, to say that this archaic part of FMLA law, which said that if you are a married couple and you work for the same employer, instead of both parents getting to take 12 weeks of job protected leave, that would combine and they could only take 12 together total. And our bipartisan bill addresses that. It says, if you’re a couple that works the same employer, you are entitled to the same job-protected leave as a couple who works for two different employers. And for my constituents who work in small towns where there is a dominant large employer or a handful of medium-sized employers and the chance of a couple working at the same place is reasonably high, that those constituents of mine deserve the same job protected leave as my constituents who work here in Wilmington and very likely work for two different employers.

[00:29:42] These are simple, but meaningful and impactful for the constituents that they represent policy solutions, right? I also joined with my colleagues on the democratic side to introduce the comprehensive paid family medical leave law, the Family Act. But we can make progress on these more technical smaller policy ideas that fall outside of the headlines. That aren’t impacted by the perverse incentives that come into play when something is viral online or covered in the news. And that makes a real difference for people. And not only does it deliver for people in a way that solves that crisis of hope we talked about, but it also helps us as colleagues across the aisle to build relationships, which is so necessary if we are going to figure out and have any chance of trying to bridge some of the divides and tackle some of bigger issues that too often fall into purely partisan lanes. And so I’m really proud that as much as I’m fighting back against the administration and the doomer leadership in Congress, I’m also really proud that I’ve introduced, according to an independent organization, more bipartisan legislation in this Congress than any other freshman, because we have to be able to do both if we are going to do the full job that’s before us.

Sarah [00:31:17] Well, before we move on to Outside of Politics, I want to ask you in the good work of undoing that crisis of hope, have there been any relationships that have surprised you? Have you done this bipartisan work? You’ve really laid out some clarity and clear-eyed assessment of some of the personal issues that I am fully convinced by. But I’m wondering if you’ve also seen the other side of humanity in your bipartisan work and if you heard from your colleagues that they’ve learned something in their relationship to Democrats has changed and shifted.

Sarah McBride [00:31:53] One of my colleagues who’s incredibly conservative, a Freedom Caucus member-- I have very serious, very serious disagreements with these folks and I am deeply disturbed by their politics and their lack of courage and all of that. And I’m still in a workplace with these people and at a certain point, like, you’ve got to engage. One of colleagues who is very conservative said that he was going to be nice to me because he’s decided to be to all Democrats because he wants to spend time in this lifetime with us since he won’t spend any time in eternity with us, which I just thought was hilarious. I know it’s cringe. I thought it was funny.

Beth [00:32:35] Every single thing you say about Congress sounds to me to be like at the same time a searing indictment and incredibly compassionate. And I’m just trying to sit with the way that you walk this line.

Sarah [00:32:47] I guess whatever gets in there.

Sarah McBride [00:32:51] If someone’s willing to come to me with some degree of humor, even if even if-- because, listen, I have to deal with a lot in Congress. And maybe my bar is just very low. But if someone is coming to me with humor that’s not mean spirited and just a little ribbing, I’ll take that any day of the week over some of the behavior of some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle.

Sarah [00:33:21] I think it’s generous you’re still using the word colleague, but Godspeed.

Sarah McBride [00:33:25] Yes, there have been moments of both personal compassion that I’ve been on the receiving end from colleagues on the other side of the aisle, especially as I have faced particular vitriol from some of the other people in Congress. Obviously, I’d love to see more from those people, but I’ll start with that personal point of compassion and hopefully build from there. And then I’ve seen opportunities where people will come to me and say I don’t like the way they’re treating you. Let’s find opportunities to work together to show people that not everyone’s like this.

Sarah [00:34:11] Oh, wow.

Sarah McBride [00:34:15] And I joined with a Republican colleague of mine on a joint letter in opposition to the Trump administration’s reimbursement cuts in home health care. And so there’ve been some opportunities to bring together Democrats and Republicans increasingly to push back on some of the policies of this administration. You’re seeing a little bit more courage from folks, not nearly enough and not, quite frankly, when it really matters. But you’re seeing some opportunities. Look, I don’t have much hope for this Congress. In fact, I don’t have any hope for the Congress. We are going to need to win Congress back in order to even have a fighting chance of changing things. But what does give me hope in this moment is that while the partisan divide in Congress is what you see is what you get, I mean, it is stark and real; one of the things I’m grateful for as an elected official is that I get out of Congress-- which what you’re seeing on cable news is what I’m experiencing on any given day. But I get out of that environment. And I get off of social media, which is also an environment that shows us the most extreme and outrageous examples. And I get out and I talked to people as I talked about earlier across the state, red, blue, purple areas, Democrats, independents, and Republicans, voters and non-voters alike.

[00:35:59] And what you realize is that, yes, we have real disagreements, but we are not as divided as the algorithms or our national politics make it seem. And you realize that many people are good, decent people who are willing to actually engage across disagreement, across a respectful disagreement, are willing to listen and be curious. I find hope in that because the reality is in this moment, our coalition, our pro-democracy coalition has to decide whether we actually believe in democracy. Not as a talking point, not as an abstraction, not only when it’s going well for us, whether we genuinely believe in it. Because democracy only works if we maintain our faith in people’s capacity to change. Once we give up on that, democracy falters and fails to authoritarianism and to violence, neither of which we can tolerate. And so we have to be willing in this moment to go past the comfort of preaching to our own choir and exercise the courage of growing our congregation. That means being uncomfortable, and it means doing the hard and often unfair work of change-making. And I’m willing to do that. I hope more people are willing to that because that is the only way we win back power. And the only way, quite frankly, we live our values as a coalition that believes in democracy.

Beth [00:37:48] I think that is an excellent place to leave it, even though I have 10,000 more questions for you. So I’m just going to say I hope that you’ll come back sometime.

Sarah McBride [00:37:55] I would love that.

Beth [00:37:56] Because I want to respect your time, but not really because I would like to talk to you about many more things.

Sarah McBride [00:38:00] I’m sorry my answers are so long, but you guys had great questions.

Beth [00:38:13] We always end our show talking about something on our minds Outside of Politics and we have it on good authority that you share a love of Taylor Swift with us.

Sarah McBride [00:38:22] So, so much so. I am definitely a Swiftie and I’m like nauseatingly listening to the new album on repeat over and over again. And I know it’s a controversial, or at least it was at the start a controversial album, but my hot take is that it’s got some really great bops and I will listen to the Fate of Ophelia over and, over and again. I like other songs on it, but that’s my favorite.

Sarah [00:38:48] Yeah, I like that song a lot. So did you go to the Eras tour?

Sarah McBride [00:38:50] Of course, Philadelphia, second night, nosebleed section, barely could see the stage because I was like so on the side of it, but I did. Did both of you?

Sarah [00:39:03] Yes, of course.

Beth [00:39:03] Yes.

Sarah McBride [00:39:03] I would hope so.

Sarah [00:39:03] Are you fully invested in Taylor and Travis?

Sarah McBride [00:39:07] I am. I’m not going to get into all of my pre-existing theories before they became serious and got engaged because those are politically incorrect.

Sarah [00:39:23] Listen, I was on record their second week of dating that they were getting married. I’m not playing. I got the receipts. And so when they actually got engaged, it was like I got engaged. Everybody was like you’re the first person I thought of. I’m so happy for you. They were like congratulating me because I had been saying for like two years these two are going to get married. And so when got engaged everybody was like congrats. I was like thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Sarah McBride [00:39:45] You are the third in that engagement worthy of congratulations.

Sarah [00:39:51] I’m basically the maid of honor!

Sarah McBride [00:39:52] Well, congratulations, Sarah.

Sarah [00:39:53] Thank you!

Beth [00:39:54] Tell us what your favorite album is.

Sarah McBride [00:39:58] Okay, I will...

Beth [00:40:03] Or maybe top three if you need that. That’s fine.

Sarah McBride [00:40:06] No, I’m going to answer it. Folklore has just a special place in my heart because it’s actually I liked Taylor before. And I know there’s like the OG Taylor fans and then the like COVID era Taylor fans. I have to say I have to admit I’m like a COVID era Taylor fan. I love all of her work prior to that but my love started with folklore and so that will always have a important place in our heart. And then my favorite song actually just because it’s my theme song and it describes too much of my life is Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me.

Sarah [00:40:42] Oh, yay! That’s perfect. Applause! Applause! You should be.

Sarah McBride [00:40:49] What about you two?

Sarah [00:40:52] I don’t know if we’ve ever answered that question, Beth.

Beth [00:40:55] Reputation’s my favorite with Folklore close second.

Sarah [00:40:58] Midnight is probably my favorite album. Midnight is probably the very first Taylor album I really listened to from beginning to end over and over and again. I really like Midnight.

Sarah McBride [00:41:10] I feel like Taylor almost more than any other artists that I experienced, she has brought back the art of the album, where it’s like there is a different experience when you listen to the entire album start to finish. And that’s true in a lot of artists, but I think Taylor really brought it back as a thing that people appreciate.

Sarah [00:41:35] And I would say my favorite song, even though it’s so different from Midnight is Exile because I just love that song so much. It’s so good.

Beth [00:41:44] It’s a great one. I have a friend who has a very, very difficult job and I love her very much. And so whenever I witness her job being very difficult, I send her Taylor Swift lyrics. We began with I’d rather burn my whole life down than listen to one more second of all this bitching and moaning. But we’ve gone from there. And I just realized more and more how much I appreciate that she writes more than just love songs, because she does have so much that’s just like relevant to business and politics and friends. She’s really good at putting hard experiences into words.

Sarah McBride [00:42:18] Can I tell you something that maybe I’m not supposed to tell anyone?

Beth [00:42:21] Please do. It’s just us.

Sarah McBride [00:42:23] Taylor and I have a mutual friend. And I’m not going to say who they are, but I was with this mutual friend’s mom and I’ve never met Taylor. That is a life goal to change. But I was gifted some of Taylor’s homemade pop tarts.

Sarah [00:42:48] A baked good?

Beth [00:42:51] No, you were not!

Sarah [00:42:53] You got a Taylor baked good?

Sarah McBride [00:42:55] It was so good. Honestly, I love homemade pop tarts.

Sarah [00:42:59] What was the flavor?

Sarah McBride [00:43:00] It was strawberry. I had two and then some cake that she had made. I was with the mom’s mutual friend at dinner and I was like, oh my God, I love Taylor. And so the next day they brought me baked goods from, that night that Taylor and that friend had been baking.

Beth [00:43:20] Was it wrapped in [crosstalk]

Sarah McBride [00:43:20] No, I wish. I’m pretty sure that it was the same batch that there was then an article about that she had given to Travis for the Chiefs.

Beth [00:43:32] I read that article.

Sarah McBride [00:43:34] I know. Well, I had that pop tart.

Sarah [00:43:38] I cannot close my mouth. I’m just got smacked.

Sarah McBride [00:43:40] I know.

Beth [00:43:43] That’s incredible. It is amazing that you waited till the end to tell us that.

Sarah [00:43:46] Well, good thing I wouldn’t have been able to think about anything else the whole time.

Sarah McBride [00:43:50] I was saving the best for last. Breaking news. That is the scoop on this podcast.

Sarah [00:43:55] Oh my god, that’s incredible. Well, I’ve saved to the end to thank you. Our paths have not crossed, but you have crossed paths with my three sons who were brought to the floor of the House with Representative Haley Stevens back in April. And my oldest son, Griffin, came out and his eyes were about this big. And he said, “I met Sarah McBride and she was so nice and she took us around and she introduced us to people.” And he was just so delighted to have met you, all three boys were, and just thank you officially for being so kind to my children. You really made their whole day.

Sarah McBride [00:44:37] Absolutely. They were wonderful. I was so glad to get to meet them.

Sarah [00:44:42] Well, I think a kid shows up on the House where everybody’s like, well, this is fun and different. Yay!

Sarah McBride [00:44:48] Exactly. Much more fun to hang with them than our colleagues.

Beth [00:44:53] What a treat to talk with you. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for the work that you do and the way that you do it. And please come back.

Sarah [00:44:59] Anytime.

Sarah McBride [00:45:00] Thank you for having me.

Beth [00:45:00] Thank you so much to the congresswoman for joining us today. Thank you to all of you for listening. Thank you to all of you who support our work and all of you who are considering doing that. Remember, you can go to pantsuitpoliticshow.com to get Good Morning, More to Say, and our spicy bonus episodes, seven premium episodes every single week. For only $15 a month, we would love to see you there and have you interact with the incredible community of people who are there. We hope that you are having the best election days available to you and we will be back on Friday to talk about the results.

Show Credits

Pantsuit Politics is hosted by Sarah Stewart Holland and Beth Silvers. The show is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. Alise Napp is our Managing Director and Maggie Penton is our Director of Community Engagement.

Our theme music was composed by Xander Singh with inspiration from original work by Dante Lima.

Our show is listener-supported. The community of paid subscribers here on Substack makes everything we do possible. Special thanks to our Executive Producers, some of whose names you hear at the end of each show. To join our community of supporters, become a paid subscriber here on Substack.

To search past episodes of the main show or our premium content, check out our content archive.

This podcast and every episode of it are wholly owned by Pantsuit Politics LLC and are protected by US and international copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property laws. We hope you’ll listen to it, love it, and share it with other people, but not with large language models or machines and not for commercial purposes. Thanks for keeping it nuanced with us.