Return to Transcripts main page

Smerconish

C.A. Voters Will Decide Whether To Adopt A New Congressional Map; T.X. Republicans Approve New Congressional Maps; The Democratic Party Faces A Voter Registration Crisis; Maxwell Says She Doesn't Believe Epstein Died By Suicide; Maxwell Says There Is No Epstein Client List. 1965 U.S. Program Tried To Replace Migrant Labor With Teens; America's Social Calendar Is Bare. Aired 9-10a ET

Aired August 23, 2025 - 09:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:00:56]

MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN ANCHOR: You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave. I'm Michael Smerconish in the Philly burbs. The Eagles weren't singing about politics in Hotel California. When I studied the liner notes in my bedroom back in the 70s. I thought it was Don Henley and Glenn Frey's warning about California excesses.

If so, then the message is all the more relevant today, some choices, once made, can't easily be undone. And that's exactly the risk if California follows the Texas raw partisan path of mid-decade redistricting. By the way, who'd have thought it as 2025 began that the most hotly contested, potentially most expensive election of the year would come from a California ballot initiative? And yet, here we go. You probably know the background 2026 brings the midterms.

Republicans hold only a razor thin House majority. They can lose no more than three seats before Democrats regain control. And history tells us the president's party usually loses about two dozen seats in the midterms. That explains Texas. At the president's urging, the state has taken the unusual step of redrawing congressional lines mid- decade instead of waiting for the next census. And early this morning, the Texas Senate approved those new congressional maps designed to give Republicans up to five more seats in next year's midterms.

Now that the vote has cleared the final legislative hurdle, it heads to Governor Greg Abbott's desk. Democrats are vowing to fight back in court, but it's legal, and SCOTUS precedent suggests it will likely withstand challenge. But legality doesn't make it right. I condemn what Texas is doing. Gallup says that 43 percent of us, 43 percent of Americans, identify as Independent, not Republican or Democrat, and yet we're governed by extremists in both parties, empowered by a system that rewards the loudest voices in the room. Gerrymandering and self-sorting, they're the twin drivers of our polarization, the former gets more attention, but the latter matters just as much.

Check out these numbers. In 2024, more than 80 percent of counties were won by over 20 percentage points. That's not gerrymandering, county lines don't move. That's self-sorting. And it won't change until we break out of our bubbles and restore common experience that connects us across differences.

You've heard me say it before, we need to mingle. But gerrymandering can be reined in, and it should be reined in. Politicians should not be drawing their own districts, independent commissions should be doing that. And guess which state has been a leader? California.

In 2008 and 2010, under Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Californians passed ballot measures that stripped legislators of the power to draw their own districts. And they gave it instead to a citizen's commission. Fourteen members in all, five Democrats, five Republicans, four Independents, they can't pass a map unless at least three from each group sign on. And the rules are pretty strict, districts have to be equal in population, they've got to comply with the Voting Rights Act, stay contiguous, respect communities of interest, follow city and county lines when possible, and be compact. Nowhere on that list is protect incumbents or advance a particular party.

In fact, that's prohibited. And unlike the backroom deals of old, this process is totally transparent. Every meeting is public. Every draft map is posted. Citizens across the state get to weigh in before a line is ever finalized.

That's not politics as usual, that's professionalism. That's reform. And Schwarzenegger, a Republican in a heavily Democratic state, gave it bipartisan legitimacy when he argued that voters should choose their politicians, not the other way around. So now, when California is asked to undo what it has built, to abandon its independent redistricting commission, it's worth remembering that Eagle's warning. You can check out anytime you'd like, but you can never leave.

Once independence is surrendered, it's nearly impossible to win it back, even if Gavin Newsom says that he will resort to an independent commission after the 2030 census. Obviously, given that control of Congress could be at stake and the expense of any statewide race in California, with its many media markets, this is going to be a costly race.

[09:05:22]

But it has other elements that'll make it fun to watch. Gavin Newsom recently adopting a Trump like persona and seeking to use the redistricting ballot initiative as a way to nationalize the issue and to boost his own stock as the 2028 nominee. But he's got a worthy adversary in the governator. Arnold has promised to be active in defending the status quo. It's too early to predict the outcome.

When California voters passed Prop 11 in 2008, that was the initiative that created the independent redistricting commission for state legislative districts. The margin in that election was less than 2 percentage points. But two years later in 2010, when that was expanded to congressional districts like we're talking now, the margin was 21.8 percent. That suggests that Gavin Newsom could have an uphill battle. But maybe not if he succeeds in making it a California referendum on Donald Trump. It's true, the latest Politico Citron Center Possibility Lab survey found that just 36 percent of respondents, just 36 percent, back returning congressional redistricting authority to state lawmakers. But Politico reports that Newsom's own pollster, David Binder, recently briefed legislators with data suggesting a slight majority of California voters agree with what Newsom is seeking to do.

And in Friday's LA Times, a new poll from UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies has 48 percent of voters saying they'd favor a temporary gerrymandering plan on the ballot, while only about a third would oppose it. Newsom is going to have to convince Californians that offsetting Texas is their concern. You know, California, the state that is often a trailblazer, they usually get it right and the rest of us, we eventually catch up. There's a long list of cultural and political firsts, whether we're talking about blue jeans, skateboards, hula hoops, or no fault divorce, term limits, medical marijuana and same sex marriage, you can add California's independent redistricting commission to that list. I say it ought to be celebrated and not suspended.

Joining me now is David Wasserman, the senior editor and elections analyst for the Cook Political Report. He's a top election forecaster specializing in the House of Representatives and an expert on gerrymandering.

David, welcome back. If mutually assured destruction among the states plays out, which party will be left with an advantage?

DAVID WASSERMAN, ELECTIONS ANALYST THE COOK POLITICAL REPORT: Well, Michael, this has the potential to be a gerrymandering apocalypse, and Republicans are guaranteed to come out ahead. It's just a question of by how many seats. Republicans wouldn't be pursuing this in Texas and setting off this war if they felt good about their chances of holding House control in 2026. It's going to be a tough midterm for them, given the numbers. And if Texas generates five additional seats for Republicans, I think it's three to five, depending on two still competitive races in South Texas.

California, if voters there approve this constitutional amendment, could offset that because California's proposed map is three to five seats for Democrats. But then you get into Ohio, which is very likely to pass a map with two additional Republican seats, Indiana and Missouri, which could generate an additional Republican seat each. And we haven't really talked that much about Florida, which is getting lost in the shuffle of Texas versus California. But if Governor DeSantis rams through a new map that revises his own gerrymander from a couple years ago, then Republicans could pick up two or three seats there. So a lot hinges on what voters decide in California.

If California voters reject Newsom's push here, then it's possible Republicans could pad their cushion in the House by up to 10 seats. Whereas if California voters decide to let Democrats gerrymander and set aside the commission, it could be more like five or six. And that difference goes a long way considering how few truly competitive seats there are in other states to determine who wins. SMERCONISH: But, David, is all of that enough? No one knows the data like David Wasserman. Am I right in saying traditionally the party out of the White House gains about two dozen in a midterm election?

WASSERMAN: Well, that's the postwar average, Michael. But keep in mind, we're not talking about an electoral landscape or a distribution of competitive House seats like we had two decades ago, because most states have very lopsided maps with few competitive seats. And right now in our ratings we only rate 18 out of 435 races as toss ups.

[09:10:19]

Now look, Democrats, given the performance in special elections we're seeing, I think what we're likely to see with a robust win for Abigail Spanberger in the Virginia governor's race, which I think we're on track for, Republicans have reason to be scared even if they pass these maps. Let's say that they get five more seats out of Texas and the other states I mentioned, then Democrats would have to pick up five more somewhere else. But those seats are still on the board. There are plenty of districts that Trump won by less than 10 points that Democrats still have a good chance to win.

SMERCONISH: The governator versus Gavin. It sounds like a big budget movie.

WASSERMAN: That's true. And what this has done is it's highlighted how ego driven this redistricting war is. And I think if there is some silver lining and it might highlight for the broader public the absurdity of the way that we draw district lines compared to most other first past the post single member democracies where it's a simple bureaucratic function.

SMERCONISH: David, one other thing, I want to put this in the context of something else we learned this week. I know you saw that "New York Times" analysis. I'm going to put up the headline that talk about voter registration and there are 30 states that are trackable by Rs and Ds and in each of them, Shane Goldmacher, Jonah Smith doing the work here. Republicans have the advantage.

There's something going on out there to the GOP's benefit. Will you speak to how that relates to the redistricting issue?

WASSERMAN: Yes. The voter registration numbers for Democrats have been ugly for a while. Florida is an extreme example. But Democrats had a registration lead as recently as 2020 there. Now it's a 1.3 million Republican voter registration administration advantage.

Here's what's happening, Michael, we're seeing a lot of young voters and new registrants who really don't like President Trump, but they're not identifying as Democrats. It's a big reason why Democrats favorability as a party is in the low 30s or maybe even high 20s in some surveys. That doesn't preclude them from winning in 2026. But Democrats lack the inspirational figure that Barack Obama was in galvanizing new voters to sign up and register as Democrats. And so increasingly, Republicans are gaining from demographics where they used to do very poorly, young voters, Hispanic voters. That's a big reason why Pennsylvania and North Carolina are on the cusp of shedding their ancestral Democratic registration lead and perhaps flipping to Republican. We saw Bucks County, the canary in the coal mine --

SMERCONISH: Yes.

WASSERMAN: it -- for the first time in years, Republicans took the lead there. Guess what? Trump carried it narrowly in November. So that was ignored with (inaudible).

SMERCONISH: Where I was born and raised. Yes. Where I was born and raised. And I thought it very accurate and very significant.

David, appreciate you always. Thank you so much.

And for everybody at home, your reactions are welcome on social media. What do we have? From the world of X, I think. It's amazing Gavin Newsom believes disenfranchising citizens of California is good for presidential aspirations.

Well, Kyle, I think he's trying to seize the mantle. Like, you know, he's the one standing up to Donald Trump and beating Trump. He thinks in his own game via social media, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I don't want to be repetitive. I laid it all out in my opening commentary.

The last thing that we ought to be doing is ditching the California model. What we ought to be doing is emulating the California like the Hula Hoop, they were right about this, too, and Van Halen and The Beach Boys and I could go on.

Up ahead, would Americans do those jobs? You hear that question, right? You hear that question often amidst the debate over illegal immigration. Just last month, Agricultural Secretary Brooke Rollins said, well, able bodied adults on Medicaid could pick crops instead of immigrants. That's what happened in the 60s when the U.S. government sent teenagers into the fields.

We're going to meet one of them and ask what it taught him. You'll love this story. And the Justice Department released a transcript and audio of its interview with convicted sex trafficker and Jeffrey Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell. Among other things, she said Jeffrey Epstein did not commit suicide. That leads me today's poll question at smirconish.com.

[09:15:06]

What do you think? Do you believe Epstein committed suicide? While you're there, make sure you sign up for my free and worthy daily newsletter. You'll get the work of gifted illustrators, political cartoonists like Scott Stantis.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SMERCONISH: I stayed up late last night reading the transcript of Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche's two day interview with Ghislaine Maxwell. You've heard a lot about it. My time would have been better spent watching that Jerry Jones new documentary on Netflix, which is great, by the way. Ghislaine Maxwell is like Sergeant Schultz.

I'm going to date myself now. Remember, I see nothing. She gave everybody a clean bill of health, herself, Epstein, Trump, Clinton, even Prince Andrew. I guess that was the point at least with regard to President Trump, to try and get herself a get out of jail free card. But I thought she would say something substantive to try to justify a pardon.

[09:20:18]

But there was nothing that I read that was colorable to warrant a pardon. She might get one anyway. After all, she already got a prison transfer. But there's like no cover that's being offered that I can see in the transcript. No, well, she gave up so and so, or she pointed us in this new direction.

Notably, she said that she does not think that Epstein committed suicide. And that is --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GHISLAINE MAXWELL, JEFFREY EPSTEIN ASSOCIATE, I do not believe He died by suicide. No.

TODD BLANCHE, DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: And do you believe that -- do you have any speculation or view of who killed him?

MAXWELL: I -- no, I don't.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SMERCONISH: Kind of a grisly subject, but that's today's poll question at smerconish.com I don't think I've ever asked it before. So make sure you're voting.

That's my take. I want to know what CNN Senior Legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Elie Honig thinks about all of this.

Elie, you heard my take. What's your response?

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: So, Michael, there absolutely could have been a scenario, and honestly, this is what I was expecting, where when we see this transcript, Ghislaine Maxwell says to Todd Blanche, yes, there were other people involved, let me tell you who they were. That is what happens in 999 out of 1,000 of these meetings. That's why you have these meetings as a DOJ prosecutor, because the person you're meeting with who's trying to get some benefit is going to give you usable information to indict others. Instead, Ghislaine Maxwell paints this absurd universe where she has done nothing wrong, where all the witnesses against her were lying, where the jurors who convicted her were wrong, where the various judges who upheld their conviction was wrong. And by the way, beyond that, nobody else did anything wrong.

In fact, Michael, she barely even implicates Jeffrey Epstein. She sort of begrudgingly says, you know, I don't know if I'm doing anything wrong, but I don't really have any reason to doubt it, especially later in his life. So I think the fact that she went in there and basically offered a complete whitewash, I don't know that even works to her own favor.

SMERCONISH: Was "Hogan Heroes" before your time?

HONIG: I know the reference. Yes.

SMERCONISH: OK. Well, it sounds like it was before your time. I guess from the President's perspective, she gives him cover, you know, both from a misconduct vis-a-vis. Epstein, and she helps him perhaps in the civil suit against Murdoch and the Wall Street Journal, insofar as, like Sergeant Schultz, she remembers nothing about the birthday book.

HONIG: Right. And that part, to me, Michael, was such a tell. I mean, they spend more time, Todd Blanche and Ghislaine Maxwell discussing the birthday book and whether Donald Trump sent this bawdy letter or not, than they actually spend discussing whether various people were engaged in any wrongdoing. And why would Todd Blanche, I'm going to put myself back in a prosecutorial stance here, why would you really even care about that birthday book? I mean, you ask a question or two, I guess, because it could establish relationship between Epstein and Trump. But they go on for pages and pages where Maxwell says, yes, I put it together.

SMERCONISH: Oh, no, no, no.

HONIG: No, I don't remember ever --

SMERCONISH: No, Elie --

HONIG: -- asking Trump for a letter.

SMERCONISH: -- Elie, Elie, pardon my interruption, come on, he was on a mission.

HONIG: Go.

SMERCONISH: That was probably -- when Todd Blanche called President Trump --

HONIG: That's what I'm saying.

SMERCONISH: -- at the -- OK, good. Then you fill in the blank because you know where I'm going.

HONIG: Yes, right. What he is trying to do there is lay a foundation and establish some evidence on which Donald Trump could say, you see, Todd Blanche went in and talked to the person, Ghislaine Maxwell, who put this birthday book together. She says she was the coordinator there and she cleared me, hence, I did not write the letter, hence my lawsuit against Rupert Murdoch has some merit. So Todd Blanche is in there almost as Donald Trump's private civil lawyer in that context.

SMERCONISH: You know, there was a phone call made from Florida to the White House at the end of day one of testimony where, you know, the president says, OK, what did you learn? And at the top of the list is Blanche says, well, I got her on the record, on the birthday book at least.

Hey, one other thing I want to ask you about, I thought this was significant, I never knew how this all came to pass, but very early on in the first few pages, you learn Maxwell was the one who extended the overture, right? If we believe her testimony, she is the one who solicited this sit down.

HONIG: Yes. She actually says right off the bat. I found this actually sort of interesting and new, that she had never been spoken to in any of the prior Epstein investigations, either the one in Florida or the later one in New York. And she actually complains about that. She says, sort of, I was hoping to come forward, I was hoping to tell my story.

But the problem is she wouldn't have had anything for prosecutors if this was her approach. I mean, her testimony's utterly useless. And if I was a prosecutor and got a look at this transcript or had some sense, this is what she'd say. I'd say, don't even waste the time. She's lying, it seems.

[09:25:09]

She gives a completely non credible account of the world and she doesn't help us implicate anyone else. So I'm not willing to buy into this wild fantasy world that Ghislaine Maxwell says. But yes, look, she really does feel genuinely aggrieved. It's astonishing, Michael, when you read the transcript, this is a person who committed and has been convicted of horrific crimes and she believes she is just purely a victim. She feels horribly sorry for herself.

She is disdainful towards the victims. It's really a remarkable sort of character study in that sense.

SMERCONISH: Gave everybody a clean bill of health, which makes it completely incredible. Elie, thank you as always.

HONIG: Yes.

SMERCONISH: And let me remind everybody else to go to smerconish.com, vote on today's poll question, do you believe Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide?

Social media reaction from the world of X, what do we have? No, not even for one minute did I believe that Epstein committed suicide. He was murdered so that he could not reveal names.

Hey, by the way, I haven't told you my vote on this issue. I believe that, what is it, Occam's razor? The obvious answer is the correct answer. I believe he did take his own life. And by the way, I think that's damn sad, but I don't buy into any of the conspiracy that surrounds it.

I think that human factors explain why the guard wasn't there. There's a missing minute or second at the top of every hour, whatever it is. No, I think it's as tragic as it appears. But please make sure that you're going and voting.

Still to come, new research shows that Americans are drinking less. In fact, drinking among Republicans, listen to this, has declined nearly 20 points in the last two years. And many say it's because of a new health awareness. I have a totally different take. And in the national conversation about immigration, one question always seems to come up, would Americans do those jobs if they had to?

Well, the U.S. government tried to replace migrant farm workers with high school jocks back in the 60s, and one of those men joins me after the break on what it was like and if he thinks Americans would do that kind of backbreaking work today. Make sure you're signing up for the smerconish.com newsletter when you're voting on the poll question. You'll get the work of illustrator Steve Breen.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:31:47]

SMERCONISH: According to Pew, unauthorized immigrants in America reached an all-time high of 14 million in 2023. With so many one question regularly comes up, if they didn't do those jobs, would Americans do them?

Well, back in 1965, the federal government decided to put that question to the test. The backdrop a sudden farm labor shortage. For decades, the U.S. had relied on Mexican migrant workers through the Bracero Program, which provided a legal supply of cheap labor. But that program was shut down in 1964 after years of criticism from civil rights leaders, including Cesar Chavez, who pointed to systemic abuse, stolen wages, inhumane working conditions.

So, the federal government tried something new. They called on American teens, specifically high school athletes, to fill the gap. It was dubbed the A-Team, Athletes in Temporary Employment as Agricultural Manpower. They promised good pay, decent food and housing.

The reality was far rougher, relentless heat, brutal conditions, camps that barely met standards. Those are the real pictures you're looking at. Only about 3,000 teens actually showed up to work the fields. And most of them, they quickly quit.

The program was never repeated. But for one, a then 17-year-old in southern California, it was life changing. He lasted all six weeks and never forgot what he saw. He joins me now.

Randy Carter is a longtime TV and film director whose resume includes working for Francis Ford Coppola and the "Seinfeld" sitcom. He says summer days in the desert taught him a lot of lasting lessons, and he's here to discuss. Randy, thank you for being here. I know that you also sought to bring this to the screen with a theme of, are you going to stick it out or are you going to quit? And in your case, you stuck it out. How come?

RANDY CARTER, FORMER TEENAGE FARM WORKER: Well, it actually became sort of a badge of honor. What you have to remember is the growers hated this program. They wanted their Mexicans -- the Mexicans that sleep in their cars. They don't complain. You don't have to provide toilets or stuff. Now, suddenly you have middle class white teenagers doing the work.

So, the gag was get rid of the teenagers and you can apply for a waiver and you can get some Mexicans. And that's where the real villain of this piece, the labor contractor, was born. So, that's -- that's the overall background.

But our group, my little high school from university high in San Diego, we were determined that we weren't going to quit and we weren't going to be fired. We were going to fulfill the obligation.

SMERCONISH: And you didn't fit the prototype, right? You weren't a jock. You were more of a of a beach bum?

CARTER: Well, the thing the -- you raise an interesting point. If you go back and look at the research, Sandy Koufax, Rafer Johnson, Stan Musial all promoted this as a team thing. The athletes would have cohesion and stuff.

But our high school, there were some nerds. There was me. Maybe you're going to meet some girls, get enough money to buy a surfboard. It was a real polyglot of motives and kids that went.

SMERCONISH: OK. And by 10 a.m., what's the temp?

CARTER: OK.

[09:35:00]

All right. Here's how it goes. So, you get up in the dark. And in the desert, it's still kind of chilly, right? So, then you drive out in a stake bed truck, you're standing up.

By 8:00, it's 80 degrees. By 9:00, it's 90 degrees. By 10:00, it's 100 degrees. By 11:00, 110. By noon, it's close to 120, sometimes over 120 degrees on the field. That's the reality.

SMERCONISH: All right. I'm setting you up here, but at least you had gloves to pick the cantaloupes.

CARTER: Well, there's the interesting thing. A cantaloupe, most people don't know it when they buy them in the store, but in their natural state, they're covered with little, tiny, prickly hairs that are very abrasive. It's like picking up pieces of sandpaper.

And so, we thought, well, we'll wear gloves. Well, a pair of cotton gloves lasted about two hours. Leather gloves, like a forklift operator would wear, lasted two days. And let me say, the Mexicans do not wear gloves.

SMERCONISH: So, I read about you in the "L.A. Times." A really, really great --

CARTER: Yes.

SMERCONISH: -- lengthy discussion of what transpired here. And the reason I was so eager to invite you on CNN is because, like, this is the answer to the question, would Americans do those jobs?

Now, you did that job for six weeks. I give you credit for it. But what do you think about the contemporary debate as to, well, if we simply paid people more, they'd go into the fields?

CARTER: Well, the one predicate you mentioned that is kind of rarely noted is, yes, these jobs can be done, but do you think -- you mentioned the secretary of agriculture, your last guest. There's the secretary of labor.

Do you think their mouths would ever form the sentence adequate wages and safe working conditions? So yes, I can cross Sunset Boulevard at rush hour, but if the traffic doesn't stop, I'm going to get killed.

So, unless these jobs pay adequately and there's protection for the workers, how about unionizing them? Then the union provides the workers. So, those part of the equations are never mentioned. And so, that's why I wrote my script "Boy Wonders" about this thing. I've noticed that it's almost a timeless piece because no one is interested in actually solving the problem.

SMERCONISH: Quick final question. Are you tight --

CARTER: Yes.

SMERCONISH: -- with any of those with whom you worked those many summers ago?

CARTER: That's a great question. We'd have some reunions, and mind you, all of us are in our 70s, so it's a diminishing pool. But those of us that went on this program, we have such a great understanding of Mexican labor, what it really takes to do these jobs.

So, when we hear, oh, they're rapists and criminals, we kind of go, I don't think so. I know we did it for six weeks. They do it for a lifetime.

SMERCONISH: I want to see the movie or the sitcom. And thank you so much for --

CARTER: Let me leave you --

SMERCONISH: Thank you so much for --

CARTER: -- leave you with this. Just to leave -- I'll leave you this. Sometimes on these newspapers, there are comments. The number one comment is everybody wants to see Stephen Miller in my movie, working on his hands and knees, picking cantaloupe. I just want to leave you with that.

SMERCONISH: Thank you, Randy. That's funny. All right. Here's some social media reaction. Yes, they did it, right? They recruited a bunch of jocks, and they got Randy.

Yes, Americans will do anything for the right price. By the way, so would non-Americans.

I got to tell -- Anthony, I'm not so sure. I'm not so sure.

He did it, for six weeks. But I think they started with 18,000, and then only 3,000 showed up, and everybody wanted to get out or dodge as soon as they began the work, no matter what, they were being paid. And Randy was being paid minimum wage. I should have said that as well.

Still to come, a new survey shows that over the past 20 years, Americans are partying and socializing less. Among young Americans aged 15 to 24, partying down a staggering 70 percent. Why have we all of a sudden stopped hanging out? And why does it matter?

Make sure you're voting on today's poll question at Smerconish.com. I know it's a little grisly, but it's in the news and let's have at it.

Do you think Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide? I do. I'm a yes vote. I'll probably be in the minority on that again.

While you're there, sign up for my newsletter. It's free. It's worthy. And you get the award-winning work of Rob Rogers.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:43:53]

SMERCONISH: The latest Gallup poll shows something interesting. Only 54 percent of American adults drink alcohol, 54 percent. That's the lowest number since they started asking this question back in 1939.

And at first blush, it sounds, you know, like a good thing. Less liver disease, less car crashes, less bar fights. That's all true. But I think it's part of a problem, less mingling. Because when people get together, they drink. Not always, but often enough that the Gallup numbers suggest people aren't going out anymore, but are staying at home by themselves, isolated.

Other data bear this out. In recent decades, the numbers show that there's been a drop in socializing and a rise in anxiety, which is why today's guest, Ellen Cushing, wrote a piece in "The Atlantic" entitled "Americans Need To Party More." As she notes years ago, it was commonplace to go out on a regular basis to a club, to church, to somebody's home where you'd see your friends. But between 2003 and 2024, there's been a 50 percent drop in time spent by Americans either attending or hosting a social event.

[09:45:00]

Shockingly, about one in eight Americans say they have no friends. And those that do rarely see them in person anyway.

Joining me now, the author of that piece, Ellen Cushing. Ellen, thanks so much for being here. So, in the late 70s, 70 percent of Americans drank. Now, it's 54 percent.

Here's a stunner. In the last two years, Republicans, their drinking has declined 19 percent. And when I discussed this on radio, people were saying, well, we're all more health conscious this day. And I said, no way. And I referred to your piece. Tell me about your experience growing up.

ELLEN CUSHING, STAFF WRITER AT THE ATLANTIC, "AMERICANS NEED TO PARTY MORE": When I grew up, I was -- you know, I grew up in the 1990s. And my parents were going to parties all the time. This is at least my memory, is that often on a Friday night, we would get a babysitter and they would go out to someone's birthday party or a, you know, a work party or something. And, you know, the statistics show that Americans just are not going to social gatherings in the same way that they used to. It's kind of stunning.

SMERCONISH: And it's not just COVID, by the way, because that stat that I quoted that you brought to my attention talks about a 20-year time period. My experience was the same. You know, parents going to cocktail parties, my dad hosting a poker club, my mother going to bridge, and so forth. I mean, this is all in Robert Putnam's "Bowling Alone" wheelhouse but we're just not getting out.

And I thought something that you highlighted, Party City. Like, I know nothing about how they ran their business, but the fact that they closed is telling.

CUSHING: It's so sad, isn't it? Like, it just is such a perfect metaphor. Like party -- the party's over. It made me really, really sad. And I also don't know anything about how they ran their business.

But there are a lot of -- a lot of data that point to the fact that, like in general, people are just not hosting or attending parties in the same way that they used to. And you're right --

SMERCONISH: OK. You have a prescription --

CUSHING: -- that this is not a COVID thing. Everyone needs to host more parties.

SMERCONISH: You have a prescription. What's the prescription?

CUSHING: The host is -- sorry. The prescription is everyone needs to host more parties. In my piece, I say, you know, this is a little bit of a joke, but kind of not. It's pretty serious. Everyone -- everyone, if you're watching this, I'm begging of you, host two parties a year.

It doesn't -- they don't need to be big. They don't need to be expensive. They don't need to be fancy. They don't need to be even inside your house. You can have 15 people for a picnic in the park.

But, you know, I think that we sort of expect parties to come to us, kind of like fire trucks. And that's not really how it works. You need to build the social world that you want to live in, and the solution to that is to just have parties.

SMERCONISH: When I saw the Gallup data about drinking being on the decline, like I get it, I do a dry January and I know that the alcoholic alternatives are great, as good as they've ever been for both booze and for beer. And I'm sure that accounts for part of it.

And I know cost is a factor. If you'd go to some place, they want $20.00 for a, you know, a Manhattan. I'm sure that's a part of it. And I'm sure more health conscious.

But in the end, I just think it's isolation. I think it's all of these social factors. And if we're not with one another, then we're not imbibing.

CUSHING: Yes, I think that -- I would think of it as like the data that we're getting about people drinking less points to something bigger. I don't think people are going to parties and simply not drinking. I think they're not really leaving their houses.

SMERCONISH: I think sadly, you are right, and I hope that everyone takes Ellen Cushing's advice and throws a party and goes to one when you are invited. Ellen, thank you so much for being here. I loved your piece in "The Atlantic."

Checking in now on social media reaction. This comes from the world of, what, X.

Dude -- dude, this comes down to the same thing as the declining birth rates. If people aren't partying as much as they used to, it's because they don't have the time or money to screw around.

We'll actually, Guttchek, we're having less kids too. Maybe, maybe, maybe you're onto something here. Maybe it's the combination of the lack of screwing around, which is induced by the booze. I don't know. We're having fewer kids.

And by the way, if you want me to be serious and carry this out when we have fewer kids, the family network is smaller. And guess what else you have fewer of? Cousins, another way that we socialize more growing up. All of these things are related.

And the solution? I can tie it back to my opening commentary today relative to self-sorting is got to get out. We've got to get out and have common experience.

You still have time to vote today's poll question at Smerconish.com where I am asking this grisly question, do you think Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide?

While you're there, subscribe to the newsletter. You'll get the editorial cartoons from the likes of Jack Ohman.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:54:14]

SMERCONISH: OK. There's the vote so far on our grisly -- oh, come on. You know, I'm always suspicious when you round off, 35,889. Pretty healthy vote. Do you believe that Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide? Seventy percent saying, no, they do not.

I am in the yes. I'm in the Occam's razor. Did I say that correctly? Category of -- yes, I think it's as straightforward as, I don't buy into any of the conspiracies. I usually don't buy into any conspiracies.

Here's some social media reaction. What do we have? From the world of X. Follow me on X.

Occam's razor would suggest he was killed, oh, whoa, a man who knew, I guess that should be, lots of devastating secrets about many other rich and powerful men in a cell with an obstructed view, dies and there's a gap in video coverage.

[09:55:00]

And you think he offed himself? I do. I mean, I can -- I can parse every line of what you just had to say there.

There's a gap in the video coverage, that's explained at the top of the hour. Not just that hour, every hour, there was some glitch in the way in which it was recorded. And the fact that, you know, he knew a lot of powerful people -- OK, that's interesting, but give me some data, give me some evidence.

By the way, I also believe that Oswald killed Kennedy and acted alone. And yes, I buy into Arlen Specter's single bullet conclusion.

Here's another social media reaction. What do we have?

I remember a time when going to a nightclub to dance or having a massive house party was a thing for young people. Right, a kegger, a kegger. Enter smartphones and parties are now with people with their heads down, as you say, Michael, not mingling.

It is so true. I mean, back in the day, in high school, it was a function of, where are we going? Not whether we're going out. And this is -- as soon as I saw that drinking headline -- and, oh, I got to tell you one more thing. I'll say it quickly. Don't worry.

It's like the sex headline. You see the headline that says that fewer teens are having sex. And as a parent you say, well, boy, that's good news. And similarly, fewer Americans are drinking. Well, that's good news.

No, they're -- they're actually bad news because it's also representative of a decline in relationships. And that's the biggest problem this country faces.

I'm off next week. Enjoy your Labor Day weekend. If you missed any of today's program, you can always listen anywhere you get your podcasts. Thank you so much for watching.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)