It's a Numbers Game: The Numbers Behind America’s Population Shift, Immigration Drop & 2030 Election Shake-Up
3/30/202637 mincomplete
0:00This is an iHeart Podcast.
0:02Guaranteed human. Welcome back to A Numbers Game with Ryan Gruduski.
0:08Thank you guys for being here.
0:10I have a packed show for you.
0:13And I mean packed, I mean packed.
0:14I have to tell you, whenever Trump does something to irritate me and annoys me,
0:19and I think this happens with everybody with Trump, you just, you're like, okay, I'm
0:23done. I've had enough. I'm tapped out.
0:25I can't do this anymore.
0:27And then he does something that is, you know, a win that is existential for
0:33conservatives where I'm like, all right, he won me back.
0:36That happened over the week.
0:39And for those faithful listeners, you've heard me say time and time again that mass
0:44immigration, both legal and illegal, are allowing Democrat -run states to escape the political ramifications
0:52for their bad policy. What does that mean?
0:54It means that, you know, every year, thousands and tens of thousands, if not more,
1:00Americans are leaving New York, New Jersey, California, Illinois.
1:04They're done. They're tired of bad liberal policies.
1:07But what happens is, is that those same states are accepting hundreds of thousands of
1:12immigrants, both legal and illegal, into the country.
1:15And so when we have our census every 10 years, those states don't lose as
1:20much electoral power as they should because they're using immigrants kind of to pad their
1:26losses. So, you know, AOC has a seat today or Maxine Waters has a seat
1:32today in part because they have enough immigrants moving to those districts and moving to
1:38those states where otherwise they wouldn't have had those seats and allows Democrats' failed policies
1:47in the states to be maximalized to the entire country because Washington doesn't feel the
1:53ramifications, which they should because of bad state policies.
1:56OK, according to new census data, because of the drastic cuts to immigration, both legal
2:03and illegal, because of the Trump administration, especially on the illegal side, there's been a
2:07little bit of cuts on legal immigration through regulatory reform.
2:11There's been obviously nothing through the Congress.
2:14There has been a massive reduction in immigration through every metropolitan area in this country.
2:22According to the census, every single metro area saw a decline in immigration numbers almost
2:28all by over 50 percent.
2:31In El Paso, there was a 95 percent reduction.
2:34That's all illegal immigration, by the way.
2:36In Los Angeles, 67 percent reduction.
2:39Denver, 72 percent reduction. New York City, 65 percent reduction.
2:45Chicago, 62 percent reduction. Seattle, 31 percent reduction.
2:50And this reduction of immigration levels create the blueprints for the 2030 census redistricting, which
2:57will only be happening in half a decade.
2:59It's not that far away, really.
3:02I mean, it's as far as 2020 was.
3:04And that feels like it was 35 seconds ago.
3:06So how many blue seats are they going to lose in the House?
3:10How many electoral college votes are they going to lose?
3:14Likely a lot more than they thought they were going to lose just a year
3:18ago. And I want to put this calculation, you know, into people's heads.
3:25In 2020, in 2024, Kamala Harris had to win every blue wall state to be
3:34president, right? Joe Biden had to win every blue wall state to be president.
3:38The rate that it is going right now, even if a Democrat were to win
3:45Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, they could not win the presidency.
3:50Let me repeat that. The blue wall becomes irrelevant the way that the demographics are
3:57shaking out. And finally, this number, this census number that just came out, this is
4:02the 2024 to 2025 census.
4:05This is a census where Biden is still the president for six months of the
4:10year. The 2025 to 2026 census, which will be coming out next year, is going
4:16to be a bloodbath. Like, if this is the first six months before Trump put
4:20in travel bans on dozens of countries, before he increased the H -1B rate to
4:29$100 ,000 for new H -1B employees, before really ramping up mass deportations, it's going
4:36to be a bloodbath for Democrats next year.
4:40However, 2024 to 2025 was the slowest rate of growth for immigration in this country
4:47since the COVID pandemic, with 40 % of U .S.
4:52counties losing population, even though the overall population grew by 1 .8 million people, which
4:58is still a lot for a one -year calendar year if you think about it.
5:02That's bigger than a lot of smaller states in the country.
5:04Net migration to the U .S.
5:06from overseas fell by more than a million people.
5:09And the places that were affected the most are big cities, especially big blue cities.
5:16Net international migration fell by more than 50 % in places that had more.
5:21than a million people living them.
5:23People do not want to live in big cities the way that they used to.
5:27They prefer exurbs or in suburbs.
5:29With the internet the way it is now, you don't need to live in New
5:33York to get a good job.
5:35It helps to have access to potential clients or to jobs, but you don't have
5:41to work there anymore. People have satellite offices everywhere and a lot of people don't
5:47work in an office at all.
5:48They work from home. They work from their computer.
5:49They travel a lot more.
5:52Here is the list of places that experience the highest number of people with population
5:58change. This is like negative population change.
6:01This is births plus inward migration, both foreign and domestic, minus deaths from outward migration,
6:09people who left the state and people who died, minus people who were born and
6:13people who moved to the state.
6:14Okay, the number one place to lose people, Los Angeles.
6:18They lost 53 ,934 people.
6:24Folks, L .A. lost a congressional district in a single year.
6:2753 ,900 people, they lost an entire congressional district in one year.
6:34Experts are saying that California's going to lose four seats by 2030.
6:37No, they're going to lose six.
6:39Unless a Democrat wins in 2028 and in 2029 they kick the doors open, which
6:45is totally possible. But going the way things are going, California's going to lose six
6:51congressional seats next year, in 2030 is what I predict.
6:54Next up, Penalas, Florida. That is St.
6:57Petersburg. They lost 11 ,800 people.
7:00That's a little surprising. I didn't expect the number to be that high.
7:03I've been to St. Petersburg.
7:04It's a nice enough place.
7:05They've got a great Dolly Museum nearby.
7:07Third to go, Miami -Dade, Florida.
7:1010 ,100 people. This does not surprise me.
7:14I have siblings who live in Miami -Dade.
7:16I've been there many, many times.
7:19They experienced a crazy influx during COVID.
7:22I think it was a little unsustainable.
7:25And Miami's just not for everybody.
7:27And still, Miami still has 30 ,000 more people who have moved there since before
7:32COVID. So it's not like they experienced, you know, they're negative since COVID.
7:35It's just that people have changed their minds about living in a big city in
7:38South Florida. Next up is my home borough of Queens.
7:41Queens, New York, Trump's home borough as well.
7:43Lost 8 ,800 people in a single year.
7:47This is before Mondani became mayor.
7:49This is before all the craziness.
7:51The calendar year goes from September to September.
7:54So it's not, this is before the election.
7:57It's going to get worse.
7:58Then Orange County, California, 8 ,500 people.
8:01I'm going to run down a list very quickly.
8:02San Diego, 5 ,300. Shelby, Tennessee, this is where Memphis is located, the most Democratic
8:07part of Tennessee, 5 ,200.
8:09The Bronx, 4 ,700. Dallas, 2 ,600.
8:13Ventura County, 2 ,600. That's the top.
8:17Those are the big counties that lost the big population.
8:19Other counties lost the population, obviously, but those are the big ones.
8:22Where did population grow? Number one, Harris County.
8:27This is the home of Houston, 49 ,000.
8:29Collin County, which is a suburb of Dallas, 43 ,000.
8:33Maricopa County, Arizona, home of Phoenix, 35 ,000.
8:37Montgomery, Texas, 30 ,000. Wake County, North Carolina, 28 ,000.
8:42King County, Washington, which I was actually surprised.
8:45So this is while Washington still has a no income tax, something that they've changed
8:49this year, 27 ,000. Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, this is the home to Charlotte, 26
8:55,500. Fort Bend, Texas, 24 ,000.
8:59Williamson, Texas, 24 ,000. Penal, Arizona, 23 ,600.
9:04Notice a trend there, by the way.
9:06Florida's not on the list.
9:08I believe that Florida is hitting this kind of reduction in influx in population.
9:17One, because so many people move there that it jacked up home prices.
9:22And secondly, I think part of it, from what I've known from people who live
9:26in Florida, is the insurance rates are just so high.
9:30They are steering people away.
9:33And also, Florida has worked harder than any other state, and this is the credit
9:37to Ron DeSantis, to deport illegal immigrants.
9:40So I think you're seeing a lot of illegal immigrants leave the state, and you're
9:44seeing people not move there as high numbers.
9:46I think in part because the insurance for hurricanes is astronomical right now in Florida.
9:52And home prices have surged.
9:54It's very expensive. Other parts of the panhandle in Mississippi, Alabama, and even part of
10:00Louisiana have seen population growth, I think, because people want to live near the Gulf
10:05of America. But that's much more affordable than it is in Florida right now because
10:10of the so many people move there.
10:11Only one county up here in Florida appeared in the top 10, which is Polk
10:15County. But anyway, a lot of growth from Texas, Arizona, and the Carolinas, all states
10:21that voted for Trump. As far as metropolitan areas go, only two states, blue states,
10:28experienced population growth in a metropolitan county.
10:31Washington, D .C., that whole area, which is northern Virginia, southern Maryland, that added 53
10:35,000 people, and Seattle added 43 ,000.
10:39Seattle is acting as a sponge for other progressives who can't afford California anymore and
10:46they want to live in a big blue area that moved to Seattle.
10:49But on the Republican side, all the rest are Republicans, right?
10:53And only one actually are in Florida.
10:55I'm not bashing on Florida, by the way.
10:57I just find it fascinating because Florida was the growth central of the entire country.
11:01But only one Florida metropolitan area saw extensive population growth, and that was Orlando.
11:08Texas made up four of the top 10, with North Carolina, South Carolina, Arizona, Georgia,
11:13and Florida making up the rest.
11:14Since 2020, and this is with Biden's insane level of immigration, when he kicked open
11:22the floodgates, Los Angeles saw a decline in population of over 300 ,000 people.
11:30Chicago has lost 85 ,000.
11:33Every borough but Staten Island in New York City has lost people.
11:38Staten Island gained 5 ,000, while Queens, Brooklyn, Manhattan, and the Bronx lost 226 ,000
11:44people. That means all of these big blue cities are losing a congressional representative, a
11:51vote in the Electoral College.
11:52Do you understand what is happening?
11:54It's a total reversal of the Biden years, of the Obama years, even of the
12:00Bush years, and I would even say of Trump first term.
12:04Letting blue cities off the hook for bad policies that drive Americans away.
12:11They don't deserve the political capital in Washington that they have gotten over the last
12:17few years. They don't deserve to have all these congressmen.
12:20While red states with red counties have, you know, real Americans living in them, they're
12:25not just immigrants living in them.
12:27They have Americans living in them who don't receive the representation that they deserve.
12:32Mass migration allows them to not be held accountable.
12:36It has been stopping and has been slowing down, and that is a good thing.
12:39They're going to lose, I would say right now, Democrats are probably going to lose
12:4312 seats in the 2030 census right now.
12:47But I had to guess about 12 seats.
12:50And Republicans are going to gain in places like North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona, Texas, and
12:54Florida. If they can keep those states red, they will control the presidency for the
13:00next decade. Who knows? They may be able to control the House of Representatives for
13:05the next decade, too. We don't know what will happen with all the redistricting.
13:08But the presidency certainly looks very favorable for Republicans because they don't need these swing
13:14states anymore in the sense of the heavily unionized, traditionally Democratic Rust Belt states.
13:22They just don't. They've made themselves irrelevant.
13:24It's not just because of good weather, too.
13:26It's because of favorable taxes.
13:27People like AOC, Maxine Waters, Mike Quigley, they're going to find themselves without a job.
13:34They're going to find me.
13:35Maybe they can primarily know they're Democrat, but it's going to be a smaller and
13:39smaller pool. Out of the congressional districts that, you know, are most likely to go,
13:46they're going to go, not only in some rural areas in those days, but definitely
13:50in the cities. And it is their own policies that destroyed them because people are
13:56abandoning them. They're dying from it with a whimper and not a bang.
14:00Okay. It's fascinating. We have a couple more years of this, of breaking down data.
14:06But if this is a sign of what's to come from the first seven months
14:10of the Trump presidency, next year's is going to be, Democrats are going to be
14:15shaking. And that is also why, by the way, you're seeing Democrats change position on
14:19housing, which is like a yes and no thing.
14:22Yes, housing in blue states are too expensive.
14:24Yes, that does drive people away.
14:26But no, that's not the only thing that will drive people away.
14:27Your crime policies are completely inadequate.
14:30Your taxes are insane. Your business tax is nuts.
14:35There's a lot of things driving you away.
14:36It's not just housing. I'm just letting Democrats know it's not just a housing thing.
14:40But they are changing their position on it because they realize how many people they're
14:45losing. Okay. Next, I have more interesting data for you guys on international news and
14:49religion. That's coming up next.
14:55So there was a story in the New York Times late last week about the
14:58number of Catholic churches in the U .S.
15:01experience a surge of conversions, people coming to the Catholic church.
15:05It's something I've explored a lot on this podcast.
15:07You guys know I'm Catholic, born and raised.
15:09And I find it very interesting because a lot of people embellish numbers on religion.
15:15And I try to find some really good, interesting, hard data to kind of back
15:19up where we are as a country.
15:21Because we're probably, we are likely the most religious country in the Western Hemisphere, especially
15:25of the developed countries. The Times reached out to 12 % of dioceses in America.
15:31That's a large sample size.
15:32And they all reported a surge of membership.
15:35This is according to the Times.
15:36People are joining the Roman Catholic Church in surprising numbers.
15:40This Easter, the Archdiocese of Detroit will receive 1 ,428 new Catholics into the church.
15:46It's the highest number in 21 years.
15:48The Archdiocese of Galveston, Houston will be at its most in 15 years.
15:52The Archdiocese of Des Moines is up 51 % from last year, from 265 to
15:57400. The first year after the election of Pope Leo, the first pontiff from the
16:02United States, many Catholic churches across America are welcoming their highest number of new Catholics
16:08in recent years. The newcomers are set to officially be received into the church on
16:11Easter Vigil Mass the night before Easter on April 5th.
16:15Of course, we think the...
16:16Holy Spirit, sorry, of course we think the Holy Spirit is, Cardinal Robert McCloy of
16:22Washington said, we are all kind of stymied.
16:25His own archdiocese is said to receive 1 ,755 people entering the church this Easter
16:31up from 1 ,500 the year prior, which was already the highest number in 15
16:36years. This data comes amid, this is by the way, this is not the Times,
16:39this is just me talking.
16:40This article comes amid new data from Ryan Burge.
16:43I've had him on this podcast.
16:45He explores data behind religion.
16:47I like Ryan, not only because his name is excellent, but I like Ryan because
16:51he's a straight shooter. He doesn't BS you.
16:54He doesn't tell you what he wants to happen.
16:55He tells you as it's happening.
16:57And he says, according to the Cooperative Election Study, this is an incredible study that
17:01Harvard puts out every year, huge sample sizes, something I'm going to explore in our
17:05next episode, what their 2025 data really looks like.
17:08The share of non -religious people in this country has dropped for the third consecutive
17:13year. 31 % of Americans as of 2025 report to be non -religious, 5 %
17:19being atheists, 5 % being agnostic, 21 % being nothing in particular, meaning they haven't
17:25really thought about it, but they don't have like a stake in being anti -religious
17:29like maybe like atheists do.
17:31That's down 5 % from an all -time high of 36 % in 2023.
17:36I think conversations about religious revivals can be overstated.
17:45People who really want there to be a religious revival will talk about it a
17:48lot. The data doesn't show that as much as it shows really a stop in
17:56the number of people being non -religious.
17:58The non -religious numbers have come to a halt.
18:01The slow washing away of Christianity in America really has rescinded since COVID.
18:08It's something that we are not seeing a huge uptick the way we used to
18:12see in the number of people stating that they're non -religious.
18:15The Cooperative Study, back to that study, also says that the number of people identifying
18:19as Catholic, kind of identifying with the Times piece, has actually increased over the last
18:24few years. It's up to 16 % of young people being, identifying as Catholic, up
18:28from 14 % back in 2021.
18:31So it's very interesting. And maybe the big hope that a lot of socially progressive
18:41people had that we're going to see this complete reversal of America's longstanding religiosity is
18:48a bet that they shouldn't have made.
18:51I mean, who knows what this means for social policy?
18:54Who knows what this means for family formation?
18:56I do know this. Religious people marry more frequently, they have children more frequently, and
19:01they are more engaged in civic society.
19:03Something interesting that the Times said, which goes back to the COVID information, is because
19:08as the world became more on the internet, percentages of the population, even if it's
19:14a minority, wanted human interaction.
19:17And religion and church attendance especially is human interaction.
19:21I mean, I guess you can watch it on television.
19:23It is not the same as going to a church.
19:26So I find that very, very interesting.
19:27And other countries have also experienced this spike, especially in France, has been a notable
19:32spike in number of conversions.
19:34Speaking of Europe, and this is my segue to the last topic I'm going to
19:38talk about on this podcast, there's been a lot of interesting breaking election stuff coming
19:42out of Europe. And I don't really touch on European politics a lot outside of
19:46England, just because it's not for everybody, I get that.
19:49But I think enough has happened to give a quick rundown to my audience.
19:53The first being that there was an election in Denmark.
19:57Now, I know, aside from Bernie Sanders praising Denmark, most of you guys are like,
20:00I don't even think about Denmark.
20:01They gave us Ozempic and Legos and, you know, nothing else.
20:06Fair. But it's important because when it comes to the American foreign policy, you know,
20:11a lot of social Democrats in Europe really stake out the hatred for Trump among
20:18Europeans as the answer to faltering political support, right?
20:25European center left has really saw a massive decline over the last couple of years
20:30in almost every part of Europe.
20:32People in Europe do not like Americans particularly well, even though, I mean, they should.
20:36I mean, we're great. But that's just a joke for my European audience.
20:39It's not a very big audience, but they're there.
20:41I acknowledge you and I love you for listening.
20:44But they really hate Trump.
20:47Europeans really, really hate Trump.
20:49And when Trump was talking about annexing Greenland, it was this massive backlash in Denmark.
20:54Well, the Danish prime minister who's been kind of faltering in the polls was like,
21:00oh, this is perfect. There's a rally around the flag effect happening in my country.
21:05Her poll numbers went up.
21:06The center rights poll numbers went up and the center moderate, moderate poll up.
21:10That's called the moderate party.
21:11It's the centrist party. Their poll numbers went up.
21:13They said, this is perfect.
21:14We'll hold an election. I'll increase my numbers in parliament and it'll be easier for
21:20me to govern. So what happened?
21:22The very opposite happened of what she predicted.
21:25The governing social Democrats, which is a left -wing party, if you couldn't tell, had
21:30their worst performance in a century.
21:32They lost 12 seats. The center -right party was called vestry.
21:36They lost five seats, which was their worst number of all time.
21:40And the moderate party lost two seats.
21:42Everyone making a bet. that this election would be a referendum on Trump lost.
21:47The biggest winner with the Danish People's Party is a nationalist party.
21:50They campaigned specifically on re -mitigating people who had immigrated to Denmark and became Danish
21:57citizens who are not Western.
21:59They ran on, we're going to offer them an incentive or demand it that they
22:04move back to Syria or Morocco or Afghanistan or wherever they came from.
22:08They won 11 seats. The Green Left, which is a very progressive party, which doesn't
22:12like how the Social Democrats were actually pretty conservative when it came to immigration for
22:18a left -wing party. They won five seats.
22:20And this new party, which is a hard nationalist party called the Citizens Party, they
22:24won four seats. Those were the big winners.
22:26The prime minister has to resign.
22:28It's kind of a traditional thing.
22:29It's not, you know, don't read too heavily into that, but she has to resign
22:32and then try to form a new governing coalition.
22:34But that would be much more difficult than in the past given how many parties
22:39have seats in parliament and how neither the center -left nor the center -right have
22:45enough seats for a coalition, for a majority.
22:48They have to work with the moderates.
22:49They have to get other minority parties together.
22:52People don't like people. It's very tense.
22:54But that's what's happening over in Denmark.
22:56Another prime minister who had a substantial election loss was my girl, Giorgio Maloney, over
23:02in Italy. There was a national referendum on the judiciary in Italy and it lost
23:08by seven points nationally. The referendum would have separated career paths between judges and public
23:13prosecutors and it would have split the high council for judiciary into two distinct bodies.
23:18I know that doesn't mean a lot to you guys.
23:20Look, this is the simplest way I can explain it.
23:23The Italian constitution is a complete disaster.
23:26It's written after World War II and it's to stymie the potential of another leader
23:31kind of gaining too much power.
23:33And in fact, the bureaucrats in Italy can depose a democratically elected prime minister if
23:39they feel that they're working out of interest of Italy.
23:42Well, what does that mean?
23:43I mean, that could mean whatever they want it to mean.
23:45They have more power than the actual democratic elected prime minister does when it comes
23:51to trying to see their goals met.
23:54It's why Giorgio Maloney can't do a lot of things that I think she wants
23:57to do, a lot of things that the people want her to do.
24:00And the judiciary also steps in the way quite a number of times.
24:05And she's really trying hard with these referendums to change the Italian constitution to make
24:10it possible to see reforms happen.
24:12But like the Italian people, I mean, totally screw this election up.
24:17They lost by seven points.
24:18It was not a big victory.
24:19And you know, I talked to one of my friends from Malta the other day
24:22about the pervasiveness of institutional socialism in European politics, especially Southern European politics.
24:31And he said the most fascinating thing that I had never thought of before.
24:35He said, after World War II, you had two choices.
24:38You were either a fascist or you were a socialist.
24:41And there was nothing in between, really, in most of these places.
24:45And international organizations, especially in America, really invested in socialists as a precaution to having
24:54another rise of fascism. We didn't want a third world war right after the second
24:58one. And it is why so much of Europe, from the European Parliament to, that
25:08was right after the 40s, but the European Parliament, to a lot of these national
25:12constitutions, to the European Human Rights Council, it's all, you know, in reaction to World
25:19War II. And it's totally incapable of making sure these countries can govern now.
25:25But it's fascinating to think of why we invested so heavily in socialism right after
25:29World War II. Anyway, it wasn't all a loss for the nationalist right across Europe.
25:36France and Marine Le Pen's party had a series of victories.
25:39They won 3 ,000 council seats throughout their entire country's municipal election.
25:44That's a fourfold increase. They also had a big victory for the mayor of Nice,
25:49which is the fifth largest city in that country.
25:52They had never governed a city or have a mayorship of a city that large.
25:55They did experience some losses in some larger cities, like in Marseille and in Toulon.
26:00But nonetheless, they did make that gain in Nice.
26:03That's nothing small. They gained a lot of other mid -sized cities.
26:05That's not that small. And in the next presidential election, when that happens in 2027,
26:11they are still firmly in first place and there's really no second close.
26:16It's a competition for second place.
26:17They don't know who's gonna come there, but they have 36 % of the vote
26:21for the first round. Remember in France, there's two rounds of the presidential elections.
26:25You have to get 50%.
26:26So the first round, they're already at 36%.
26:28They've never been that high that early on before.
26:31And in fact, it was two presidential election cycles ago where they ended the second
26:35round only at 33%. So they've really made gains.
26:38And the last thing I wanna address over in Europe was a vote in the
26:41European Parliament was pretty significant.
26:43The EU Parliament voted 389 to 206 to endorse tougher deportation methods.
26:50This makes it easier for countries in Europe to create offshore detention centers for people
26:55to be deported outside of the EU, for people who are considered criminals or just
27:01regularly illegal aliens to go to a country and not be in the EU where
27:06they have more EU rights and privileges.
27:08This is something that Georgia Maloney and other EU...
27:11of... of... nationalists have really fought for New York for many, many years now.
27:17It expands the number of countries acceptable to be outside of the EU that you
27:20could deport people to and allows for up to two years in detention, which is
27:25the highest that the EU has ever allowed.
27:27It is a big victory for EU nationalists.
27:30But more importantly, in the European Parliament, what has always been kind of the mover
27:37and shaker is that the center left and the center right and the centrist always
27:41work together to knock out the quote unquote far right and the quote unquote far
27:45left. Well, in this case, the center right worked with the nationalist right for the
27:50first time really ever to stand up to the left and the centrist who wanted
27:57kind of the business to continue as is and didn't really want to increase deportations.
28:02And it's the first time that that wall, that coalition wall has cracked in a
28:07serious way. I want to see what that means.
28:11One, for Germany, because Germany is the largest block of delegates in the European Union.
28:16They are the biggest powerhouse right now in the European Union.
28:20And what they say really does kind of matter in a big way.
28:25And they have elections coming up with local governments where the AFD, which is the
28:30Nationalist Party, and Uncle Merkel's old political party will maybe be able to work together
28:36for the first time. They may not be able to box out the nationalist right
28:39like they have done for the last 30 years.
28:42It could be a major development in Europe that we're seeing right now.
28:46Okay, Ask Me Anything is coming up next.
28:49Stay tuned. Welcome back to the Ask Me Anything segment.
28:55If you want to be part of the Ask Me Anything segment, email me, Ryan
28:57at numbersgamepodcast .com. That's Ryan at numbers for numbersgamepodcast .com.
29:02First email comes from Tommaso.
29:04He says, love your story about working at Victoria's Secret.
29:06I worked at the store downtown not far from Wall Street.
29:08It was my first job, and it teaches you skills in dealing and not dealing
29:12with people. That is for sure.
29:15He asked the question, it looks like Hilton is in the lead for the governor
29:19of California, but it's early, plus they steal votes in California.
29:22What are the odds, do you think, for most pollsters' minds?
29:27Well, I want to say, first, I'm not a pollster because I think that people
29:30do confuse it. Sometimes I just analyze polls and I pick up on trends, but
29:33I think that the odds of Hilton being in the runoff are extremely high.
29:39I would say probably 95 % chance he's going to be in the runoff, and
29:45he's going to make the top two in California.
29:48The bigger question is, can the other Republican, Bianco, Sheriff Bianco, also make the top
29:54two? That is a really hard question to ask, and it depends on two things.
29:59One, will the Democrats consolidate, which as of yet, they have not.
30:02And two, what does the overall electorate look like?
30:05If the electorate is 37, 38, or 39 % Republican, which is the number between
30:09the presidential election and their last two gubernatorial elections, then they have a good chance.
30:15I think Republicans need to get as close to 40 % of the overall electorate
30:20as possible. It's Republicans plus independents and Democrats who vote Republican.
30:24It's like a certain percentage of independents and it's a few Democrats.
30:27As of right now, I would say there's a 20 % chance that it's Republican
30:32versus Republican and they box up the Democrats, which would be good.
30:36I mean, because it would be, one, they'd have a Republican governor, even if it
30:39was only a year and a half before they did the whole trying to kick
30:43him out. But also because if it's two Republicans, a lot of low propensity Democrats
30:48who don't have a Democrat on the top of the ticket and the ballot probably
30:52will stay home. I mean, and it could actually help Republicans down ballots.
30:56So it's a big question.
30:57Will Porter or Steyer take out Slawwell or will Slawwell search?
31:01Slawwell is definitely the Democrat getting the most amount of attention right now, but Steyer
31:04has a lot of money.
31:05Porter has a lot of money.
31:07Slawwell is a very flawed candidate.
31:08A lot of other big Democrats are running.
31:10So we'll see. Next question comes from Mark.
31:13He writes, Ryan, love listening to your podcast and hearing about incisive insights.
31:17I am bombarded with news from the states such as Texas, Florida, and Tennessee, but
31:21becoming more conservative by the influx of refugees from failing blue states.
31:24I moved to Arizona in 2020 and live in a retirement community in North Tucson.
31:29Tucson's great, by the way.
31:30Food is excellent. A huge portion of new residents are moving here from California, as
31:34well as Colorado and Washington.
31:36I fear they are bringing the disease politics with them.
31:39In Arizona, the Republican Party seems to nominate candidates with no chance of winning.
31:44How do you assess the prospect of a Republican Party in Arizona in the near
31:48to midterm? Are we doomed to become California?
31:51So I've done some work in Arizona, a lot with my school board PAC, the
31:551776 Project PAC, and a little with Blake Masters.
31:58I helped a little bit on his congressional race, his second race, and there are
32:02a lot of problems in Arizona.
32:06First and foremost is there's a complete breakdown of trust between voters in the party.
32:12Voters and the party, rather.
32:14It's worse than I've ever seen anywhere else in the country.
32:18And part of that is because I think in Arizona, I mean, Arizona used to
32:24be a very, very rural state, right?
32:27Extremely rural. So you could really just campaign in country clubs and win for a
32:33very long time. And that kind of political method of country club Republicanism running the
32:38interworking. So the party still is very real in Arizona, maybe not as real as
32:44it was even a couple of years ago.
32:45But a lot of prominent politicians in the Arizona Republican Party, Doug Ducey, the McCains,
32:52you know, there's been a lot of them who really had a lot of support
32:56from within the country club apparatus.
32:59And that built a lot of resentment in the grassroots.
33:03And there's just that resentment has really reached a boiling part.
33:06And especially as the states ballooned in population, everyone's like, give me attention and give
33:11me equal voice. Also, 2022 election really broke a lot of people's brains.
33:15I think Carrie Lake did a giant disservice to the voters of Arizona, especially Republican
33:21voters, because she has real talent.
33:22Like, I'm never going to take away from her.
33:23She's a really talented auditor, but she squandered that by running a terrible campaign for
33:28governor and then lying to people saying that her election was stolen.
33:32It wasn't stolen. And I think that she's done a lot of things, allegedly, that
33:38have landed her in hot water with courts.
33:40And she put out a lot of fury among the base who believe that they
33:46cannot trust the system in Arizona.
33:48And they believe it's not.
33:49And Arizona, by the way, Arizona's election can be improved for sure.
33:52I'm not saying it's perfect.
33:53However, she has created an anger and a rage that they can't trust anybody.
33:59And there's a complete breakdown.
34:00There was a breakdown of trust beforehand.
34:02And she lit this entire thing on fire, making it all more worse.
34:06The good thing for Republicans, I will say, is that the voter registrations in the
34:11state have boomed in Republicans' favor.
34:14Republicans have a 330 ,000 registered voter advantage.
34:19That is double what they had in 2022.
34:22In 2022, they had 160 -something thousand.
34:26Had they had those 160 ,000 Republicans that they have now, they would have won
34:33every single statewide race in 2022.
34:36So that's the one thing, good thing going.
34:38I think in Maricopa County, some Democrats have surged recently.
34:41But overall, the balance has been significant in Republicans' favors, which is a good thing.
34:45Can they win the governor's election?
34:47Biggs, Andy Biggs, who's the Republican likely nominee, he's down single mid digits right now
34:52in the polls. But I have to stress there haven't been many polls taken this
34:56year. I think there's only been two since December.
34:58So we will see. Last question comes from John from Kentucky.
35:02John writes, I don't know where you got your information on the Strategic Petroleum Reserve,
35:08the SPR, but it was wrong.
35:11The EIA website, the best source of information, says that the SPR, when full, holds
35:16a little more than 700 million barrels of oil.
35:19The chart, he links, he sent me a chart with the EIA page, shows that
35:23the reserve is primarily filled under Bush and topped off at the beginning of Obama's
35:27administration. Biden depleted the reserve dramatically in 2022 to lower prices in advance of the
35:322022 midterms. Biden began refilling the reserves at a slower rate than he had depleted
35:38it, and Trump continues to refill it until recently, but at a rate even slower
35:41than Biden. Okay, this comes from a question that I received from a listener several
35:49weeks ago. And John from Kentucky, I have to apologize.
35:51I looked for where my source was because you asked me where my source was
35:56for my answer, and I couldn't even find the scripts.
35:58I saved all my scripts, so I don't know what happened to it.
36:01But I did research on what you said in this, and you are right.
36:05I was wrong. I gave people the wrong information.
36:07I said that our petroleum reserves were near historic highs as of 2023, and they
36:11were not. Our petroleum reserve is actually at the lowest it's been since 1984, which
36:18is kind of crazy. So I apologize for that, John, and you are absolutely correct.
36:23Our long -term average strategic petroleum reserve is usually 576 million barrels of oil, and
36:31right now we're at 415 million.
36:34So we're not only not near the highest amount, we're not even near our average
36:40of where we usually are by over 150 million barrels of oil.
36:45So that's pretty concerning. During Biden's presidency, we had an all -time low of 348
36:52million barrels and it's slowly been increasing, as John mentioned.
36:55And Obama's was the highest in 2011 at 726 million barrels.
37:00John, thank you for the correction.
37:01It's important sometimes that when I get things wrong, I don't know where I did
37:04that research from. I usually am pretty methodical.
37:07So I apologize for that, and I want to thank you for sending me this
37:11email. I want to thank you all for listening.
37:12That's this episode. I will see you guys on Wednesday.
37:14If you like this podcast, please like and subscribe on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
37:19wherever you get your podcasts, and on YouTube.
37:20I will see you guys on Wednesday.
37:23This is an iHeart Podcast.
37:26Guaranteed Human. I will see you guys on Wednesday.