Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar
2/18/26: GOP Midterm Wipeout Polling, Zohran Rent Freeze Win, UAE Pressured On Sudan
18 Feb 2026
Chapter 1: What do GOP midterm wipeout polls reveal about the political landscape?
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Chapter 2: How did Zohran Mamdani achieve a rent freeze win?
New York Times asked their focus group. A candidate who identifies as progressive or a candidate who identifies as moderate? Every single person in the focus group across the demographic spectrum from every different cohort said a progressive candidate. And for a moderate candidate, the New York Times reports, no one raised a hand.
Now, this is a feast for somebody who wrote the books that you've written, Ryan. Like, this is a veritable feast of different threads to pull. It's bittersweet because it's like if... you would have listened to us when it mattered, then we might not be here. So it's very bittersweet to have people come around and be like, okay, yeah, actually, you were right. Yeah, well, we're still in hell.
Okay, yes. But also it's interesting how people are going to define moderate and progressive. Because are they defining progressive as Alyssa Slotkin? Do you remember in the 2008 Democratic primary, it was a big deal for Hillary Clinton to identify herself as a progressive. It was like a question at debates. Yeah, it meant something back then. Right.
Yeah, and then 2020 kind of lost its meaning because everybody adopted it. But then by 2024, in the backlash around... BLM and everything and the woke stuff, you had a little bit of sheen come off of progressive and it meant more to say you were progressive. Now, people witnessing what moderation gets you are saying, I don't want anything to do with that. which is very interesting.
Because on the one hand, there are obvious analyses about voters seeing and there's primaries and general elections, obviously, but voters seeing Democrats as having gone a little wacky on some of the cultural stuff. And polling on some of the cultural stuff suggests that's absolutely true, that Dems got on the wrong side of some different issues.
So that's going to be a very, very interesting question post-primary for Dems running in Nebraska or, well, independent, like a Dan Osborne running in Nebraska or a Grant Plattner running in Maine or... uh, Tallarico or Crockett running in Texas.
That's, that's what I'm curious to see is how people who are defining themselves as progressive are approaching those issues because I don't know what that means. Yeah. And it's, it's to get a sense of how bad it is, um, for Democrats, let's roll.
I mean, for Republicans, uh, even Kamala Harris is like, if you did a redo right now with Trump, the public is saying that they would actually elect Kamala. So let's, let's roll Harry Enten and CNN here. Choice for 2024 presidential election. The actual was Donald Trump winning by about a point and a half. It rounds to a point.
But take a look here in a polled redo between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. In April of 2025, it was within the margin of error, right? Kamala Harris by a point. But look at where we are now according to an NBC News Survey Monkey poll. Kamala Harris wins in a redo, asking folks essentially if you could redo the 2024 election, how would you vote? She wins it by, get this,
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Chapter 3: What challenges does the UAE face regarding its involvement in Sudan?
And if he goes up then against Tallarico, okay, I'll watch it. I'm not going to believe it, but I will pay attention to it. For the record, I have no dog in the Texas Republican primary. To the extent, my only real dog in that fight is that John Cornyn is an establishment McConnell tool. So I'll say that. That doesn't mean the other options are great either.
So speaking of which, that's exactly what I was just going to say. My caveat to everything you just laid out about the climate being unfavorable to Republicans is that I went back and recently pulled the numbers compared to 2018, which was a massive blue wave, a blue tsunami. Republican favorability, Dem favorability, right now Dems are at negative 19.9. Republicans are at negative 12.8.
The Democratic Party is less favorable nationwide than the Republican Party, even though Donald Trump is so unfavorable. People do not like Democrats. They just don't like Democrats. Now, Dems still lead in the congressional ballot right now, but by a smaller margin than they did at this point in 2018. What's that lead looking like now? Let me pull the RCP here.
Well, I find that I will keep... Okay, here it is. Okay. So DEMs have a plus 4.6 spread right now. Plus six? Plus 4.6. Plus 4.6, got it. Plus 4.6. So, I mean, it's actually fairly healthy at this point, but it is lower than where they were at this point in 2018, or at least as of the time that I published that last story.
So anyway, the problem that Democrats will have is getting people to the polls to... counter disillusionment with the party. Now, Republicans are gonna have that problem too, because Donald Trump is not on the ballot, and the disillusionment when Donald Trump is not on the ballot makes people stay home, vote for the Dem in some cases if it's an independent,
But that's a, I mean, independent voters in general elections like Maine, for example, certainly in Texas, certainly in Georgia, certainly in Alaska, if independents don't like Democrats, that's the caveat. I do think things are, the climate looks good for Democrats for maybe a blue wave, but is it a blue tsunami, the type of which that sweeps
you know, Ossoff into a healthy reelection, possibly someone from Texas, possibly someone from Alaska, Dan Osborne in Nebraska. I don't know that yet. And Osborne obviously is running as an independent, but Democrats are carrying a lot of, they're carrying a lot of weight. The brand is carrying a lot of weight right now. It is. So yeah, in a midterm though,
People are almost always voting against something than for something. And that was the case in 2010. They came out against Obama and Democrats and the status quo, 94, 2018, 2006. Like 2006... Democrats were not popular, but Bush was much more hated. And so the only option that we give to voters to express their anger in a midterm is to vote for the other party.
And because you're not gonna put them in power, I think it's easier for people, you're not gonna put them in the White House. So in 2006, you might not like Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, but you really didn't like Donald Rumsfeld and George Bush and Dick Cheney. So you're like, fine, Democrats. So I think that's what they're going to do this time. Fine, Democrats. Interesting.
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Chapter 4: What impact do drone strikes have on civilian life in Sudan?
It featured two prominent figures in Black history, Martin Luther King Sr. and a young student, Samuel L. Jackson. to be in what we really thought was a revolution. I mean, people were dying. 1968, the murder of Dr. King, which traumatized everyone.
The FBI had a role in the murder of a Black Panther leader in Chicago. This story is about protest. It echoes in today's world far more than it should, and it will blow your mind. Listen to The A Building on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is Ryder Strong, and I have a new podcast called The Red Weather.
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Chapter 5: What are the implications of the US's recommendations to the UAE?
We never get you in character, so this is a rare treat. And so, basically, they said, Mamdani can't... He can't... All right, we're good with that tweet. Mamdani cannot, on his own, freeze the rent. So stop getting excited about what this guy is promising you he's going to do. And other people said, look... With enough will, there is a way.
With public pressure, the board will do what the mayor wants to do because they don't want to get in the way of this public will. And right as he left office. Eric Adams tried to install a landlord-friendly member to this board for a period of time that would have made it difficult for Mamdani to have full control of the board and execute it on his agenda. Guess what that guy said? No way.
Are you kidding me? Like if you are a landlord friendly type of person that Eric Adams is going to put on the board, you're probably doing pretty well in your life. You may have some difficulties at home. You know, there's probably some unhappiness somewhere in your soul as a result of how you got where you are. But you're doing pretty good. Like your life is life is pretty good.
And Eric Adams is like, why don't you be the face of rent increases against Mayor Mamdani? And so they nominated this person. And we won't even name them because why make them infamous? In fact, we'll give them credit. But when it was too late for Eric Adams to do anything about it, the person said, actually, how about I don't do that? How about I don't spend the next several years
Being the face of rent increases. The guy standing in the way of this democratic mandate for freezing the rent. He might not, this guy probably thinks freezing the rent is a terrible idea for all the reasons lots of people think it's a terrible idea.
Including me.
Including you. I don't think it's going to work. I'll go on the record right now. God bless the people of New York City. You know what, it might not. but what it's going to do is bring relief to a lot of people in the short term. And then it will put pressure on... politicians to get it right.
As a long-term solution, there's a lot to... And I think Zohra Mamdani, actually, if he were sitting with us right now, he probably would say the long-term solution is the more important policy. Right. Right. And sort of like tariffs in a way, like tariffs for Trump were a stand-in. Yes. They were a proxy for Trump understands that things suck and that we're getting ripped off. Yeah.
People are ripping you off and he's going to do something about it. Not that tariffs alone are going to fix everything or that tariffs long term, the way he's implementing them, are even a good idea. Of course, he can. I think there's a similarity there. The freeze the rent was a stand in. For fixed prices. No, for like housing is unaffordable.
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Chapter 6: How is the international community responding to the conflict in Sudan?
They let you live in abject squalor. And so the mayor's going to have to then be policing that even harder, like housing codes and regulations and all of that. On the other hand... Can you get people into... I mean, can he build? I don't know. Can he build the types of places that people want to move into? Can you increase supply in a way that doesn't just leave people stuck?
You can freeze the rent, and it's going to be frozen at an unacceptably high level for a lot of people. That's kind of the problem with New York City to begin with. Yeah, and to me, it's an incomplete policy. You would need... If you're going to freeze it and... What often happens is a tenant leaves and the place needs somewhere between $10,000 and $50,000. So you get empty spaces.
Because for a new tenant, you want to make the place look better. And you want to fix all the problems that exist. And that can end up being fairly expensive. And if it costs $40,000 to rehab the unit, it's a lot, but let's say it costs $40,000 to rehab the unit, and you can't move the rent. Yep. to cover that cost. Because construction's expensive in New York.
Then what a lot of landlords do is they just leave it empty. And that's not, like nobody would argue that we should leave units empty. I think Zoran has actually talked about that too, like empty units. There's tons of like ghost units. So to me, a more complete policy would be like, okay, We're asking you to subsidize against the market rate by keeping this rent underneath the market rate.
So we then, as the city, are going to come in and we'll rehab it for you. Do that at least. Well, let's put this on the screen. I mean, this is E4. This is going to be Assad. This is Mamdani doing a little bit of doge because even before he was elected, he was the guy who was holding court, speaking fluent abundance in conversations with Derek Thompson. So listen to Mayor Mamdani.
This is the next stop.
We are being as aggressive as we can in recognizing additional revenue and have surpassed the state in our estimates of personal income tax, corporate tax, and sales tax. But responsible governance is not only about revenue. It is also about discipline. That means finding savings across city government, reducing bureaucratic waste, and rendering agencies more efficient and cost-effective.
That is why I signed an executive order establishing a chief savings officer in every city agency. Chief Savings Officers, or CSOs, have a simple remit, identifying savings within the agencies they serve. They will consolidate redundancies, insource programs that have been outsourced to bloated consultant contracts, and eliminate extraneous programs.
Each CSO will issue a public report by March 20th, detailing the savings they have found and provide updated assessments every six months. These CSOs will have clear goals, 1.5% in savings in fiscal year 2026 and 2.5% in fiscal year 2027.
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Chapter 7: What strategies are being discussed for a potential ceasefire in Sudan?
And that's not sustainable, and it's not a way to scale up. You want it working for everybody. So... Good for Mamdani for embracing this because it's too easy to just not do it. That's why Doge could have been great if Doge came in and was like, wait a minute, you're all using these 1984 computers running on Microsoft Windows 98? Yeah. Like, let's upgrade this stuff.
Let's make it so you can do your job more efficiently. It's going to cost a little money here, but it's going to save all of this money down the road. That would have been one of the best services. Al Gore tried to do that, remember? Yeah, but to your point, Doge lost the public trust really quickly. And to undertake... significant reforms, you have to have public trust.
And they lost public trust. And actually, I want to ask about this because this I just remember broke last night. I'm curious what your take of this is. New York Post. So they don't like Mayor Mamdani to say the least. By the way, producer Max says he's up plus 16. He's up 16 points in his approval rating. So interesting. Mamdani won by about 15. So that's up. So he's like even more.
It's unusual to go northward. We'll see how that continues, but here's the headline. Mom Donnie brings back homeless encampment sweeps turning on campaign promise after backlash over cold weather deaths.
So the New York Post is reporting that he's expected to reverse course on this campaign promise because of this deadly cold snap in which I think at least 10 people have died on the streets of New York City. It's been very, very cold. And sources have told the New York Post that that is going to start possibly as soon as today. Very interesting.
The Post says the city's Department of Homeless Services, which has been left in the lurch with zero guidance since Mamdani's order came down to halt the sweeps last month, will again take the lead on issuing notices to people living on the streets, sources said. That was an Eric Adams policy. It's been unpopular with people on the left. Listen, my perspective on that is it can save lives.
I wonder if that's Bear Mom Donnie's perspective, having been in power for about a month now, if that actually is worth the life-saving efforts in just bitterly cold weather in New York City. So I don't know, Ryan. I don't know what to make of that, actually, to be honest. This seems like a case of where your well-meaning left orthodoxy ran into this fierce ice storm and snow storm.
Right.
And I'm glad he's readjusting this. On the other hand, the orthodoxy comes from a serious place where criminalizing homelessness has its own obvious problems.
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Chapter 8: What are the long-term solutions proposed for the Sudanese conflict?
This was a difficult situation. New York seems to have handled it much better than D.C., in fact. It's been fun. Thankfully, the 40-degree days are now getting us out of this. But the city was struggling. And Mamdani was very out there and energetic, out there with the crews and doing the mayor thing.
Yeah.
Which, you know, they're probably some people are like, oh, the problem with these left-wing candidates, they're not, they don't, they're just going to be lost in like the ivory tower of socialist ideas. but not get into the streets and actually do the job of being a mayor, which the number one job of being a mayor is plowing the streets when it snows.
But he was so aware of that, like deeply aware of what went wrong with de Blasio. So we'll see if he can stave that off in his own tenure at Gracie Manor. Let's move on to Sedan Run.
Welcome to the A Building. I'm Hans Charles. I'm Menelik Lumumba. It's 1969. Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. have both been assassinated, and Black America is at a breaking point. Rioting and protests broke out on an unprecedented scale. In Atlanta, Georgia, at Martin's alma mater, Morehouse College, the students had their own protest.
It featured two prominent figures in Black history, Martin Luther King Sr. and a young student, Samuel L. Jackson. to be in what we really thought was a revolution. I mean, people were dying.
1968, the murder of Dr. King, which traumatized everyone. The FBI had a role in the murder of a Black Panther leader in Chicago. This story is about protest. It echoes in today's world far more than it should, and it will blow your mind. Listen to The A Building on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
This is Ryder Strong, and I have a new podcast called The Red Weather.
It was many and many a year ago in a kingdom by the sea.
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