Politico's Off Message

An all-star panel discusses how #MeToo changes the way we think about Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, why the scandals of 1998 would play out differently in today's media environment, and what Trump learned from Clinton's example. Join Politico editor-in-chief John Harris, New York Times chief White House correspondent Peter Baker, Politico chief international affairs columnist Susan B. Glasser, and Yahoo News chief investigative correspondent Michael Isikoff for a roundtable discussion of the scandal that rocked Washington and changed American politics.

DNC chairman Tom Perez is the son of immigrants from the Dominican Republic. He shares his personal reaction to President Trump's comment about 'shithole countries,' and explains why he thinks the "party of Lincoln" is dead — despite the fact the GOP controls the White House, Congress, judicial branch, and most state governments.

Jordan Klepper has spent the last three months hosting the Alex Jones-style parody “The Opposition” on Comedy Central, working hard to get into the head of all the conspiracy theorists — including President Donald Trump himself — who’ve latched onto tales of illegal voters and the “deep state” and media witch hunts. And he's scared of what he's seen there.

John Dean, the former Nixon White House counsel, has a memo for White House lawyer Ty Cobb and the rest of President Donald Trump’s defenders as they enter 2018: believing the investigation and prosecutions will be over any time soon is “wishful thinking.” And, says the man who famously flipped and became the Watergate prosecution’s star witness in the process that helped take down Richard Nixon, no one in the president’s orbit should assume they’re prepared for everything that cooperating witnesses George Papadopoulos and Michael Flynn might be telling Bob Mueller, as they’ve done out of confidence from their own review or just out of public bluster. That’s the mistake Dean saw Nixon, H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman make about him.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio takes a break during his trip to Iowa to sit down with Isaac and assure him he isn't running for president. Hizzoner talks about why he's a polarizing figure, what it's like being a progressive leader in the Trump era, and what he thinks about all the New Yorkers being mentioned as 2020 candidates.

Joe Manchin is a rare breed: a West Virginia Democrat and self-proclaimed “radical moderate.” He's one of 10 Senate Democrats up for reelection in 2018 in states that Trump won. Red-state Democrats like Manchin should have been putty in the president’s hands. Instead, he’s alienated them to the point that he’s neither feared nor loved.

An exclusive preview of our upcoming episode with Sen. Joe Manchin, in which he talks about the sexual misconduct allegations against Al Franken, why he hopes Franken doesn't resign, and what he sees as total hypocrisy on the part of his fellow Democratic senators

The retired general and former CIA director explains why he thinks Trump’s foreign policy is more continuation than change, what he knows about Mike Flynn, and what his own woes have taught him about life not being an endless series of 'high-five moments.'

Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie don’t know if Donald Trump will remain a Republican, but they believe Republicans owe him their loyalty. They join Isaac to discuss their new campaign tell-all, Donald Trump, and why they think Paul Manafort deserves what’s coming to him. Also, Eliana Johnson swings by to discuss Trump’s inner circle.

Isaac talks with Politico congressional reporters Rachael Bade and Elana Schor about Al Franken, John Conyers, Roy Moore, why Hill staffers fear what leadership will do if they speak out about sexual harassment and what it will take for the ‘dam to break’ and unleash a wave of scandals.

Chess? That’s not what Garry Kasparov sees Donald Trump or Vladimir Putin playing—three-dimensional or any other kind. But if they did sit down for a game, the former grandmaster knows who’d win: “Both of them despise playing by the rules, so it’s who will cheat first.”

Former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry is America’s nuclear conscience — and he’s worried. We talk to him about nukes, North Korea, and the two times he’s stared down the apocalypse.

Alec Baldwin inhabits Donald Trump on ‘Saturday Night Live.’ Bradley Whitford spent years in ‘The West Wing.’ Here’s what their time with fake presidents tells them about the real one.

An Election Day special: Heading out on the campaign trail, we talk with former Attorney General Eric Holder, who has taken to the stump himself to rally Democrats in Virginia, and occupies a newly political role.

Nancy Pelosi is hated; she’s a hero. She’s the Democrats’ secret weapon; she’s the Republicans’ favorite target. She’s been around politics her entire life — she tells us about a time she ditched her school’s Model UN to sit next to JFK at dinner — and at 77, shows no signs of slowing down. With Democrats out of power and Pelosi under attack from her own members, she has re-emerged as an essential player in Washington. But while the Democratic Party is in a rolling existential crisis, can she hold on?

For years, former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara was one of the most feared prosecutors in America. Then President Trump asked him to resign. Now, as Robert Mueller’s investigation unleashes its opening torrent of indictments, we talk to Bharara about the president who ousted him, what to make the special prosecutor’s investigation into Trump’s orbit, and a similarity between Donald Trump and Vito Corleone.

North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis discusses his dream of going to Burning Man and how he sees Breitbart and the Huffington Post as the same. The Republican also explains about the need to focus on results in the Senate and his commitment to conservative ideals.

Puerto Rico's delegate in Congress discusses what she made of President Trump’s promise to wipe away the territory’s debt, what she thinks will happen now that the White House has backtracked on it, and the new kind of community thinking that’s taken root since Hurricane Maria. 

Captain Mark Kelly sits down to discuss gun control in the wake of the Las Vegas shooting, how Gabby Giffords feels about returning to stand with her old colleagues on the Hill, and his own feelings about President Trump’s space council.

Actor and activist Rob Reiner sits down with Isaac Dovere in New York to discuss Russia, Trump, cultural fights sweeping and country and celebrities' role in all of it.