The Ken Harbaugh Show

MAGA didn’t lose to the Democratic Party on Tuesday night. It lost to the people Donald Trump spent two years going after. Democrats took the House, flipped the Senate, and won governor’s races in places nobody thought possible. Trump’s approval was 38% in the exit polls, on track to be the lowest any president has had at a midterm. Retired Navy Commander Bobby Jones breaks down why this was more...

On this episode of Meidas Defense, host Joe Plenzler sits down with Ian Bassin, Co-Founder and Executive Director of Protect Democracy and former Associate White House Counsel, to examine the authoritarian playbook threatening American democracy. Bassin breaks down how political leaders undermine democratic institutions, the “Deceive, Disrupt, Deny” strategy targeting elections, and why local elec...

Tuesday’s election result was historic, but Donald Trump remains president and is already working to undermine the voters’ verdict. Ken Harbaugh talks with Kris Goldsmith, Army combat vet and President of VALOR Media, about the Veterans Day March for Democracy on the National Mall on Nov. 11 – led by vets, open to everyone. Support VALOR Media Network here: https://valormedianetwork.com/ Sign up f...

Retired Navy Commander Bobby Jones sits down with retired Army Lt. Col. Maura Keller, the Democratic nominee for Georgia’s 3rd Congressional District. It’s Bobby’s home district covering southern Atlanta suburbs and its rural areas.  Keller enlisted as an Army military police officer in 1978 and rose through the ranks over 26 years, retiring as a lieutenant colonel. She received the Gene...

Mike Johnson says the polls are all wrong, and he’s bragging about arenas filled with a few hundred people. That’s what panic looks like. Ken Harbaugh explains why the blue wave may be even bigger than the polls suggest – and why Democrats still need to vote like they’re one point behind. Then he talks with JoAnna Mendoza, who served 20 years in the Navy and Marine Corps, including a tour as a dri...

Seven months ago, Kentucky Republican Ralph Alvarado boasted that he’d stood with Trump in 2016, 2020, and 2024. Now the self-described MAHA doctor has scrubbed the president from his campaign website, part of a GOP stampede away from a toxic president who is still complaining that he isn’t in enough of their TV ads. Ken Harbaugh talks with Zach Dembo, the Navy JAG veteran and former federal prose...

On this episode of Meidas Defense, host Joe Plenzler sits down with former Pentagon official and national security expert Dr. Michael Horowitz to discuss how drones, artificial intelligence, and emerging technologies are transforming modern warfare. He explains why the U.S. military risks falling behind, the challenges facing the Pentagon, and what these developments mean for America's national se...

One week out, the midterms come down to one thing: Donald Trump’s corruption, his war with Iran, and his economic incompetence. That message has put races in play no one thought were competitive. Ken Harbaugh sits down with retired three-star admiral Nancy Lacore, the Democrat within striking distance of flipping Nancy Mace’s South Carolina seat, to talk about how she put the race on the map and w...

With less than two weeks until the American Midterm Elections, Retired U.S. Navy Commander Bobby Jones sat down again with Cait Conley, the Democratic nominee in New York's 17th District and one of the tightest House races in the country. She's a West Point graduate, a 16-year Army veteran with three Bronze Stars, and a former NSC counterterrorism director. We talk about the Iran war, oversight of...

In a single week, Russia launched more than 2,500 strike drones, 1,500 aerial bombs, and over 50 missiles at Ukraine, killing civilians like a one-year-old in her stroller. Trump and Witkoff responded by praising Russia, with Trump saying it is “doing fine on Ukraine” and Witkoff calling Putin a humanitarian. Ken Harbaugh talks with Army combat vet Kris Goldsmith, founder of Veterans Fighting Fasc...

In this episode of the Meidas Defense Podcast, host Joe Plenzler sits down with cryptocurrency researcher and journalist Molly White to expose the darker side of the crypto industry and its growing influence on American politics. White explains how cryptocurrency has become a speculative industry that often benefits wealthy investors while leaving everyday Americans vulnerable to financial losses....

Ken Harbaugh sits down with Senator Elissa Slotkin of Michigan to unpack the coordinated, implicitly violent backlash that followed her remarks on holding lawbreakers in the Trump administration accountable. They discuss what it’s like to be the target of a MAGA and presidential pile-on, and the panic in Trumpworld driving this kind of reactionary behavior. Support VALOR Media Network here: https:...

Trump just pulled the plug on Pete Hegseth's livestreamed execution. That decision tells you a lot about the man running the Pentagon. Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan will still face a firing squad. But Trump has now scrapped Hegseth's plan to stream it, the plan that would have made it America's first public execution in 90 years. "This event will not be streamed," Trump wrote on Truth Social. Reti...

Ken Harbaugh talks with Brian Bengs, the Navy and Air Force veteran running as an independent against Sen. Mike Rounds in South Dakota, about how he’s reaching former Trump voters in a state where Trump’s policies are proving toxic. They also dig into the true cost of the Iran war and the Pentagon’s quiet upward revision of the death toll. Subscribe to Ken’s Substack here: https://thekenharbaughsh...

Ken Harbaugh reacts to new White House press secretary Katie Zacharia’s rocky first briefing, and to her history of amplifying Pizzagate, calling to “Suspend Habeas Corpus,” and facing questions about her legal credentials. Ken also talks with Tara Palmeri of the Red Letter Substack and The Tara Palmeri Show, who watched the briefing live with him and shares her take on it before turning to her su...

In this episode of the Meidas Defense Podcast, host Joe Plenzler sits down with military defense attorney Cody Harnish to discuss the controversial prosecution of Air Force Major Jason Watson, who faces charges after publicly criticizing U.S. military operations and calling for constitutional accountability. Harnish, who attended Watson's preliminary hearing, reveals troubling details about his tr...

Ken Harbaugh sits down with Joanne Carducci, better known as JoJoFromJerz, for the second half of their conversation, a deeply personal one about the assault she survived at 17 and the scars she still carries. At a moment when young people are watching leaders reject empathy and treat power as the only thing that matters, Ken and Jo make the case for starting with hard conversations. Subscribe to...

Maj. (Ret.) Richard Ojeda is a combat veteran who deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan.  Now he lives in Aberdeen, and he's the Democratic nominee in North Carolina's 9th District. His opponent is Rep. Richard Hudson, who has held the seat since 2013 and chairs the National Republican Congressional Committee. That makes Hudson the fifth-ranking Republican in the House and one of the most pow...

Meidas Defense host Joe Plenzler sits down with retired U.S. Army Colonel Steve Miska to discuss why abandoning the local partners who served alongside American forces isn’t just a humanitarian issue; it can directly undermine U.S. national security. Miska explains the critical role interpreters and other “soft networks” play on the battlefield, recounts his efforts to help Iraqi allies escape thr...

Ken Harbaugh argues that November 3rd is a referendum on Trump and on a Republican Party that followed him over the cliff, and that Ohio is already showing signs of a shift. He then talks with Brian Poindexter, the union ironworker running to flip Ohio's 7th District against a former Trump aide. Learn more about Brian’s campaign here: https://poindexterforcongress.com/ Read Ken's latest feature in...

Army tank officer. Tech executive. State legislator. Now an independent running for U.S. Senate in Idaho. Todd Achilles has been a Republican, a Democrat, and now neither. He left the Idaho House to take on three-term Sen. Jim Risch as an independent, because he says the two-party system is broken. Retired U.S. Navy Commander Bobby Jones and Todd talk about service, partisan politics, and how Idah...

Ken Harbaugh argues that Trump is losing and dragging the entire Republican Party down with him, and asks what Democrats can do to make November as bad as possible for the GOP. In conversation with Hunger Games screenwriter Billy Ray, who has advised Democratic candidates for 11 years, Ken explores how better storytelling can move voters. Read Ken's latest feature in The Atlantic, "The Armored Sar...

Ken Harbaugh sits down with former Republican strategist Stuart Stevens for part two of their conversation, on why Democrats can't choose between rebuilding and accountability – they have to do both, starting the moment the gavel passes on January 3. They also discuss the latest from Ukraine, where the two have travelled together several times. Chapter: For free and unbiased Medicare help, dial (7...

On this episode of the Meidas Defense, Joe Plenzler speaks with Dr. Roman Sheremeta and Ken Harbaugh about the war in Ukraine, why it matters to U.S. national security, how Russian propaganda has shaped the debate, and how drones, AI, and electronic warfare are transforming modern combat. Sheremeta breaks down the history behind Russia’s invasion and the case for continued U.S. support, while Harb...

Ken Harbaugh breaks down a taxpayer-funded ad pushing Trump's authoritarian rhetoric, arguing it's backfiring as his approval craters ahead of a potentially historic November. He's joined by former Republican strategist Stuart Stevens — who ran Romney's 2012 campaign before breaking with the GOP — for part one of a two-part conversation on how Democrats turn a wave election into real political rea...