IAhead of the presidential election, vice presidential candidates Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump have begun appearing on podcasts to engage with potential voters.

According to Jeff Gulati, a political science professor at Bentley University in Waltham, Massachusetts, Harris and Trump’s podcast appearances are simply another part of their larger campaign and communications strategy.

For Trump, this includes appealing to young, often politically disengaged men, who are “likely to support him but less likely to vote,” Gulati says. The so-called “brother voice”.” is why Trump’s podcast appearances have landed him in the studios of bridge legends like Joe Rogan and Theo Von. The hope is that these appearances will ingratiate Trump with these young men, enough to get them to the polls.

“It’s a risky strategy,” says Gulati. “It’s the same as his McDonald’s look: he’s not trying to pretend he’s a regular guy, but he really is voice of the common guy and that he speaks for them.”
Harris, for his part, chooses his podcast appearances much differently. Although there were rumors about it she was also supposed to be on Joe Roganin her pursuit of male voters, she has so far chosen podcasts with audiences that focus primarily on women and young black men.

“The Harris campaign feels like they’re going to win this election if they can really capitalize on this gender difference that they have,” says Gulati, emphasizing that Harris’ strategy is less risky than Trump’s. “The Harris campaign is focusing on people they think are already engaged, (in an effort to) get them more engaged.”

Read more: Harris is campaigning for the Bro vote

Below are some of the key highlights from the major podcast appearances Harris and Trump made.

Kamala Harris podcast appearances

Call her dad

On Call her dada podcast focused on women’s issues, mental health, sex and relationships, Harris leaned the most on his stance on abortion. Host Alex Cooper — who refers to his listeners as the “dad gang,” asked Harris how she felt when Trump told women he was going to be their “protector.”

“So, he who, when he was president, handpicked three members of the United States Supreme Court with the intention that they would undo the protections of Roe v. Wade. And they did exactly as he intended. And there are now 20 states with Trump abortion bans, including bans that make no exception for rape or incest,” Harris said on the podcast, which aired Oct. 6. “So this is the same guy who’s now saying that?”

Harris emphasized her commitment to reproductive rights by reminding the audience that she is first vice president to visit an abortion clinic. She also responded to Trump’s claims during their debate that doctors under the Biden Administration want to “take the life of the child in the ninth month, and even after birth.” Harris called this a “bold face lie”.

“It doesn’t happen anywhere in the United States. It’s so insulting to suggest that it would happen and that women would do it,” she said.

All The Smoke

On September 24, Harris sat down for an interview on the podcast All The Smoke, hosted by former NBA stars Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson.

One topic she spoke about was marajuana, stating that people should not go to jail for possessing the drug.

“I just think we’ve come to a point where we have to understand that we have to legalize it and stop criminalizing this behavior,” Harris said.

She also laid her out financial plan to the hosts, specifically to increase funding for small businesses, which includes tax credits of up to $50,000, and address the nation’s affordable housing crisis, including a $25,000 down payment assistance program for first-time home buyers.

“I start from the perspective that the vast majority of parents want to raise their children well. They love their kids, but they don’t necessarily have the resources they need,” Harris said. “And if we understand that the children of a community are the children of the community, we will understand that an investment in something like the first year of a child’s life benefits us all.”

The breakfast club

On October 15, Harris sat down with radio host Charlamagne Tha God (Lenard McKelvey) for The breakfast club morning radio show. Here she focused hard on…and posted videos from the show talks about — “delivering for black men” through healthcare and education.

“It’s an agenda that understands — by the way, because we’ve already talked a lot about criminal justice — the needs of the black community are not just about criminal justice.”

She also went after Trump’s supposed plans to address racial divides and prejudice, pointing to Project 2025, which Trump has said he has no involvement with.

“Ask Donald Trump what his plan is for Black America. Ask him,” she said. “I’ll tell you what it is … look at Project 2025.”

Donald Trump’s podcast appearances

The Joe Rogan Experience

In Trump’s latest appearance, he joined Joe Rogan on his podcast. The interview, which was recorded on October 25 and released the next day, was almost three hours long. Trump covered a range of topics, from praising Robert E. Lee’s military strategy to speculating about life on Mars.

Read more: Joe Rogan’s Live Comedy Special lets Netflix have it both ways

Rogan gave Trump an opportunity to discuss his 2020 election denial and asked him to do so discuss how he was “robbed.”

“What’s happened is the umpires don’t want to touch it. . . . The umpires didn’t have what it took to overturn a pick,” he said.

Of the news that his former chief of staff John Kelly called him a “fascist” earlier this week, Trump also told Rogan that he made a mistake in appointing certain people.

“The biggest mistake I made was I picked some people…I picked some great people, you know, but…I picked some people I shouldn’t have picked. Neocons. Yeah, neo-artists or bad people or disloyal people , he said.

Impulsive

In the former president’s first major podcast in this run — pre-President Joe Biden’s historic defection and Harris’ bid for the presidency — Trump joined former YouTube prankster and vlogger Logan Paul on his podcast Impulsive.

The interview, released in June, came shortly after Trump’s historical belief on 34 counts of falsifying business records, and Paul commented that Trump’s support and donations to his campaign had increased after the verdict.

“Hundreds of millions of dollars… and too bad it couldn’t have been done for other reasons, but they saw the case as so corrupt and so ridiculous,” Trump said.

Trump also gave Paul a t-shirt with his own mugshot on it.

“Our country has enormous potential, but it’s going down the drain very, very quickly. No one has ever seen anything like it, how it’s run so badly,” he said.

This past weekend with Theo Von

Stand-up comedian turned podcaster Theo Von interviewed Trump for an episode that aired on August 20 (Von has also since interviewed Bernie Sanders and JD Vance).

Here, Trump and Von mostly discussed their mutual friends UFC worldabuse, Trump’s brother and sons, and calling lobbyists one “big problem.”

A viral moment also stemmed from the conversation in which Von and Trump discussed drug addiction, in which Von told Trump that “cocaine will turn you into a fucking owl, homie.”

Flagrant

On October 9, Trump was a guest on the comedy podcast Flagrantwhich is hosted by standup comedian Andrew Schulz along with Akaash Singh, AlexxMedia and Mark Gagnon.

The conversation began with discussion of Trump’s children, but turned to talking about attempted murder at the beginning of July.

“I have a lot of respect for the Secret Service and the guys that were with me,” Trump said. “Those bullets went over my head. If it had been up another couple of seconds, I wouldn’t be here.”

He then hinted at possible foreign conspiracy theories related to the shooting incidents.

“They haven’t opened the shooters’ phones — and they had several. Why wouldn’t you open them? When you hear about foreign connections, like Iran, it makes you wonder.”

Another viral moment came after Trump said that while his opponents can “say whatever they want,” he has a “hard time doing that to them, because … I’m basically a truthful person, but —”

In response to the statement, Schulz began to laugh.

Six Feet Under with Mark Calaway

On Six Feet Under with Mark Calawayalso known as wrestling legend The Undertaker, Trump’s viral moment came when he discussed wrestler-turned-actor Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, who he says called him after the July assassination attempt.

“You know he was great. I never thought he liked me,” Trump said. “I felt bad because I think he’s a great guy. When I got shot – you may have heard about it – Rock called Dana White and said “I want his number. What he did is unbelievable.” He thought it was brave. It was actually very nice.

He also asked Calaway many questions about the reality and logistics of wrestling.

Bussin’ with the boys

Trump made an appearance on the football show Bussin’ With The Boys with Will Compton and Taylor Lewan.

He discussed sports, including his views on transgender athletes.

“They want men playing in women’s sports. I don’t think I could ever say I’m happy about that. I’ve seen people get really hurt. In the Olympics… did you see the young Italian girl… she said ‘ “I just got hit by a horse. I can’t take it,” Trump said.

Notably, in the incident he recounts at the Olympics, the Algerian woman in the middle of the gender row…gold medalist Imane Khelif—is not transgender and was born a biological female.

PBD Podcast

Businessman Patrick Bet-David interviewed Trump for an episode published on October 17. The Republican presidential candidate again questioned Harris’ racial and ethnic identity.

“They have a woman who is black, even if you would say she’s Indian, but she’s black, but she really — a lot of people didn’t know, which is true,” Trump said, to which Bet-David responded that he “learned me about it just a couple of months ago.”

He also discussed several foreign policy issues, particularly tensions in the Middle East and the war between Russia and Ukraine, and claimed that he would end the latter while he is president-elect and that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would listen to him if he wins in November.

“Had that election not been rigged and stolen, I’m telling you, we wouldn’t have a problem anywhere in the world,” Trump claimed.

Discussing Iran, he said he “would like to see Iran be very successful. The only thing is they can’t have a nuclear weapon.”