In this episode of The Depolarizers, I’m in conversation with Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet, who represents Michigan’s eighth congressional district.
Rep. McDonald Rivet (affectionately known by her initials KMR, like some other leading ladies in Congress) may be a freshman member of Congress, but she’s no rookie when it comes to winning and getting things done.
You may recognize McDonald Rivet’s name as the one that tops Split Ticket’s WAR (Wins Above Replacement) Model chart — McDonald Rivet was the biggest over-performer of the 2024 election cycle, with a WAR score of a whopping 8.6 points, and she over-performed Harris by 8 points.
McDonald Rivet is a member of the New Democrat Coalition, serving as the caucus’ Freshman Leadership Representative.
Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet is speaking at WelcomeFest next Wednesday, June 4 in Washington, DC. RSVP to hear her live! We’ll have a virtual option for those who can’t make it in person!
As this past cycle’s biggest over-performer, McDonald Rivet won over A LOT of voters in her district who also split their ticket to vote for Donald Trump — and people say split ticket voting is dead! I asked KMR who the Trump-McDonald Rivet voter is.
She responded with a story about an experience she had out knocking doors on the campaign trail. She met a UAW retiree who had a Trump sign in his yard. He shared with KMR that as a retiree, he’ll probably have to get a part-time job because his retirement and social security isn’t enough to cover his bills, including costs for prescription drugs. He also expressed concerns about his neighborhood and his children moving away from the area. KMR expressed similar concerns about her children moving away and the cost of groceries. They spoke on his front porch for about 10 minutes, after which KMR noted:
At the end of the conversation, I don't know he agreed with everything I said, but he knew that I saw him.
And that was really important because I think a lot of the Democratic conversation and Democratic agenda in politics has left the folks who shower at the end of their workday behind.
Most of them used to be Democrats, but they don't feel like they belong anymore in our party.
In a recent vote on the House floor, Rep. McDonald Rivet voted to repeal the Environmental Protection Agency’s waivers for California’s vehicle emissions standards. Those emissions standards would have mandated zero-emissions vehicles to account for 35% of auto sales in 2026, 51% by 2028, and 100% by 2035. The mandate would have also went into place in 11 other states that adopted California's rule. I asked Rep. McDonald Rivet about why she made this vote, particularly as Democrats look to regain trust among voters.
The EV mandate is tricky because I really do believe it's important that we are focusing on clean air, and environmental concerns are real. But the problem with that mandate is that one, as you said, the timeline was unrealistic. And two, Michigan does not have the EV infrastructure.
When I first started reading up on EVs, the first thing I did was Google the cost of an EV pickup truck. Because that's what my district drives. We've got a lot of farmers.
Well, how much does that cost? It's north of $70,000 a year. That's a year and a half salary for a lot of people.
So the idea that we're going to get at this by mandating was going to be bad — not just for the people in my district, but for the people around the country who are just really struggling.
It's just not the time.
I do think that we have to figure this out. But frankly, EVs are going to start to sell when the market makes sense.
A government mandate isn't going to help that… And that's how we regain trust is we address the things that are real in people’s day-to-day lives.
KMR’s ads in 2024 were lighthearted and fun— including one where her husband rolled out of a moving vehicle to escape her talking about cutting taxes, and another of her holding a beer talking about football and hating Ohio. I asked her how the lightheartedness and direct way that she speaks to voters informs the way she communicates with them, and what Democrats need to do more and better to authentically communicate with voters.
We have a really divided country right now, but the one thing that I think you would get a really significant percentage of Americans to agree on is that they hate politics, and they don't trust politicians.
So in the first ad we did, my husband and I are going through a day — pouring our coffee and getting ready for work.
He starts by saying, “my wife loves talking about taxes,” and then it cuts to me saying, “no, I love talking about cutting taxes.” Which isn't a normal thing for a Democrat to say.
But I authored the largest tax cut for working families in Michigan's history. So I wanted to talk about it.
And we also worked really hard in the campaign to just remind people that I'm a very real person. My husband and I raised six kids. I also worry about grocery bills — I’ve got a 15 year old teenage son who drinks two gallons of milk a week. You can't fill up a 15 year old boy! I've worked a lot on childcare and have personally spent a lot of money on childcare. We have to bring those bills down.
I just real talk and really reflect, I think, where a lot of people, particularly in Michigan, are worried.
Of our kids, five of them are adults. They all moved away, every one of them. I want to see my grandkids when I have some. I want to be able to be the one who goes to the soccer games and picks them up from school every once in a while. And that's not a reality for me. And we have to do something about that.
Screaming and yelling and shouting into a camera on TikTok — that's not going to solve any of those problems.
What we really need to do is move forward things that really matter to people. It doesn't matter whether you've got an R or a D behind your name — that's how people begin to trust that you've got their best interest in mind.
Because Welcome talks a lot about illiberalism and a lack of nuance on the left, I asked KMR in what ways she thinks the left can regain trust among voters to prove that we champion nuance, we want to sustain and preserve a liberal democracy, and we are serious about ensuring everyone's voices are heard — not just the voices of the extremes.
We have to really not be afraid to talk to blue-collar voters. We have to not be afraid to go out on farms. And then we also have to be willing to sit and listen to things that are complex and difficult and have the hard conversations.
I had a bill in the state legislature that required safe storage of firearms, and it got hot really fast in my district. I held a town hall, and we had about a hundred people there.
We had one side of the room filled with folks in the red Moms Demand Action T-shirts — I used to be in leadership of Moms Demand Action locally, so they are my people — and then we had people that were coming in, some of them wearing MAGA hats, some wearing NRA hats. And the room just erupted, and people were at each other.
About 10 minutes in, I said, “Hold on. Can everybody in this room agree that no one wants another child to die?”
And just like that, you could feel the whole room just stop. And then we built from there in a conversation.
Now, I'm not saying that we got everybody on the same page and we walked out with a plan because that didn't happen.
But we were all willing to have a conversation about safe storage — about 80% of people support it. My family owns guns. My husband owns guns. We're a hunting culture in Michigan. It isn't about taking away a gun, but it is about making sure that a child cannot get hold of a weapon and hurt themselves or someone else.
It's really hard to do that in a 30-second TV commercial, or a 15-second TikTok. That's a form of communication, but that's not the work. The work is building an agenda in communities and in neighborhoods and in garages and on farms.
That is our work. That is what we should be doing. And I think that that makes us stronger across the board.
I noted to Rep. McDonald Rivet that she joins a long list of women who over-perform in competitive congressional districts. I asked her why she thinks women candidates and even women incumbents are so good at earning and keeping trust among voters in some of our most competitive congressional districts, and what advice she would give to Welcome candidates that are running in districts in 2026 and years to come.
I think women are so good at it because I think that we're seen as being different from who you picture in your head when you think about who's representing us in Congress — it usually isn't people who look like me.
I think that so many of us — and I don't mean to stereotype here — are like, “Okay, did we make the meal list for the week? And have we gotten groceries? And is the laundry done? And did I manage to get the lunchbox to school? Oh, and by the way, how are we trying to figure out how to fight a cut to $800 billion in Medicaid? And are my roots showing?”
This is what it means to be a woman. And we get to this point where, generally, I think that we are just too tired to mince our words.
So we're just like, “This is how it is: We’ve got to bring the price of groceries down. And why is child care $16,000 a year?”
We can say those things and we can say them directly because they're a lived experience.
I can speak for a long time about what it means when we not only have $300 billion cuts to SNAP, but we've cut out the operational grants for our food banks, and we've stopped federal delivery of food. We cut a billion dollars out of the school food program. When you add those things up, those aren't just numbers on a balance sheet — what you have are hungry kids, and that's intolerable. And frankly, morally wrong.
And I think that it's that level of sincerity, coupled with experience of having brought up six kids of my own that I think a lot of women have.
And I think it's why we tend to be pragmatic and win in these top districts.
Lastly, I asked KMR what any candidate looking to win over voters in presidential swing states like Michigan should ensure they exhibit to earn voters’ trust in the state.
Can I swear on this podcast? Look, I'm just going to say it: No bullshit.
You’ve got to have an agenda, it's got to be forward thinking, and it has to be based on what people really need, which is more money in their pockets and for things to get cheaper.
Don't come with slogans. Don't come with wishful, dreamy ideas.
Have a plan, and come with some— as Sen. Elissa Slotkin would say — alpha energy.
And people will react to that.
I keep telling people that in my district, which I think is a good microcosm for the entire state, people will forgive you for trying something that doesn't work. What they will not forgive you for is not trying. It's a roll up your sleeves, get to work kind of job.
And you have to be able to show that you can do that, whether we're talking about President, Senate, any of these jobs. Roll up your sleeves, and get to work.
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