Speaker 1: Pod Save America's brought you by simply Safe. Summer travel
Speaker 1: season is officially here, which means it's time to pack
Speaker 1: your bags, double check your itinerary, and panic about whether
Speaker 1: you remember to lock up the house before you left.
Speaker 1: Or if you're like us, you can arm your simply
Speaker 1: Safe system and head out completely stress free. I've set
Speaker 1: up a simply Safe, incredibly easy to do. I customize
Speaker 1: it to my house and it came in the mail.
Speaker 1: I set it up, customer support great, app great, highly
Speaker 1: recommend it. But simply Safe. You can customize your system
Speaker 1: to fit your needs. They ship fast directly to your door.
Speaker 1: The app guide that's set up is simple and there's
Speaker 1: no drilling required, so you can install and arm your
Speaker 1: system in under one hour, then get back to the drilling.
Speaker 2: I'm all right, Tommy.
Speaker 1: Simply Safe is more than just a security camera. It's
Speaker 1: a comprehensive system of sensors, indoor and outdoor cameras in
Speaker 1: twenty our seven professional monitoring so you can feel safe
Speaker 1: and secure this summer and beyond. Over five million people
Speaker 1: value and trust simply Safe with their home security every day.
Speaker 1: Right now, our listeners will get fifty percent off a
Speaker 1: new system, and you sign up for professional monitoring and
Speaker 1: your first month is free. Just visit simplysafe dot com
Speaker 1: slash cirkd. That's half off at simplysafe dot com slash cirkd.
Speaker 1: There's no safe like simply safe.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm John Favreau and I'm
Speaker 2: Alex Wagner in studio in La.
Speaker 3: I came to cast my ballot just kidding. I'm here.
Speaker 2: We'll still take it, still be encounted. How many do
Speaker 2: you want to drop off?
Speaker 3: Several? All for Heidi Montag just.
Speaker 2: Trying to get on the five. Uh, it's good to
Speaker 2: see it.
Speaker 3: It's great to be here. I'm I'm always so thrilled
Speaker 3: to be in person.
Speaker 2: I hear that we're doing this two weeks in a
Speaker 2: row because mister Pfiffer is out. Oh my next Thursday
Speaker 2: as well. Wow, I know.
Speaker 3: I'm so glad that you're in control of the calendar.
Speaker 3: I had no idea.
Speaker 2: I just found that out yesterday.
Speaker 3: I'm sorry everyone who wants Stan Pfeiffer on the show,
Speaker 3: which is probably most people, but sometimes Dan has to Dan.
Speaker 2: It's rare that Dan takes a break from anything.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, I don't think he's contractually allowed to.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, that is true.
Speaker 3: That is working in a goologs.
Speaker 2: Well, we're very happy to have you, and on today's show,
Speaker 2: we have lots to talk about whether the Insurrectionist slush
Speaker 2: fund is really dead and why Republicans just refuse to
Speaker 2: kill it for good when they had the chance. We're
Speaker 2: also going to talk about Todd Blanche's promotion to Attorney General,
Speaker 2: Congratulations Bill Pulti's promotion to America's spy chief, the latest
Speaker 2: results from Tuesday's primaries in Iowa and California, yet more
Speaker 2: Grand Platner news, the melt down at sixty minutes, and finally,
Speaker 2: for the first time ever, I will reveal a secret
Speaker 2: I've been keeping and tell the story of how I
Speaker 2: was invited, actually invited to the White House UFC FID.
Speaker 3: Oh what a deep tease the industry, that.
Speaker 2: Is de tease. It's happening before we start. If you
Speaker 2: want to find out the real story, you'll have to subscribe.
Speaker 2: Not just kidding, but you should subscribe. If you haven't
Speaker 2: subscribed already, what are you doing to crookeet? You could
Speaker 2: become a friend of the pod cricket dot com slash
Speaker 2: friends You get ad free episodes of all your favorite pods.
Speaker 3: I mean, there's really nothing better than.
Speaker 2: That, Isn't it nice to listen to this and all
Speaker 2: your other cricket pods as.
Speaker 3: Oh, we love our advertisers.
Speaker 2: We of course we love our advertisers. But some people
Speaker 2: like the advertisers. Some people just.
Speaker 3: Want did you want to get right to the meet?
Speaker 2: And you know what, if you do like ads, there's
Speaker 2: a lot of other benefits too. There's subscriber only shows
Speaker 2: like Polar Coaster with Dan Pfeiffer.
Speaker 3: That's a must listen, our special.
Speaker 2: Extra secret episode of Podsave America called Potza America only friends.
Speaker 3: Oh, I mean, and it is really an inside scoop.
Speaker 2: Scoop and lots of substack newsletters these days. And you
Speaker 2: get to support an independent, proudly pro democracy media company
Speaker 2: that Barry Weis can't.
Speaker 3: Murder and Scott Pelly soon to join the roster right.
Speaker 2: That's right, That's right.
Speaker 3: It's called one hundred and fifty three minutes.
Speaker 2: That's the name of this podcast. That is quite long.
Speaker 2: Criocket dot com slash friends. Check it out, all right, Alex.
Speaker 2: The Republican Congress has been hard at work this week.
Speaker 2: Trying to shovel another seventy billion dollars of our money
Speaker 2: to Donald Trump so that Ice can keep rounding up
Speaker 2: immigrants and locking them away in barbaric detention camps. Trump
Speaker 2: wants even more, of course, billion dollars for his ballroom
Speaker 2: and one point eight billion dollars for a slush fund
Speaker 2: he could use to make cash payments to convicted criminals
Speaker 2: who stormed the Capitol on January sixth. Republicans denied him
Speaker 2: the ballroom money in this bill, but they did on
Speaker 2: Thursday block a Democratic amendment that would have killed the
Speaker 2: J six slush fund. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said
Speaker 2: this week that they wouldn't be moving forward with the
Speaker 2: slush fund, but when Trump was asked about that, he
Speaker 2: gave an answer that surprised absolutely no one. I love it.
Speaker 2: I think it's so important. On Thursday, he did a
Speaker 2: clean Coal event in the Oval Office where we all
Speaker 2: thought he'd elaborate on the future of the slush fund,
Speaker 2: but instead he dozed off several times in between his
Speaker 2: home renovation updates, which today included an announcement of yet
Speaker 2: another brand new construction proce. Let's listen, this is now open.
Speaker 4: You see the size of that compared to some of
Speaker 4: the biggest buildings in the country, actually the biggest hyppeter.
Speaker 4: And we haven't finished. The water is pouring in as
Speaker 4: we speak. This is from just a little while ago,
Speaker 4: nice clean water. The Lincoln Memorial. The front was supposed
Speaker 4: to be the back. The back was supposed to be
Speaker 4: the front. It never got built because they built two
Speaker 4: roadways behind it after it was built, and it shut
Speaker 4: off the gateway to the water that was who were
Speaker 4: going to be the main entry And we're going to
Speaker 4: be doing that. We're gonnas called the promenade the promenade.
Speaker 4: They want to call it the Trump Promenade, but I
Speaker 4: don't know if I want to do that.
Speaker 2: What the fuck is happening?
Speaker 3: It's we really need to talk about how unwell this
Speaker 3: man is. Yeah, first of all, was there a penis
Speaker 3: also on that that? Like that chart of big things
Speaker 3: that Trump's obsessed with.
Speaker 2: I don't know, this is I don't we should. This
Speaker 2: is not super important, but this is the second day
Speaker 2: now he has led off an event in the Oval
Speaker 2: by holding up a chart to show that the reflecting
Speaker 2: pool is bigger than most buildings. Yes, but like it's
Speaker 2: not even something that he can brag about, like he
Speaker 2: did it. He didn't lengthen. The reflecting pool.
Speaker 3: Was built in nineteen twenty, right, he just put.
Speaker 2: In, He just painted it and renovated it. But now
Speaker 2: he's obsessed constantly with like holding up a billboard of
Speaker 2: how it's big. What that what?
Speaker 3: It's a sort of I mean, it's it's legacy by
Speaker 3: way of phallic imagery. I think it's just an absession
Speaker 3: with size. It is, uh, it is inversely proportional to
Speaker 3: his rate, his approval ratings. Right, so as he sinks
Speaker 3: in the polls, he needs to erect or claim the erection.
Speaker 3: I'm sorry I keep saying these sort of penal the vocabulary,
Speaker 3: but it is all I mean, it's all intermingled, and
Speaker 3: it's the only way he believes he'll have a legacy
Speaker 3: is brick and mortar. And even if it's not his
Speaker 3: own brick and mortar, I mean he's destroyed. He is
Speaker 3: destroying the country, He's lost the faith of maybe his
Speaker 3: even his own party in Congress or is losing it.
Speaker 3: He has a colossal a blood letting ahead of him
Speaker 3: in November, which is going to leave him even more castrated.
Speaker 3: And so what's his recourse, I guess reflecting his promenades. Yeah,
Speaker 3: big penis cool.
Speaker 2: And now we're doing a promenade around the Lincoln Memorials.
Speaker 3: I mean, are we there?
Speaker 2: Are we going to get the like are we going
Speaker 2: to get those mar Lago yellow umbrellas like we have
Speaker 2: in the what used to be the Rose Garden rip?
Speaker 3: I I don't know that any of this is going
Speaker 3: to come to pass. I mean truly. First of all,
Speaker 3: he's over budget and and uh over over time on
Speaker 3: all the projects that are already underway. The Republicans in
Speaker 3: Congress have gotten very fatigued of I think that the
Speaker 3: ego and the vanity projects, and I you know, they're
Speaker 3: not giving him a billion for the ballroom. I just
Speaker 3: I think that this is all, first of all, a
Speaker 3: distraction what's really happening, And we should talk about what's
Speaker 3: unfolding in Congress right now. But like, I don't know
Speaker 3: how fast can you build a promenade. The thing they're
Speaker 3: doing in the reflecting pool isn't even fixing the leaks.
Speaker 3: It's going to be covered in mold in like a
Speaker 3: year or a couple months.
Speaker 2: And the arch don't forget about the Arch.
Speaker 3: I don't know. I don't know. I just hope all
Speaker 3: of them become intake processing centers for newly arrived migrants,
Speaker 3: Like that's just the only good. Drain the pool and
Speaker 3: let make it, you know, put bedding down, let people
Speaker 3: sleep there, like, just make it something useful for this
Speaker 3: increasingly poor and destitute country that he's running into the ground.
Speaker 2: I absolutely loved the John os off line from over
Speaker 2: the weekend about all this, where he said, yeah, he's
Speaker 2: building all these monuments to himself because after he's gone,
Speaker 2: no one else will.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that is absolutely devastating. That is an as off
Speaker 3: has been so good on reinforcing the narrative that this
Speaker 3: is all the kind of Louis the fourteenth style corruption
Speaker 3: and self.
Speaker 2: For Sciono Potomac exactly.
Speaker 3: I mean, it is it's lest Samois that means the state.
Speaker 3: It's me Spanish, non French.
Speaker 2: Thank you for thank you for moving that one forward.
Speaker 3: It's a disaster of epic proportions in terms of one
Speaker 3: man's ego. But I am skeptical that it actually comes
Speaker 3: to fruition the Trump prom not at least, let's hope.
Speaker 2: So what did you make of the dead or alive
Speaker 2: drama around the slush fund and the Republicans refusal slash
Speaker 2: failure to kill it for good because some tried today, yeah,
Speaker 2: to not get their caucus on board. Some tried to
Speaker 2: save their own.
Speaker 3: Asses, some not all. I think Number one, it is
Speaker 3: important that there be specific written language passed by Congress
Speaker 3: that outlaws the slush fund. It is quite clear to me,
Speaker 3: especially based on Trump's suggestion that he loves not explicit
Speaker 3: declaration that he loves the fund, Todd Blanche will do
Speaker 3: anything Donald Trump wants. If Todd Blanche says on Monday
Speaker 3: the slush fund is gone, and Trump says on Tuesday,
Speaker 3: I love it, that means by Wednesday the slush fund
Speaker 3: could be up and running. It is imperative that the
Speaker 3: legislative branch shut this thing down, right, So I think
Speaker 3: the movement to attach an amendment to this reconciliation bill
Speaker 3: that's being voted on right now is essential. What is
Speaker 3: the point of Bill Cassidy. Bill Cassidy is a senator
Speaker 3: in his He's the Republican who upon which this like
Speaker 3: the future of this slush fund, in large part hinges right.
Speaker 3: He was the holdout today. He delayed, delayed, delayed, people thought,
Speaker 3: oh my god, he's going to kill this thing, and
Speaker 3: then decided at the last minute, after three hours of deliberation,
Speaker 3: you know what, I need this to be a Republican
Speaker 3: effort and not a Democratic effort. Bill Cassidy gave the
Speaker 3: country a raccoon testicle obsessed Health and Human Services director
Speaker 3: who is vac an, anti vaxer, Robert F. Kennedy Junior.
Speaker 3: He a doctor. Bill Cassidy gave us a lunatic at HHS.
Speaker 3: He was the pivotal vote. This was the one chance
Speaker 3: Bill Cassidy had to redeem his reputation, his stature as
Speaker 3: a statesman, And like, what did he do with it?
Speaker 3: What's the point of mounting resistance for three hours and
Speaker 3: then saying on partisan grounds, I can't I can't accept
Speaker 3: this amendment. I need Republicans to author it.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So, just to catch people up on what happened here,
Speaker 2: Democrats offered an amendment to say it's nice that Todd Blanche
Speaker 2: said that this we're not moving forward with the fund,
Speaker 2: but we're going to kill it statutory. They're going to
Speaker 2: put it in a lot to make sure that it's
Speaker 2: gone for good. And Schumer offered the amendment and they
Speaker 2: got Collins, and they got Dan Sullivan in Alaska, who's
Speaker 2: Mary Peltola is running.
Speaker 3: Against the chips falling where they may?
Speaker 2: And John Husted exactly anyway, he's the guy that Shared It.
Speaker 2: Brown's running against in Ohio who Fox News pole came
Speaker 2: out yesterday that shows him trailing Shared Brown by ad
Speaker 2: Shared's best pole. Awesome. But anyway, those three just coincidentally voted. Yeah,
Speaker 2: they voted to kill it as Republicans, but you're right,
Speaker 2: Cassidy and Tillis thought they would be cutesie and they
Speaker 2: decided not to vote for that amendment. They introduced their own,
Speaker 2: which was to say, you can't use the slush fund
Speaker 2: than the way that Trump wants to use it. It
Speaker 2: has to be used for the anti fraud initiative that
Speaker 2: Jade Vance is running, which is basically like, you know,
Speaker 2: robbing states of medicaid funding. If they find someone committing
Speaker 2: fraud somewhere, they just sort of collective punishment for the
Speaker 2: rest of the people who are on Medicaid. So they
Speaker 2: introduced that amendment, and obviously Democrats weren't going to support
Speaker 2: that because it's crazy and the anti fraud initiative is bullshit.
Speaker 2: So they got like I don't know seven eight nine
Speaker 2: Republicans on that one, but that one didn't pass either.
Speaker 2: So now we don't have no weight. Now we have
Speaker 2: no language, We have no language to kill the fund.
Speaker 3: And I say this, it's like fool me wants shame
Speaker 3: on you fully twice, shame on me only seventeen times.
Speaker 3: I should stop talking. And that's how I feel about
Speaker 3: Republicans in Congress. It's like I can't believe, I mean,
Speaker 3: even still fucking entertaining the idea that they'll do the
Speaker 3: right thing on this, that they'll actually deliver on something
Speaker 3: they say they're so against, which is a slush fund.
Speaker 3: But I stupidly hold out hope that Bill Cassidy will
Speaker 3: get something done, that Tom Tillis will find a backbone,
Speaker 3: and at Susan Collins, Susan Collins for whom there's a
Speaker 3: specific place, and you.
Speaker 2: Know what, like it doesn't count what Susan Collins and
Speaker 2: Sullivan did, because if it really counted and they really
Speaker 2: didn't want the fund, they could vote against the final bill.
Speaker 2: They could vote against the final bill.
Speaker 3: They're all on their way out. Tom Tillis and Bill
Speaker 3: Cassidy are out. It's a joke. It's a fucking joke.
Speaker 3: At the same time, it's really important that this get done,
Speaker 3: I know, because we cannot have a two billion dollar
Speaker 3: taxpayer slush fund given to insurrectionists like that is not
Speaker 3: so someone. I mean, I don't know, I don't know.
Speaker 3: So I'm outraged. I'm incensed by the existence of Bill Cassidy,
Speaker 3: and I you know, I look for redemption. I hope
Speaker 3: there is some for them.
Speaker 2: What's your level of concern that there hasn't been more
Speaker 2: drama around the ICE funding itself, which is sort of
Speaker 2: not even being talked about as much, partly because I
Speaker 2: think it was baked in that it was going to
Speaker 2: pass way back when you know, the government shutdown happened
Speaker 2: or the DHS shutdown happened. I know you covered ICE
Speaker 2: detention centers on Runaway Country this week. I interviewed Andy
Speaker 2: cam on Tuesday pod Senator from New Jersey about the
Speaker 2: horrific conditions at the detention center in Newark. I mean,
Speaker 2: this is one that has been like making me quietly
Speaker 2: sick every time I see more stories because it's like,
Speaker 2: I'm very aware that we finished the episode of Trump's
Speaker 2: America where there was the battle of Minneapolis, and then
Speaker 2: Christy Nome was fired, and then they pulled back and
Speaker 2: Stephen Miller was sort of like, you know, had to
Speaker 2: go back in his cave for a little bit. And
Speaker 2: so everyone moved on and thinks, Okay, now things are
Speaker 2: good and things are not good.
Speaker 3: No, there may be fewer expenditures on expensive horse rental
Speaker 3: under Mark Wayne Mullen, the new DHS secretary, but things
Speaker 3: are as dastardly as ever. Let's just I mean, just
Speaker 3: for people who have not paid attention to what's going
Speaker 3: on in terms of detentions. Caitlin Akerson, who we have
Speaker 3: on the show on Runaway Country this week, has been
Speaker 3: doing some essential reporting from on the ground. The idea
Speaker 3: of family separations still happening. By her estimate, I think
Speaker 3: two hundred thousand parents have been deported and separated from
Speaker 3: their children, some of whom have ended up in foster care,
Speaker 3: some of whom have ended up with other relatives or strangers.
Speaker 3: There's no tracking for that part, and they can't get
Speaker 3: their kids back. In many cases, they're in dangerous places
Speaker 3: where they have no home, They're facing threats of gang violence,
Speaker 3: their children are locked in the United States. It is
Speaker 3: a devastating situation. So there's that reality. And then when
Speaker 3: you talk about what's happening inside the detention centers, I
Speaker 3: mean there, I think fifty people have died in detention
Speaker 3: since Trump took office. The standard of care in these
Speaker 3: detention centers is appalling. You're talking about medical concerns like
Speaker 3: people needing to see doctors for routine small issues that
Speaker 3: when they aren't treated, become life threatening issues. The lawyer
Speaker 3: that we spoke to, Melissa Shepherd from Immigration Defenders, talked
Speaker 3: about someone who had a hangnail that was left untreated
Speaker 3: and couldn't see a nurse, couldn't see a doctor, and
Speaker 3: eventually was at risk of dying from sepsis because of this. Right,
Speaker 3: these are I mean, then you talk about just basic
Speaker 3: you know, basic, basic, basic, basic levels of care, including
Speaker 3: clean water. They're being given moldy food or not enough
Speaker 3: food or contaminated water. The latrines aren't being cleaned. Detaims
Speaker 3: are volunteering to clean up and create shifts because nobody
Speaker 3: else is cleaning the facilities.
Speaker 2: I mean, these are pregnant women and children. These are
Speaker 2: elderly people who need their medicine. John, these are.
Speaker 3: People that've been living in the United States for like
Speaker 3: twenty years. Yes, they used to go to cvs to
Speaker 3: get their prescriptions like this is, and that doesn't it
Speaker 3: doesn't make it easier, It doesn't make it better if
Speaker 3: they weren't those people. But they were integrated into American society,
Speaker 3: and even if they didn't have the paperwork, they were
Speaker 3: living like we are. And they have been shunted into
Speaker 3: a just dark and unimaginably depressing, devastating environment from which
Speaker 3: there seems like no escape. These private prisons, these private
Speaker 3: detention centers are being run by for profit companies like
Speaker 3: the Geo Group, from which the Trump administration is cherry
Speaker 3: picking executives and making them the new head device. Tom
Speaker 3: Holman was a consultant to the geogroup. Ag Bondi back
Speaker 3: in twenty nineteen, another consultant to the Geogroup. It's a
Speaker 3: revolving door where you know, the snake is eating its
Speaker 3: own tail and as a result, there are you know,
Speaker 3: Geogroup has made I think an eight hundred percent increase
Speaker 3: in profits between twenty twenty four and twenty twenty five.
Speaker 3: It's really lucrative business to cram a bunch of people
Speaker 3: with no legal representation into sub human conditions and charge
Speaker 3: the government a lot of money for it. And that's
Speaker 3: what's happening. And now we're about to dump another seventy
Speaker 3: two billion dollars in ice in CPP's.
Speaker 2: Lab And like, we've both interviewed people who've been caught
Speaker 2: up in this and people who probably like have more
Speaker 2: means and maybe they're like Canadians that got caught up
Speaker 2: in it, but right, and they will say, like, it's
Speaker 2: not even like they're just deporting people, right, Like that's
Speaker 2: what I think. People have this image of a Trump
Speaker 2: wants to de poor people and he wants to deport
Speaker 2: you know, the world the worst or maybe just undocumented immigrants.
Speaker 2: And obviously it's gone beyond that. But it's beyond just deportation,
Speaker 2: which in some cases would be more humane than what
Speaker 2: they are doing to people in these detention centers. Some
Speaker 2: people are like begging to be deported something.
Speaker 3: Yes, well, that's the point. I think. One of the
Speaker 3: things they're doing is making the life so abominable that
Speaker 3: people just decide I'm going to give up on my case.
Speaker 3: I mean, and by the way, half the time they
Speaker 3: can't be in touch with their lawyers. They're shipped around
Speaker 3: from detention center to detention center. They're lost in the
Speaker 3: system and they give up hope. I mean, it's an
Speaker 3: incredibly emotionally traumatic thing to be snatched off the street. Kids,
Speaker 3: children taken, or children themselves.
Speaker 2: Kids are are kids age well, and like what happens
Speaker 2: after you spend a month in a detention center like that?
Speaker 3: I mean. I also, I mean there's no oversight into
Speaker 3: any of this. And you see Andy Kim, who you
Speaker 3: had on. I mean, when you have congressional representatives who
Speaker 3: are you know, tasked with oversight, trying to do their job,
Speaker 3: they are pepper sprayed, they are arrested, they are charged
Speaker 3: with crimes. I mean, and we have no idea what's
Speaker 3: happening in Dilly detention, which is where all the kids are.
Speaker 2: I will tell you when I was talking Andy Kim,
Speaker 2: I was thinking about remember that he was he was
Speaker 2: like a brand new new to Congress time of January sixth,
Speaker 2: and he was in the Capitol picking up the trash. Yes,
Speaker 2: and like I remember interviewing him after that and he
Speaker 2: was like so still so like hopeful even though that
Speaker 2: had happened, because he was and you know, when I
Speaker 2: interviewed him on Tuesday, he seemed like beat down. Yeah,
Speaker 2: Like when you see something like that, it's like and
Speaker 2: he's not the type of he's not the type of
Speaker 2: politician who's like hair on fire partisan this that he
Speaker 2: just he saw something and you can tell he like
Speaker 2: can't even believe what he saw.
Speaker 3: You can't unsee it or unlearn it. And I have
Speaker 3: to say one of the advantages of the way the
Speaker 3: government is handling deportations right now is it's happening, in
Speaker 3: large part behind the worst parts of it are happening
Speaker 3: behind closed doors. When Alex Pretty and Nana cole Good
Speaker 3: were killed, it alarmed the entire country because it was
Speaker 3: happening in broad daylight. And now the abuse and dehumanization
Speaker 3: of people is just happening behind closed doors. And they're
Speaker 3: brown people, and they have fewer rights, and there's less
Speaker 3: mainstream media coverage, and the federal government makes it very
Speaker 3: difficult to get information. Nonetheless, I mean, you know, this
Speaker 3: is happening in our name, and we are doing this
Speaker 3: to people who were once integrated members of our society,
Speaker 3: who contribute to our economy and to the fabric of
Speaker 3: our democracy. And I just think, you know, it's devastating
Speaker 3: for anybody that works on it, but we should be
Speaker 3: I mean, we should be all more publicly devastated by it.
Speaker 3: And in the context of this funding, you know, these
Speaker 3: jabbronis in Congress doing whatever they're doing. We shouldn't forget
Speaker 3: that the essential fight here. The reason this bill is
Speaker 3: happening through reconciliation is because the Democrats didn't want to
Speaker 3: fucking fund ICE and CPB without reforms because what they're
Speaker 3: doing is an abusive power. It is not constitutional, and
Speaker 3: that should always be the sort of EndNote for any
Speaker 3: discussion about whatever Congress ends up doing on reconciliation.
Speaker 2: Did you one more thing on this? Did you see
Speaker 2: on Wednesday? Homeland Security Secretary Mark Waynemullen refused to rule
Speaker 2: out his crazy as plan to basically shut down not basically,
Speaker 2: it would shut down international travel at airports in sanctuary
Speaker 2: cities by removing customs and border patrol officers. So here la,
Speaker 2: I mean, the first threat was Newark because there were
Speaker 2: the protests outside the Delaney Detention facility. And that is like,
Speaker 2: I don't know whether to be like that is completely
Speaker 2: insane and scary and what are we gonna do or
Speaker 2: like go for it, touch the stove, shut down, shut
Speaker 2: down international travel on this economy to the United States.
Speaker 2: That's gonna work.
Speaker 3: Yeah, No Republicans fly though, right they only they traveled
Speaker 3: by pony. What the fuck?
Speaker 2: Can you imagine the hit to the economy.
Speaker 3: It would be so bad. It's such an example of
Speaker 3: this idiot ass administration cutting off its nose despite its face.
Speaker 3: I mean, good job guys like make gas a trillion
Speaker 3: dollars a gallon and then shut down air travel way
Speaker 3: way to make America great again? I mean. And Mark
Speaker 3: Wayne Mullin in his you know notes on this plan,
Speaker 3: suggested that it's something they've been cooking up for a
Speaker 3: while and they're ready to execute on it until and
Speaker 3: unless ICE officers are respected. Well, you know, on some level,
Speaker 3: I have to say, John, maybe doing that, I mean,
Speaker 3: taking the setting aside the hit to the economy. It's
Speaker 3: like at least people would be reminded. I know that
Speaker 3: this is an ongoing side design.
Speaker 2: It's a touch and stove moment.
Speaker 5: This podcast is sponsored by Squarespace. Squarespace is the all
Speaker 5: in one website platform designed to elevate your online presence
Speaker 5: and drive your success. Squarespace provides all the tools you
Speaker 5: need to promote and get paid for your services in
Speaker 5: one platform. Whether you offer consultations, events, or other experiences,
Speaker 5: Squarespace can help you grow your business. Squarespace offers a
Speaker 5: complete library of professionally designed and award winning website templates
Speaker 5: with options for every use in every category. No matter
Speaker 5: where you start, Your website is flexible to what you
Speaker 5: need with intuitive drag and drop editing, beautiful styling options,
Speaker 5: unrivaled visual design effects on brand ai content in more
Speaker 5: ways to list what you offer, no experience acquired. Squarespace
Speaker 5: domains makes it easy to find the best name for
Speaker 5: your business at one fair, all inclusive price. There's no
Speaker 5: hidden fees or add ons required. Every Squarespace domain comes
Speaker 5: advanced privacy and security tools included to ensure your domain
Speaker 5: remains online and protected. Plus, squarespace provides everything you need
Speaker 5: to bring more of your dream to life, whether that
Speaker 5: means building a website or adding a professional email or service.
Speaker 5: Don't wait to claim your name. Invest in your dream
Speaker 5: domain today. Head to squarespace dot com for a free trial,
Speaker 5: and when you're ready to launch, go to squarespace dot
Speaker 5: com slash crooked to save ten percent off your first
Speaker 5: purchase of a website or domain. That's squarespace dot com
Speaker 5: slash crooked for ten percent off your first purchase of
Speaker 5: a website or domain.
Speaker 6: Podda America is brought to you by or A Frames.
Speaker 1: Dads are notoriously hard to buy for us, so this
Speaker 1: Father's Day, get him something he's guaranteed to love, an
Speaker 1: or a frame. How could a dad say no to
Speaker 1: hours of looking at pictures he already likes? That's right,
Speaker 1: he couldn't. You could easily load the R frame with dozens,
Speaker 1: even hundreds of pictures your dad will love, featuring family memberies,
Speaker 1: the kids and grandkids, beloved pets, or even random blurry
Speaker 1: iPhone picture or he sends to the family group chat
Speaker 1: with the caption get a load of this. Whatever you
Speaker 1: put in your frame, Ora insures that those memories don't
Speaker 1: just live in your head. The frame features free unlimited storage,
Speaker 1: meaning you can add as many photos and videos as
Speaker 1: you want. Every frame comes beautifully packaged in a premium
Speaker 1: gift box and you can preload photos before it even ships.
Speaker 1: Then he can keep adding photos from anywhere, anytime via
Speaker 1: the free or app or texting photos directly to the frame,
Speaker 1: which is great, because it's very likely or Dad will
Speaker 1: forget how immediately after you tell him, so you could
Speaker 1: just fill it with a bunch of family photos and
Speaker 1: then seeded through. Every fortieth picture is just Jeffrey Ebstein
Speaker 1: name number one by wirecutter. You can save now by
Speaker 1: visiting or frames dot com for a limited time. Listeners
Speaker 1: can get thirty five dollars off of select frames with
Speaker 1: code crooked. That's Aurea frames dot Com promo code crooked.
Speaker 1: Support the show by mentioning us at check out. Terms
Speaker 1: and conditions apply, So.
Speaker 2: Good news for the brains behind the J six slush fund.
Speaker 2: Trump announced this week that he intends to officially promote
Speaker 2: Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to permanent Attorney General. Todd Blo. Blanch,
Speaker 2: President's former personal defense lawyer, has been on a role
Speaker 2: since he took over for Pam Bondy. In addition to
Speaker 2: coming up with a slush fund, Blanche has brought a
Speaker 2: second indictment against Jim Comey for his Seashell art picture,
Speaker 2: and he's also stepped up an investigation into John Brennan.
Speaker 2: Blanche's nomination will have to go through the Senate Judiciary Committee,
Speaker 2: whose Republican members include John Cornyn and Tom Tillis. Are
Speaker 2: we gonna be stuck with Todd Blanche for as long
Speaker 2: as we're stuck with Donald Trump?
Speaker 3: Well, first of all, I mean, no matter what Tom
Speaker 3: Tillis intends on doing, there is the reality that Todd
Speaker 3: Blanche can stay acting age till Trump is out office.
Speaker 3: And I don't know if this is the time to
Speaker 3: mention the Julie suit situation, but under Biden in twenty
Speaker 3: twenty two, he could not get his acting or his
Speaker 3: deputy Labor secretary confirmed to be Labor secretary, in large
Speaker 3: part because of Joe Manchin and Kristen Cinema. Will set
Speaker 3: that aside for a rainy day another rank, but effectively
Speaker 3: set and I don't want to say set the precedent
Speaker 3: because I think what's happening here is much more nefarious,
Speaker 3: but opened the door to a mechanism by which a
Speaker 3: deputy secretary can become acting secretary for a largely indefinite
Speaker 3: period of time, assuming that the sort of paperwork around
Speaker 3: that is taking care of every year, and Republicans are
Speaker 3: looking at that, or the Trump administration, I would assume
Speaker 3: is looking at that and saying, well, if you could
Speaker 3: do that with your Labor Secretary, Julie Sue. We can
Speaker 3: do that with our wanna be ag ring kiss or
Speaker 3: extraordinary Todd Lynch.
Speaker 2: And this is sort of I mean, it's been the
Speaker 2: law forever and it's sort of like the Vacancies Act.
Speaker 2: Without getting into all of the details on this. Yes,
Speaker 2: if you are confirmed to be a deputy something something
Speaker 2: at a cabinet agency and then you're going to be acting,
Speaker 2: it is pretty easy to just restart the clock every year.
Speaker 2: Every year. We're now we're withdrawing the nomination. We're doing
Speaker 2: it again, and they're going to get a vote. They
Speaker 2: didn't get a vote, and now we're going to take you,
Speaker 2: you know, so like you can just play with the
Speaker 2: paperwork and Todd Lynch can serve forever, thank god, for
Speaker 2: as long as we have done.
Speaker 3: I don't know, I guess good job, Todd, Like what
Speaker 3: didn't you bow and what didn't you scrape in order
Speaker 3: to get that nod?
Speaker 2: Yeah? No, he's got it, that's for sure.
Speaker 3: And yet he's not the worst I think of the
Speaker 3: nominees that have been proposed this week.
Speaker 2: Well, here we go take it up for you.
Speaker 3: John.
Speaker 2: The Blanche News did briefly overshadow the appointment of Bill Poulty. Yes,
Speaker 2: the same Bill Poulty who's been using his perch a
Speaker 2: top the Federal Housing Finance Administration to manufacture mortgage fraud
Speaker 2: allegations against people on Trump's enemies list. Don't worry, he
Speaker 2: apparently still gets to keep that job too, because he's
Speaker 2: doing such a good job.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, Can he be the Viceroy of Venezuela as well?
Speaker 2: Probably? We only have a couple of people to do
Speaker 2: all the jobs now. No one else wants to work there.
Speaker 2: This is also the same Bill Poulty who Scott Best
Speaker 2: and threatened to punch in his fucking face. And it
Speaker 2: does seem like even Republicans and other Trump administration colleagues
Speaker 2: may not be super thrilled with making this dufus America's
Speaker 2: top spy chief. Let's listen.
Speaker 6: Do you think that Bill POLTI has the experience to
Speaker 6: be the actor DNI.
Speaker 2: I'll defer the chairman on that Centaer Cotton, you want
Speaker 2: to speak to that.
Speaker 5: We have four more weeks with Director Gabbard as the
Speaker 5: d and I and I look forward to implementing last
Speaker 5: year's Intelligence Authorization Act with her.
Speaker 2: I have no observations on the matter.
Speaker 4: Have you ever, specifically in the context of the intelligence community,
Speaker 4: heard the name Bill Paulty in the context of intelligence.
Speaker 2: That's what I say.
Speaker 3: Did you mean like the intelligence community or just intelligence generally?
Speaker 2: That's my question, Tom Cotton saying, I have no observations
Speaker 2: on the matter. I know that is all we got.
Speaker 3: You speak for all of us.
Speaker 2: Trump was asked about this one in the oval when
Speaker 2: he was giving us his renovation updates. And here's his explanation.
Speaker 5: Why do you think, mister president, he's the best person
Speaker 5: for the job.
Speaker 4: Well, he's very smart. He's a person who's got high integrity.
Speaker 4: And it's an acting position. It's not a provment. He's
Speaker 4: not going to be permanent because you know, I don't
Speaker 4: think he'd want to be prev And you may find
Speaker 4: out some things about the rigged elections et cetera, et
Speaker 4: cetera have been necessary for You're used to president the
Speaker 4: necessary national security experience to take on that, Well, I do,
Speaker 4: and I think he does actually because he's smart.
Speaker 2: That's it. Trump says, you're smart, you have all the experience.
Speaker 2: What's your level of concern on this one?
Speaker 1: Hi?
Speaker 3: Very high? Hi, Hi, I think even and especially the
Speaker 3: fact that he's just serving for a specific window to
Speaker 3: find election interference right ahead of the midterm elections. What
Speaker 3: could go wrong? I will draw everybody's attention, like as
Speaker 3: if you didn't give us enough examples of this person
Speaker 3: be clowning himself in life. Will summer at.
Speaker 2: The point, I'm so glad you brought this up. Oh,
Speaker 2: it's such a good story. It's such a good story.
Speaker 2: Everyone go read it.
Speaker 3: Pull despential, like much of twenty twenty three, trying like
Speaker 3: as a meme stock investor, trying to get people to
Speaker 3: invest in like worthless shares of bed Bath and Beyond.
Speaker 2: Yes, and as smart as his sole mission.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's all he did. And like basically they will
Speaker 3: will talks about how he organizes an event in December
Speaker 3: of twenty twenty three at a Florida hangar, I guess,
Speaker 3: like an airplane hangar that was dedicated to the conspiracy
Speaker 3: that Bed Bath and Beyond never actually went bankrupt. With
Speaker 3: Pulty sitting on stage, one promoter slapped a grateful supporter
Speaker 3: in the face with a green dildo, which was apparently
Speaker 3: a powerful symbol in their inscrutable online subculture. He uncovers
Speaker 3: what that inscrutable dildo symbolism means, and it's just as
Speaker 3: heinous as you would imagine it to be. This is
Speaker 3: the person that Trump wants to put in charge of
Speaker 3: our intelligence infrastructure.
Speaker 2: Do you see what he got at that event? So
Speaker 2: he was sitting there while the dildo incident occurred. Someone
Speaker 2: else got slapped in the face with the green dildo.
Speaker 2: And then Paulty was given a little trophy with the
Speaker 2: t rex on it and it said it said Poulty
Speaker 2: only fucks the young.
Speaker 3: Well, okay, he I think they were on two It
Speaker 3: was two different sides of the trophy. But yes, if
Speaker 3: you put all the sentence together, that's what. It's only
Speaker 3: the young and he fucks and so he foxes on
Speaker 3: one side. And I believe on the fact the cracker
Speaker 3: Jack fact checking, yet he fox only the young. It
Speaker 3: is all I mean, I just we have to go
Speaker 3: back to the phallic obsession of this administration. It is
Speaker 3: all just about dick swinging, and like he proved himself
Speaker 3: to be both at once willing to be castrated by
Speaker 3: Donald Trump but having some kind of dick to swing
Speaker 3: around at some point, or at least a dildo. I'm
Speaker 3: sorry that this has gotten so lude. I know it's
Speaker 3: a family pro I mean, but it's not fault. It's
Speaker 3: not it's the new acting director of National Intelligence who
Speaker 3: reportedly gave Trump that you are the You are Jesus J. Pegg.
Speaker 2: Yes, the guy.
Speaker 3: He's the behind the fifty year mortgage boondoggle. Like, what
Speaker 3: we're really talking about this guy? I mean, not only
Speaker 3: does he have I mean it's almost like the fact
Speaker 3: that he has zero qualifications for the job an afterthought.
Speaker 3: He is com completely morally and like I would say,
Speaker 3: ethically corrupt. He's a joke. And I would hope that
Speaker 3: Trump's suggestion that he'll only be in the office temporarily
Speaker 3: is some kind of hat tip to the fact that
Speaker 3: he knows that he's a joke. Yeah, but that should
Speaker 3: not call him anybody's fears, because as you know, it's
Speaker 3: quite obvious. I mean, he's being put in there for
Speaker 3: one reason only, and that is to help Trump find
Speaker 3: a reason to say that the results of the twenty
Speaker 3: twenty election were fraudulent and potentially to say that the
Speaker 3: results of the twenty twenty six midterms should not give
Speaker 3: Democrats to gabble.
Speaker 2: And you know, we just talked about why it's challenging
Speaker 2: to prevent the president from putting someone in a temporary position.
Speaker 2: And yeah, for you know, for as long as he wants.
Speaker 2: Section seven oh two warrantless wiretapping authority is up for
Speaker 2: renewal Thatttle Chestnut and both parties have negotiated surprisingly an
Speaker 2: agreeable solution to that. So they were going to put
Speaker 2: that up for a vote. But now Democrats are saying,
Speaker 2: we're not going to reauthorize that if the person in
Speaker 2: charge of it is this fucking dufus, And they're wondering
Speaker 2: if enough anti Poulty Republicans would join along try to
Speaker 2: use that as leverage. I think I saw maybe Collins, Murkowski,
Speaker 2: and Tillis voted for an amendment that would prevent Poulty
Speaker 2: from being a DNI chair that they added, But I
Speaker 2: don't think any of the other Republicans voted for I
Speaker 2: don't think the past.
Speaker 3: I can't believe you have to debate them, you have
Speaker 3: to sweeten it, like, we know he's a clown, we
Speaker 3: know he's a maniac, we know he's completely untrustworthy and
Speaker 3: could do crazy damage to the democracy. But if that's
Speaker 3: not enough, we're going to hold seven oh to FISA
Speaker 3: wire having an authorization hostage. It's insane to me that
Speaker 3: Democrats have to add a sweetener to attract more Republicans
Speaker 3: when this person is so categorically unqualified for this job.
Speaker 3: It's shameful.
Speaker 2: I wonder what John Ratcliffe thinks. Who is the CIA
Speaker 2: director and like not my cup of tea, but like
Speaker 2: a profession Yeah, and you know, I know that the
Speaker 2: ORG chart there is a little little loosey goosey, but
Speaker 2: he still has to like, like, this is the director
Speaker 2: of National Intelligence. Maybe they just cut him. I bet
Speaker 2: they cut him out of all the important stuff. And
Speaker 2: then when Trump wants really bad shit done, then Paulty
Speaker 2: gets access to everyone.
Speaker 3: Which is what he's already digging up. You know, he's
Speaker 3: rummaging around mortgage files, trying to find fraudulent mortgage applications
Speaker 3: so that he can tag Letitia James and Jim Comey.
Speaker 3: I mean, he this is all so utterly embarrassing. And
Speaker 3: yet what's crazy is we don't know what happened, Like
Speaker 3: we don't know if the visa reauthorization is going to
Speaker 3: be sufficient enough to get Trump's party to shut down
Speaker 3: the nomination of someone who could do grave damage, not
Speaker 3: just to do the democracy, but even to them. You
Speaker 3: know what I mean, Once you cross Trump, once you're
Speaker 3: no longer in office at anything's fair game. Like they're
Speaker 3: in peril as much as anybody else.
Speaker 2: You know, there's a lot that if Democrats take Congress
Speaker 2: that they can't achieve in two years with Donald Trump
Speaker 2: as president because he's still got veto power. But these
Speaker 2: are the kinds of things, especially PULTI, where if Democrats
Speaker 2: have control of Congress, you haul this guy in for questioning,
Speaker 2: you send subpoenas not just for him, but for document
Speaker 2: like you can. You can make stuff happen if you
Speaker 2: control Congress with appointments. This horrendous for sure.
Speaker 3: Tulsey Gabbert looked like j Edgar Hoover, doesn't it?
Speaker 5: I guess in a in the best possible way, Patze
Speaker 5: of America is brought to you by Wild Alaskan Company.
Speaker 5: The difference between low and high quality seafood is enormous,
Speaker 5: but it's also one of those things it's tough to
Speaker 5: accurately assess for yourself in the grocery store. Wild Alaskan
Speaker 5: Company offers the best way to get wild caught high
Speaker 5: quality seafood delivered to your door on your schedule. Each
Speaker 5: Wild Alaskan box comes with individually portioned filetse vacuum sealed,
Speaker 5: easy prep and great for any meal, no matter how
Speaker 5: quick or elevated. All fish is quick frozen fresh from
Speaker 5: the Alaskan waters, which helps lock in its freshness, texture, flavor,
Speaker 5: and key nutrients.
Speaker 2: They comega threes.
Speaker 5: It's fish you can trust with no GMOs, antibiotics or
Speaker 5: other additives. Every order supports sustainable harvesting practices in Alaskan
Speaker 5: fishermen whose history is tied to the region and the practice.
Speaker 5: Gotten a couple boxes of a Wild Alaskan Company. Everything
Speaker 5: tasted amazing. We ate some salmon, there was some white
Speaker 5: fish for fish tacos. I think there's some halbit. It
Speaker 5: tasted fresh, it was delicious. It was super easy to
Speaker 5: thaw out or just keep in the freezer for wherever
Speaker 5: you needed it. Highly recommend and Wild Alaskan Company is
Speaker 5: so confident that their fish is the best that they
Speaker 5: can offer a one hundred percent satisfaction and money back
Speaker 5: guarantee so you can try your first box risk free.
Speaker 5: Good Wild Alaskan dot Com slash crooked for thirty five
Speaker 5: dollars off your first order of premium wildcotseeafood that's wild
Speaker 5: Alaskan dot com slash crooked for thirty five dollars off
Speaker 5: your first order. Thanks to Wild Alaskan Come for sponsoring
Speaker 5: this episode.
Speaker 6: Hot Day America is brought to you by Helix Sleep.
Speaker 6: It's so important. A good night's rest sets you up
Speaker 6: for a great next day. I have trouble sleeping.
Speaker 1: I've had trouble sleeping in the past, usually because if
Speaker 1: thoughts in my brain, or I could fall asleep and
Speaker 1: not wake up, or I had caffeine too late, or
Speaker 1: the room is too hot, or the room is too cold,
Speaker 1: or you know the many different things you didn't finish
Speaker 1: that day that you said you were going to do.
Speaker 1: Helix didn't solve any of those problems. But the mattress
Speaker 1: is very comfortable. You get your mattress right to your
Speaker 1: door with free shipping in the US. How do you
Speaker 1: know which mattress is right for you? You take the
Speaker 1: Helix Sleep Quiz, which will match you with a perfect
Speaker 1: mattress based on your personal preferences and sleep habits. They
Speaker 1: have over twenty mattress models so you can find the
Speaker 1: perfect fit for you. The Happy with heliks Guarantee offers
Speaker 1: a risk free customer first experience. It's not to ensure
Speaker 1: you're completely satisfied with your new mattress, so you can
Speaker 1: rest easy with seamless returns and exchanges. He Loox offers
Speaker 1: one hundred and twenty nights sleep trial and a limited
Speaker 1: lifetime warranty. I have the dawn Luck, super comfortable, really
Speaker 1: glad to have it, and it's been better than other
Speaker 1: mattresses I've gotten in the past, so I recommend it.
Speaker 1: Helix Sleep dot com slash crooked for twenty percent off
Speaker 1: site wid be's he looks sleep dot com slash crooked
Speaker 1: for twenty percent off site wide. He looks Sleep dot
Speaker 1: Com slash crooked.
Speaker 2: One more congressional development of note before we leave Capitol Hill.
Speaker 2: Four House Republicans, including Thomas Massey, joined Democrats on Wednesday
Speaker 2: and passing a war Powers resolution directing the president to
Speaker 2: end military operations in Iran. Democrats and Republicans in the
Speaker 2: Senate advanced a similar measure a few weeks ago. This
Speaker 2: is all largely symbolic, however, because Trump can just veto
Speaker 2: the resolution, which he's not too happy with. He responded
Speaker 2: on Thursday by calling the warp powers a vote unpatriotic,
Speaker 2: the Republicans who voted for it grandstanders, and the Democrats Democrats,
Speaker 2: which seems to be his new nickname of choice. We
Speaker 2: haven't played a clip yet of this on this program,
Speaker 2: but he has said now multiple times he tells this
Speaker 2: story and he's like, you know, a lot of people
Speaker 2: don't know that dumb has a B at the end.
Speaker 2: This is what he's been saying, and like straight face,
Speaker 2: and he's like, I call them the Democrats.
Speaker 3: For who the bell tolls eight tolls.
Speaker 2: For people below't know all this time, you know there's
Speaker 2: a B at the end of dumb. Meanwhile, there seems
Speaker 2: to have been zero progress this week and actually ending
Speaker 2: the war in Iran, which Trump said Wednesday is quote
Speaker 2: not a big thing, not a big thing for the
Speaker 2: US to detour. I'd like to read you some rave
Speaker 2: reviews about the Iran war in the Wall Street Journal
Speaker 2: today Thursday. Quote it has achieved enough to produce a
Speaker 2: far better Middle East. Quote reaching no deal is fine
Speaker 2: end quote, this is a new day in the Middle East, cared.
Speaker 2: I guess the author.
Speaker 3: Hmmm, I'm gonna say who who? John who loves ill
Speaker 3: can see regime change more than someone from the George W.
Speaker 3: Bush administration. Could it be?
Speaker 2: It's Condialeza Rice pops are head up to just give
Speaker 2: a ringing endorsement of our progress on Iran.
Speaker 3: Which is less welcome the Jill Biden memoir or the
Speaker 3: Condaleza Rice op ed.
Speaker 2: Honestly, the You'll Biden memoir that's saying something, but the
Speaker 2: only because the Kandye Rice one is like, what is
Speaker 2: this gonna do?
Speaker 1: What?
Speaker 3: Also, what are you doing?
Speaker 2: What are you doing?
Speaker 3: Let me burnish my reputation by defending a failing president
Speaker 3: that broadly misguided war.
Speaker 2: That is commitment to the bit that like she is
Speaker 2: a true, true Neo Khan till till the end.
Speaker 3: I read this and I was like, are you kidding lady?
Speaker 3: The war? First of all, she writes about it in
Speaker 3: the past tense, and I'm like, wait a second. It
Speaker 3: drew America, Israel and Arab States closer through defense, cooperation
Speaker 3: and intelligence. What didn't draw the region closer? It also
Speaker 3: showed that although Iran can close the straight of horror moves,
Speaker 3: that leverage is limited. Is what it doesn't seem like it.
Speaker 3: His approval rating is like negative one million right now,
Speaker 3: and he's about to hemorrhage any leverage he has in conquer, Like,
Speaker 3: what in the fuck are you talking about?
Speaker 2: Also, and she's like, and do we need the enriched uranium? Sure,
Speaker 2: but that can be a tomorrow problem.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yes, John, there are large dog piles of highly
Speaker 3: enriched uranium somewhere in ran. But this is a problem
Speaker 3: for the future, not today, really well, and then goes
Speaker 3: on to just like sbout pure conjecture about like anyway,
Speaker 3: there ways of enriching it are probably dismantled or destroyed.
Speaker 3: Trust me. What I don't like hindsight is negative twenty twenty.
Speaker 3: Like the whole thing is just like we have learned.
Speaker 3: I mean, I just the hubrious, the foolishness. Anyway, I
Speaker 3: delighted in it. Actually, yes, it was breaking.
Speaker 2: I was trying to figure out what it was. And
Speaker 2: buried in there is her saying like, you know, no
Speaker 2: deal is fine, and that's better than a bad deal.
Speaker 2: And she said, under no circumstances can we be lifting
Speaker 2: any sanctions and giving them money? Yeah, And so she
Speaker 2: is doing the classic yes, anti anti Trump Republican thing
Speaker 2: of being like, I think we can play him right,
Speaker 2: because we'll tell him that the war went great, but
Speaker 2: what we really don't want is pellets of cash to Iran.
Speaker 2: And they don't want a deal where we unfreeze sanctions
Speaker 2: and unfreeze funds for them in exchange for getting rid
Speaker 2: of the nuclear material, which was the whole reason that
Speaker 2: we started the war in the first place ostensibly, and
Speaker 2: opening the straight up hor Moves, which was open at
Speaker 2: the beginning of the war. And so she's like, yeah,
Speaker 2: understand all that, but things aren't that bad, and so
Speaker 2: what she really wants is a deal to open the
Speaker 2: straight no money to Iran, and then just cut and run.
Speaker 3: I don't know how you negotiate that deal, and nobody
Speaker 3: seems to be able to. But like, I guess, nice
Speaker 3: try Kandy, You're totally right that It's like we will
Speaker 3: stroke the dog, will come running at us with saliva
Speaker 3: foaming at its mouth, and we will stroke the dog
Speaker 3: right between the eyes, right between the eyes, and we
Speaker 3: will calm the dog down, and then we will get
Speaker 3: it into the cage. And it's like, no, that dog's
Speaker 3: going to fucking bite you. It's good.
Speaker 2: Dog's uh. All right, let's talk about the big we
Speaker 2: had this rule, the ongoing and Iowa, Josh Turret beat
Speaker 2: Zach Wallas to become the Democratic Senate candidate. He'll be
Speaker 2: squaring off against Ashley Hinson in November in a race
Speaker 2: that Cook political report has now shifted from likely Republican
Speaker 2: to lean Republican. So Iowa Senate in play in Montana,
Speaker 2: a Bernie AOC backed smoke jumper and union leader named
Speaker 2: Sam Forstagg beat two moderate Democrats to become the nominee
Speaker 2: in the state's first congressional district, which Republican Ryan Zinke
Speaker 2: is vacating.
Speaker 3: Hot Fireman, dude, we need more fucking smoke jumpers. I'm
Speaker 3: sorry to curse him. We need more smoke jumpers. Please
Speaker 3: delete the fucking we need more smoke jumpers.
Speaker 2: Smoke jumpers. I just look at what a smoke jumper.
Speaker 3: Was I did. I actually just assumed it was fire
Speaker 3: religious glad that it's not some acrobatics that I was
Speaker 3: unaware Of'm like parkour for fire.
Speaker 2: No, it's like it's definitely fire related. And here in
Speaker 2: California we're still counting votes as we will be potentially
Speaker 2: for another week or two.
Speaker 3: So embarrassing.
Speaker 2: I know it is embarrassing as of right now. The
Speaker 2: guy His race shows Republican Steve Hilton and Democrat Javier
Speaker 2: Bassera in lead, though there's a small chance the Democrat
Speaker 2: Tom Steyer could catch Basera as more ballots are counted.
Speaker 2: He's currently about six percent behind. In the mayor's race,
Speaker 2: Karen bass is headed to the runoff in November, and
Speaker 2: currently Republican reality TV Doe Spencer Pratt is in second,
Speaker 2: but there's also a chance the Progressive challenger Nythia Rahman
Speaker 2: could catch him. She's currently seven percent behind. Election analysts
Speaker 2: say that in the past, the ballots got bluer the
Speaker 2: later they were counted, and that may be especially true
Speaker 2: in this election, since a lot of undecided Democrats held
Speaker 2: their ballots until the very end.
Speaker 3: Like the people who usually said at this table.
Speaker 2: Like the people who usually sit at this end. I mean,
Speaker 2: I I decided late before these guys, But I did.
Speaker 2: I turned it on Monday.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's still considered late.
Speaker 2: That's pretty Yeah. I dropped it in. I dropped it
Speaker 2: in a box on Monday, So who knows when it
Speaker 2: finally got to the may not have Yeah, while we
Speaker 2: have you here in La, what have you made of
Speaker 2: our California primaries?
Speaker 3: Cousin to count your boats a lot faster. There are
Speaker 3: machines that will help you. I am. You know, we
Speaker 3: focused actually on both Texas and California and last week's
Speaker 3: Runaway Country, and we had the inimitable Daniel Pfeiffer on
Speaker 3: and it worries me as someone who would like to
Speaker 3: see a changing of the guard in twenty twenty eight
Speaker 3: about what this could portend for the Democratic Party writ large.
Speaker 3: It's a good point just because there's I mean, I
Speaker 3: think the gubernatorial race is a little different. It was
Speaker 3: hit with obviously the Swallowell revelations or accusations or whatever
Speaker 3: we're calling them, and that up ended, I guess the race.
Speaker 3: But there's a real lack of enthusiasm, no coalescing. It's
Speaker 3: what exactly the party wants to do in terms of
Speaker 3: like it's priorities for like arguably one of the most
Speaker 3: the most important state in the Union. I'm a New Yorker,
Speaker 3: so I can't really give you that, but you know,
Speaker 3: there's no clear agenda. There's a lack of enthusiasm. There's
Speaker 3: a sense that everyone's votes are very scattered and it's
Speaker 3: based on strategy, and that's not how you win a
Speaker 3: national election, and I worry that some of that can
Speaker 3: trickle down to what is going to be very crowded
Speaker 3: primary field and where I think the order of the
Speaker 3: day is going to be electability, which is so what
Speaker 3: the fuck is that?
Speaker 2: And I mean, I guess it makes super important, super
Speaker 2: hard to define exactly, very subjective and not totally subjective
Speaker 2: though that's the real You want to be like, well,
Speaker 2: you can't dismiss it totally and be like, well, it's
Speaker 2: all subjective. No one knows electability. Yeah, you can kind
Speaker 2: of tell, but it's also not perfectly objective either.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And the mayoral race really worries me in many ways.
Speaker 3: The gubernatorial race, I will set aside to like sort
Speaker 3: of strange dynamics, but the mayoral race seems like an
Speaker 3: area where Democrats are having a really hard time articulating
Speaker 3: a message that is dressing people's deep seated concerns. So
Speaker 3: much so that a no nothing reality TV star sounds
Speaker 3: familiar has somehow vaulted to the like the head of
Speaker 3: the pack. I mean, that's that's not good. That means
Speaker 3: there's real desperation inside. You know, one of the bluest
Speaker 3: cities in the blue estates in the country. So what
Speaker 3: does that mean for the country where it's not as
Speaker 3: blue and it's not as concentrated. I just I I
Speaker 3: don't like what I'm seeing here, and I genuinely love
Speaker 3: this state.
Speaker 2: I have been like grumbling about this to anyone who listened.
Speaker 2: But all the Democrats running in California in these primaries
Speaker 2: mayor and governor, who's the really inspiring communicator? Yeah, who's
Speaker 2: really good? Who gets who's good at getting attention by
Speaker 2: just talking and not spending two hundred billion dollars two
Speaker 2: hundred million dollars like Tom Styre did, not a lot
Speaker 2: of them. And then you have someone Katie Porter's a
Speaker 2: good example. Here's someone who in twenty eighteen rising star,
Speaker 2: great communicator, policy want but also someone who's like explained
Speaker 2: it and accessible way had the whiteboard. And then she
Speaker 2: has a personal character issue right with staff. So then
Speaker 2: you got that and that becomes a theme in the
Speaker 2: Democratic Party as well. Now, right, so you got that
Speaker 2: kind of person, you got your nithias like this, and
Speaker 2: a lot of other folks were running to who are
Speaker 2: like good at the job. You can tell they're going
Speaker 2: to be good at the job, and they have brilliant people,
Speaker 2: but like, were they born to be campaigners? Not really.
Speaker 2: We've had a lot of that in the Democratic Party. Yeah, right,
Speaker 2: And then you have the Besias, the Karen Basses, who
Speaker 2: their claim to fame is just sticking around long enough
Speaker 2: and just hanging around Democratic politics and being part of
Speaker 2: the establishment and making enough connections in the establishment that
Speaker 2: suddenly people are ready to rally behind you. And do
Speaker 2: you have good intentions? Yeah, I'm sure. I'm sure Karen
Speaker 2: Bass had great intentions when she took the job, and
Speaker 2: same with I assume that of Javier Biserra because I
Speaker 2: like to always assume well about people. But Karen Bass
Speaker 2: didn't adequately communicate in the last couple of years on
Speaker 2: this job. She didn't show the kind of urgency you
Speaker 2: need to show to be mayor of a city this large,
Speaker 2: even though it's a weak mayor. That actually means you
Speaker 2: have to work even harder to communicate in a weak
Speaker 2: mayor system. And you know that doesn't surprise me because
Speaker 2: in Congress is a member of Congress, which she was
Speaker 2: for so long. You can just kind of hang out
Speaker 2: in Congress and take your votes. But like, we need leadership, yeah,
Speaker 2: we need people to like stand up and point somewhere
Speaker 2: and say this is where we're going, and this is
Speaker 2: how we get there, and get behind me, and we're
Speaker 2: going to get excited. And it's like, where is that?
Speaker 3: Well, And the party by nature doesn't lend it sort
Speaker 3: of antithetical to be standing up and guiding everything in
Speaker 3: the Democratic Party, which is much more of a consensus
Speaker 3: oriented group of people, right, and it's much more inclusive
Speaker 3: and expansive in thought and agenda and all the rest.
Speaker 3: But that is a sort of structural problem for a
Speaker 3: party that desperately needs leadership and like executive style leadership.
Speaker 2: Yes, And it bunks me out to say it, because
Speaker 2: first of all, it is really hard to run for office,
Speaker 2: and it's a lot of sacrifice, and especially in this environment,
Speaker 2: it's like why does anyone want to go through that? Right?
Speaker 2: And there are so many people who are going through
Speaker 2: it right now, who are wonderful candidates who people will
Speaker 2: maybe never hear about because they're just putting their head
Speaker 2: down and trying to win their races. And they're not
Speaker 2: as flashy as some of the other candidates we talk about,
Speaker 2: and like, God bless them. But when we get to president,
Speaker 2: this is going to be the Yeah, this is why
Speaker 2: it's like this is spook in me, because you can
Speaker 2: you can do that in a congressional race. You can
Speaker 2: do that probably even in a Senate race. As you
Speaker 2: get to governor in this state, or as you get
Speaker 2: to a mayor or now especially when you get to president,
Speaker 2: it's going to be a lot tougher to do that. Yeah,
Speaker 2: just sort of fake it. Yeah, you need the real
Speaker 2: talent there.
Speaker 3: It's true. I know that town's come from California. JK, JK.
Speaker 3: It's a great state. It is a great people here,
Speaker 3: a lot of great people. Favreau twenty eight.
Speaker 2: Yeah, right, okay, Right, as we were speaking of all this,
Speaker 2: right as we're preparing to record this, the much rumored
Speaker 2: second New York Time story on Graham Platner's problematic behavior dropped.
Speaker 2: This one talks about his relationships with his past girlfriends.
Speaker 2: Several of them spoke of him fondly. Three others the
Speaker 2: time spoke to described quote, toxic relationships that were unsettling.
Speaker 2: I'm going to try to quote as much as I
Speaker 2: can here because it is it's a lot to untangle
Speaker 2: in this piece. Yeah, the most prominent voice in the
Speaker 2: piece is a longtime conservative activist. He dated between twenty
Speaker 2: thirteen and twenty fifteen, so I guess this is when
Speaker 2: he was in DC. And she said that while Platner
Speaker 2: quote never hit me, he once yanked her out of
Speaker 2: a cab by her wrist and also during one argument,
Speaker 2: twisted her arm behind her back, shoved her into a
Speaker 2: bedroom and told her to remain there until she was calm.
Speaker 2: Platner strongly disputes any claims of physical intimidation or altercations.
Speaker 2: This is all according to the Times. Seems like every
Speaker 2: time you're on the show, there's a big turn in
Speaker 2: the Platiner story. So welcome back.
Speaker 3: Coincidence or not?
Speaker 2: What do you think of this one?
Speaker 3: I feel like I get the gram Platiner hot potato lamb.
Speaker 2: I really do.
Speaker 3: And there's not even Dan here to, you know, create
Speaker 3: some levity around the absurdity of all of this.
Speaker 2: Dan never gets it, by the way.
Speaker 3: I feel like every time, well, it's just a quiet
Speaker 3: sort of rivalry that Dan and I have, like Platiner v. Mills. I.
Speaker 3: I will say, there's another part of the piece again
Speaker 3: quoted a quote or we're told by this conservative activist
Speaker 3: former girlfriend, where she says that Platner had what she
Speaker 3: described as a warrior ethos and would fantasize about killing
Speaker 3: people he deemed a threat. She said that he told
Speaker 3: her that rape was about power. It was something that
Speaker 3: stuck with her through the years. She said he said
Speaker 3: this a lot. If anybody ever broke in here, I
Speaker 3: would rape them, she recalled, saying that he added it
Speaker 3: would not be in a sexual way, not in a
Speaker 3: gay way. He was like, I would rape them to
Speaker 3: show them that I'm dominant. Yeah, I mean, okay, this
Speaker 3: is where it's like, this is really this fucking sucks.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I I.
Speaker 3: I want to be a person that has learned the
Speaker 3: lessons of like if you have multiple people accusing the
Speaker 3: one person of very similar behavioral power, like there's a
Speaker 3: good chance there's something there. This story goes. I mean,
Speaker 3: they go out of their way in the Times piece
Speaker 3: to quote girlfriends who were like, he was a gentle giant,
Speaker 3: I have nothing bad to say about him. But then
Speaker 3: they're a handful of women that more like I, you know,
Speaker 3: his behavior was sometimes made me feel not safe. And
Speaker 3: then this one in particular, this one ex girlfriend has
Speaker 3: the most distressing and in my mind, disqualifying things to
Speaker 3: say about him, and I think, like, we can't, this
Speaker 3: can't be brushed aside. He has to he has to,
Speaker 3: you know, tackle this head on. And if this was
Speaker 3: a Republican everybody would say, no fucking way. Yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean that's just the truth. Like with all of this.
Speaker 3: She also said, and then right, well fine, and ultimately
Speaker 3: this is an up to you in me, this is
Speaker 3: up to the voters of Maine. And this is a
Speaker 3: really interesting study. I mean, so much of what Platner
Speaker 3: represents was the less answer to the toxic masculinity of
Speaker 3: the right. And what's really fucking unf fortunate is that
Speaker 3: this kind of masculinity, if this stuff is true, is
Speaker 3: just as fucking toxic as everything being served.
Speaker 6: On the right.
Speaker 3: And there has to be a difference. There has to
Speaker 3: be a difference between what the left is proposing men
Speaker 3: and strength can look like and what the right is
Speaker 3: because otherwise we as women and the citizens of a
Speaker 3: democracy are completely fucked. So I would love to hear
Speaker 3: a lot more from Grand Platner on this, like getting
Speaker 3: into these allegies. She also suggests that he taught her
Speaker 3: the name of his Nazi tattoo and knew very much
Speaker 3: that it was a Nazi tattoo called the my tote
Speaker 3: cuff my tote.
Speaker 2: Cof, which makes me is the exact language that was
Speaker 2: used in Andrew Kazinski's piece about this. Because Andrew did
Speaker 2: he's a great reporter and said this on Tuesday, we
Speaker 2: basically reported that an acquaintance of his said that he
Speaker 2: had told her my tote cough before. So I was like,
Speaker 2: I want it. The language was the same, so I
Speaker 2: wonder if it was the same source. But regardless, look,
Speaker 2: I said on Tuesday Show that Platner's biggest issue going
Speaker 2: forward is trust. Yeah, and there are allegations in this
Speaker 2: story about the SSESS symbol and when he found out
Speaker 2: and what he knew, And you know, after that, he
Speaker 2: got more questions about, you know, were there any more
Speaker 2: skeletons in your closet? He said no. Then the sexting
Speaker 2: story came out, he got more questions about whether there
Speaker 2: are additional allegations coming out from Democratic senators this week,
Speaker 2: and he said nothing like the rumors that have been circulating.
Speaker 2: I'm not going to shed the rumors here, but the
Speaker 2: rumors have been they have been actually much much worse
Speaker 2: than what The New York Times ended up with and
Speaker 2: he said, no, nothing like those rumors that we've been hearing,
Speaker 2: which may be technically true. But now there's this story, right,
Speaker 2: and even if he is completely telling the truth, and
Speaker 2: this is it and he really is a different, better
Speaker 2: person who and he says in the story, I was
Speaker 2: a bad boyfriend, I drank too much. He has said
Speaker 2: all kinds of things about how horrible he was before
Speaker 2: he tried to turn his life around, even if he
Speaker 2: is telling the truth about that, which I can't judge.
Speaker 2: You can't judge, None of us can judge. The problem
Speaker 2: is it's going to be really hard to blame voters
Speaker 2: who wonder whether they can.
Speaker 3: Believe you can't blame voters. But also it's not even
Speaker 3: beyond Justeres that sucks. Is this a person who does
Speaker 3: this stuff? I mean that that's a fun essential question.
Speaker 3: I mean, like it is, harp. It is like very difficult.
Speaker 3: Well that's what, given how how absolutely asymmetrical, the asymmetrical
Speaker 3: the value system is here that democrat, you know, like
Speaker 3: that a person who otherwise has adopted a very sort
Speaker 3: of strong set of beliefs and policies that would help
Speaker 3: a large part of this country and seems very much
Speaker 3: like he believes those things could be shut down based
Speaker 3: on this. But if this is true, I mean, you can't.
Speaker 3: It's a moral You can't behave like this. You can't
Speaker 3: talk about women and do things like this to them.
Speaker 3: You can't talk about rape like that. I mean you
Speaker 3: you cannot fucking do that. That is, those are not
Speaker 3: the morals of a sensible party. And I don't know,
Speaker 3: I I gotta say because I I mean, I remember that,
Speaker 3: and I understand the repulsion of like having the DSCC
Speaker 3: involve itself in a Senate race. But everybody was like
Speaker 3: Janet Mills is too old. And I remember talking to
Speaker 3: Dan about this and I was like, I mean, yeah,
Speaker 3: she's old, but like Graham Platner has a lot of
Speaker 3: fucking question marks, guys.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well, I mean here's the thing about that is
Speaker 2: two things can be right, fine, but.
Speaker 3: I do It's like I think, like, you know, but
Speaker 3: all I'm saying is, and I see that, like there
Speaker 3: was so much interest in the fact that he could
Speaker 3: be a noose kind of masculinity for the left, and
Speaker 3: it's like, I'm sorry that she's old and that she's
Speaker 3: a woman, and that she was governor, but she was
Speaker 3: tough in her I'm not a Mills person.
Speaker 2: I'm not and I'm not like if they if if
Speaker 2: if you know, if they decide tomorrow like they're gonna
Speaker 2: replace him with Mills and Mills that's all. I'm not
Speaker 2: gonna be like, Oh no, like great, we need to
Speaker 2: win the fucking seat. That's the most important thing. It's
Speaker 2: not about like, it's not about Grand Platner, right, It's
Speaker 2: about it's about winning this it is, and.
Speaker 3: You know what, it's a good fucking thing. I was
Speaker 3: back on the map.
Speaker 2: I guess is that wells like I do try to separate,
Speaker 2: like this is a political situation and this is like
Speaker 2: a personal situation, right, Like imagine if we were talking
Speaker 2: about this person and he wasn't running for office. Okay,
Speaker 2: just as an experiment here, because I think this is
Speaker 2: what has been bothering me about it is like I
Speaker 2: do very much believe in the ability to redeem oneself
Speaker 2: and to change and to become a better person. And
Speaker 2: I still think it is very possible that this is
Speaker 2: the case with him, that all that stuff in the
Speaker 2: past is true. Yeah, and that somewhere along the line,
Speaker 2: as he says, he was like, my life is really
Speaker 2: fucked up. And you know, people say, like he's blaming
Speaker 2: the war, but like you know, every time, every person
Speaker 2: who's fucked up is a product of their environment and
Speaker 2: their own choices. It's both right. And so his own choices,
Speaker 2: his environment led him to this moment where he's really
Speaker 2: fucked up. He gets help, He tries to, you know,
Speaker 2: work in his community, organize people, tries to and over
Speaker 2: a new leaf, and then someone's like you should run
Speaker 2: for office. He's like me, what the fuck. And then
Speaker 2: he's like, Okay, I guess, but what about my past.
Speaker 2: You can do it right, You're you're a changed person.
Speaker 2: And then he does it, and then this is what
Speaker 2: happens now. No, No, I'm just saying, Yeah, the more
Speaker 2: these I'm telling you what I feel like, like, the
Speaker 2: more these stories come out, the more I'm like, yes,
Speaker 2: that could all be true, but there's a bigger there's
Speaker 2: a bigger there's more at stake here than your personal
Speaker 2: redemption story because we need the sense. So that's sort's
Speaker 2: wy I'm landing.
Speaker 3: But I'm just saying, and I say one thing to that, though, Yeah,
Speaker 3: I don't think I mean, I think at essence, I
Speaker 3: wouldn't divorce the personal from the political in this in
Speaker 3: part because there's been such an assault on women in
Speaker 3: this country, whether it's denying them basic reproductive health, continuing
Speaker 3: to drag feed on basic you know, maternal health questions,
Speaker 3: especially in low income communities, or on paid family leave.
Speaker 3: You know, there are essential questions about how much you
Speaker 3: value women and families like these are questions that senators
Speaker 3: are going to have to answer if Democrats have power again.
Speaker 3: There needs to be legislation to address the wrongs and
Speaker 3: the assault on women's lives. And you know, you want
Speaker 3: people that see women as co equals. You want people
Speaker 3: that see families as you know, an important unit of
Speaker 3: American society and believe in the I don't mean to
Speaker 3: sound like some family valuings democrat, but I think you
Speaker 3: know it is. This is the reason this stuff bleeds
Speaker 3: into the politicals because those are you're you know, these
Speaker 3: are organizing principles, and if you're living your life in
Speaker 3: such violation of some of those principles that you then
Speaker 3: need to turn into legislation, it makes you question how
Speaker 3: effective someone's going to be in office if they get there.
Speaker 3: I mean, that's all I'll say about it because I
Speaker 3: don't I don't know if any of this is true.
Speaker 2: No, I don't need that.
Speaker 3: I don't think the excuse, the reasoning that he's given
Speaker 3: us far is sufficient to paper over this new reporting.
Speaker 3: I guess is what I would say.
Speaker 2: And I guess I'm just saying, like, don't don't we
Speaker 2: want people who change and who are like I what
Speaker 2: I thought back then, what I said back then was
Speaker 2: fucking wrong, and I actually mean it, And like whether
Speaker 2: it's say someone who voted for Trump and who supported Trump,
Speaker 2: whether it's a fucking oysterman in Maine, whether it's where
Speaker 2: a party who wants to reabailitate people who serve time
Speaker 2: in prison and give them a second chance, who were murders,
Speaker 2: and we get attacked for that by Republicans. We say no,
Speaker 2: we think it's important to do rehabilitation. And again, I
Speaker 2: don't people are gonna take this out of context. I'm
Speaker 2: not saying that therefore Grand Platter must get a see,
Speaker 2: we must do it for him. I am just saying
Speaker 2: that on an individual level, as a party, sometimes I
Speaker 2: think that one of our and maybe this is just me,
Speaker 2: but like I want to I want to believe well
Speaker 2: about people, and then I want to believe that when
Speaker 2: people fuck up and do something horrible and are genuinely
Speaker 2: sorry and genuinely want to change, that they are able
Speaker 2: to do that, and that people can accept them for
Speaker 2: doing that, no matter who they are, what they believe,
Speaker 2: what their background is. Fucking Donald Trump now not Donald Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying that is like, that's just
Speaker 2: like me therapizing this and just like talking about like
Speaker 2: this is this is divorcing it from the Like. I
Speaker 2: do think this is a huge fucking problem right now.
Speaker 3: We want people who've made mistakes, because life is full
Speaker 3: of mistakes. But there are mistakes there, there are patterns
Speaker 3: of behavior that suggests that lessons are have not been learned,
Speaker 3: and then there are mistakes that you make and move past.
Speaker 3: And I just don't know which one this falls into.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And also it's like and again, how many can
Speaker 2: you add up exactly and pile up if you want
Speaker 2: to be a United States senator? Now, I also think
Speaker 2: that it's a The challenge is, you know, contrary to
Speaker 2: what people online have said, like the guy generated an
Speaker 2: impressive amount of support in Maine, but.
Speaker 3: This is why it doesn't fucking matter what we say.
Speaker 3: I mean, we already know that, but like, it really
Speaker 3: doesn't like it will be very interesting to me as
Speaker 3: someone who's interested in kind of the social currents that
Speaker 3: I mean, I say this as an armchair sociologist, but
Speaker 3: whether this is an issue for him, I mean, it's
Speaker 3: entirely possible. Well, and it also he can move past it.
Speaker 3: I guess it's.
Speaker 2: Also too like it's it's, you know, for all the
Speaker 2: what did Chuck Schumer and the d SEC do with
Speaker 2: Janet Mills or what did the left do forcing Graham
Speaker 2: platter on. It's like no one forced Janet Mills on anyone.
Speaker 2: No one forced Grand Platner on anyone. Graham Platner decided
Speaker 2: to run, and a bunch of people showed up. Chuck
Speaker 2: Schumer wanted Mills to run, and she said sure, and
Speaker 2: she ran a campaign like and then the people of
Speaker 2: Maine came out, and you know what, we have a
Speaker 2: primary on Tuesday, And I do think, like, I mean,
Speaker 2: he's she's on the ballot. Still there's like one other
Speaker 2: candidate as well. You expect him to get like if
Speaker 2: he was a normal candidate without scandal in a situation
Speaker 2: like that, eighty five ninety percent of voty percent. If
Speaker 2: he's down to like sixty sixty five, it's a real
Speaker 2: fucking problem. Orf And like, I don't want to just
Speaker 2: because you don't want to just base it on poles.
Speaker 2: But like you know, we haven't seen any poles post
Speaker 2: the sexing scandal except for their internal which had him
Speaker 2: only up four for a while. But like, there's gonna
Speaker 2: be plenty of poles that come out. Yeah, and we'll
Speaker 2: see what happens in the primary. But the party has
Speaker 2: till I believe July thirteenth, if he'd opts out to
Speaker 2: replace him with someone else. So there's there's some time here,
Speaker 2: there's there's another month of pain.
Speaker 3: I don't want to do this show. This primary is over. Same,
Speaker 3: get me out of this seat.
Speaker 2: Same. It's but like you said, we'll end it where
Speaker 2: you begin. It sucks.
Speaker 3: It fucking sucks, It sucks.
Speaker 2: Hats America is brought to you by ze Biotics. You've
Speaker 2: heard us all talk about zebiotics a million times. We
Speaker 2: once again when Hill we got married the other weekend,
Speaker 2: he was giving up zobiotics to folks and at the
Speaker 2: wedding and people were like, does this really work? I
Speaker 2: heard you guys talk about this on the pod, and
Speaker 2: every single person to zibiotics the next day was like,
Speaker 2: oh wow, you guys weren't lying about that. It's like, yeah,
Speaker 2: of course we're not lying about that.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: Anyway, zebiotics works. It's a pre alcohol probiotic drink. It's
Speaker 2: the world's first genetically engineered probiotic. It was invented by
Speaker 2: PhD scientists to tackle rough mornings after drinking. Here's how
Speaker 2: it works. When you drink, alcohol gets converted into a
Speaker 2: toxic byproduct in the gut. It's to build up in
Speaker 2: this by product, not dehydration that's to blame for rough
Speaker 2: days after drinking. Pre alcohol produces an enzyme to break
Speaker 2: this by product down. Just remember to make pre alcohol
Speaker 2: your first drink of the night. Drink responsibly and you'll
Speaker 2: feel your best tomorrow. Just do yourself a favor and
Speaker 2: try it. You're gonna have a couple drinks, drink zibiotics first.
Speaker 2: You're gonna feel much much better tomorrow. Go to zebiotics
Speaker 2: dot com slash cricket to learn more and get fifteen
Speaker 2: percent off your first order when you use cricket a checkout.
Speaker 2: Zebiotics is backed with one hundred percent money back guarantee,
Speaker 2: so if you're unsatisfied for any reason, they'll refund your money.
Speaker 2: No questions asked. Remember to head to ze biotics dot
Speaker 2: com slash crooked and use this code crooked a checkout
Speaker 2: for fifteen percent off one other big topic to get to.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, I can't We're just here now, sixty minutes.
Speaker 2: Melt down at sixty minutes. This, Oh, we show, we
Speaker 2: can go forever. This isn't this as you said, This
Speaker 2: show isn't called sixty minutes.
Speaker 3: This is one hundred and ninety whatever we want t
Speaker 3: t tic tics.
Speaker 2: As you know by now. Ever since Trump hell David
Speaker 2: Ellison put contrarian conservative columnist Barry Weiss in charge of CBS,
Speaker 2: she's taken a special interest in sixty Minutes. Last week,
Speaker 2: Weiss fired the show's executive producer, along with several correspondents,
Speaker 2: and hired Nick Bilton, a tech journalist with no broadcast experience,
Speaker 2: to run the program. At Bilton's introduction meeting, which Weiss
Speaker 2: did not attend, maybe the funniest part of the whole
Speaker 2: story now, veteran correspondent Scott Pelley accused Weiss of trying
Speaker 2: to quote murder the show, and according to recordings of
Speaker 2: the meeting that have circulated shortly after that, Pelly was
Speaker 2: fired and then on his way out, publicly accused Weiss
Speaker 2: and CBS leadership of instructing him to quote inject falsehoods
Speaker 2: and bias and unverified assertions into quote a politically sensitive story.
Speaker 2: You worked at CBS News for a while. I know
Speaker 2: you've been writing about the story a bunch on your
Speaker 2: excellent substack.
Speaker 3: How the hell with Alex Wagner?
Speaker 2: Perfect title, hellfe It's a great name for a substack.
Speaker 2: Care to unquirk on this one?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 4: I do.
Speaker 3: How much time we got? Can you hear the sound
Speaker 3: of me rubbing my hands together?
Speaker 2: Please do it.
Speaker 6: So?
Speaker 3: I have so much to say about this, but I
Speaker 3: know I can't spend an hour on I can't spend
Speaker 3: sixty minutes on it. It's appalling what Barry Weiss is doing.
Speaker 3: It is all part of a project that Barry Weiss
Speaker 3: is a small player and a larger machine, which is
Speaker 3: for the Ellisons. I mean, I actually don't think David Ellison,
Speaker 3: who I refer to as Lord Collagen on my substack.
Speaker 3: Have you noticed how just moving that rice a lot
Speaker 3: but also just ripe. The ripeness of his cheeks and
Speaker 3: lips shiny, very collagen filled, but not I think he's
Speaker 3: naturally just peach like. Anyway we'll go with that. He
Speaker 3: I don't really, I mean, I think they're conservatives. This
Speaker 3: is I mean they are. They want to make a
Speaker 3: lot of money, and the way they're going to do
Speaker 3: that is by currying with this the Trump administration by
Speaker 3: any means possible, and they've figured out wisely that the
Speaker 3: best way to do that and ensure that they can
Speaker 3: proceed with the paramount Warner Brothers Discovery merger, which is
Speaker 3: supposed to happen as soon as next month, is to
Speaker 3: show Trump that they have no compunction about gutting legendary
Speaker 3: news institutions and destroying the Fourth Estate if it's inconvenient
Speaker 3: to this president. And that's what's happening here. And you know,
Speaker 3: Barry Weiss is a fool. I will say that this
Speaker 3: is foolish, bad, a moral, unethical behavior. She's hollowing out
Speaker 3: this institution that was one of the last you know,
Speaker 3: we talk about this moment in American life when people
Speaker 3: used to gather around and watch things on the television
Speaker 3: sixty minutes is like the last bit of appointment television we.
Speaker 2: Have in modern culture. We've had a real monoculture problem
Speaker 2: in this country last ten.
Speaker 3: Years, and it's I don't think much is going to
Speaker 3: exist of it at the end of all of this,
Speaker 3: and that's a real travesty because I don't think you
Speaker 3: ever get those viewers back. I mean, that's the problem
Speaker 3: with broadcast. It's an iceberg that melts, and once it's melted,
Speaker 3: there's no refreezing. And so you know what I would
Speaker 3: love to see in all of this is the people
Speaker 3: who count in terms of the ellisons life and financials
Speaker 3: say something about it, which means I sit here in
Speaker 3: Los Angeles, California, and the thing that the Ellisons are
Speaker 3: interested is television and movies. That's their bread and butter.
Speaker 3: That's what makes money for the Ellisons and Paramount and
Speaker 3: like it is one thing for Alex Wagner and Jon
Speaker 3: Favreau to stand in solidarity with Scott Pelley and the
Speaker 3: staff of CVS and sixty minutes. It's another thing for
Speaker 3: everybody who's on a Taylor Sharedan or Tyler Sheridan show
Speaker 3: to say, Hey, you can't gut the fourth Estate. Just
Speaker 3: because you want to make money on entertainment. It's like,
Speaker 3: where are all the people that have movies made by Paramount?
Speaker 3: Where are the people that have TV shows made by Parau?
Speaker 3: This is their fight too, because this is an issue
Speaker 3: of free speech, and until and unless they stand up,
Speaker 3: it's not going to make a difference. News doesn't fucking
Speaker 3: make money. News is an afterthought. This is an inconvenience
Speaker 3: for the Ellisons. The only thing they care about is
Speaker 3: making money through entertainment. And until the entertainment world stands
Speaker 3: up and says you can't do this, you know, a
Speaker 3: crime against one of us in terms of free speech
Speaker 3: is a crime against all of us. This goes nowhere.
Speaker 2: You can tell that Nick Bilton, did you see like
Speaker 2: his long note that he put out today where he
Speaker 2: was like, and I, you know, we're committed to transparency
Speaker 2: and honest journalism. And I've talked to Leslie Stall and
Speaker 2: the remaining correspondents, and you know, you can tell there's
Speaker 2: a little he's a little worried.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he should be a lot worried, a lot worried.
Speaker 2: And they and they promoted Maria Gavrilovitch to senior producer.
Speaker 2: Who's think we both know. I know, I've known for
Speaker 2: a while and she's fantastic.
Speaker 3: When I worked at CBS News, we weren't allowed to
Speaker 3: cross the street to go over to sixty minutes.
Speaker 2: You had to like that's how they Wow.
Speaker 3: It was a separate office with better lighting, better everything.
Speaker 3: I think it was like soundproofed, so you never knew
Speaker 3: what was happening.
Speaker 2: You know what's really annoyed me about this, I mean
Speaker 2: there's a lot of it. Everything you said is like
Speaker 2: right on the sources that are saying to media reporters
Speaker 2: about this. You know, the culture was kind of bad
Speaker 2: at sixteen minutes, and it's not everyone, you know, all
Speaker 2: you tds, libs think it's all politics, but there was
Speaker 2: a culture problem that needed to be solved and this
Speaker 2: is just maybe a bit of a rough way to
Speaker 2: do it.
Speaker 3: Fuck off, I mean, yeah, it drives me nuts well,
Speaker 3: and is someone I was on the fucking the farm
Speaker 3: team over at CBS right, I was doing CBS this Morning,
Speaker 3: CBS this Morning on the weekends, like I was the
Speaker 3: bottom feeder, and you look enviously across the street. But
Speaker 3: there was a reason you were envious because the quality
Speaker 3: of investigative research and reporting they were doing was was
Speaker 3: barn on. I mean, there was just no nothing like it,
Speaker 3: and they deserved to be an island under themselves because
Speaker 3: of the rigor of what they were doing and the
Speaker 3: audience that they commanded, you know what. I mean. Sorry
Speaker 3: that they were on top, and sorry that it sucked
Speaker 3: for everybody else, and especially the CBS News division, which
Speaker 3: was starved into obsolescence and left to eat you know,
Speaker 3: moldy green beans in the cafeteria from nineteen seventy six.
Speaker 3: That was literally something that I did on a daily basis.
Speaker 3: But like they earned that reputation for a reason. And
Speaker 3: the shadenfreude around this among news industry veterans and people
Speaker 3: who once worked there, Fuck off. This is not about
Speaker 3: like a dick swinging contest about who got what resources.
Speaker 3: This is about attacks on the free press, and this
Speaker 3: administration through the lackeys that it has put in its corner,
Speaker 3: disassembling like one of the last great institutions.
Speaker 2: It's also it's like you think there's a culture issue,
Speaker 2: you think it's a fossil, You think it needs to
Speaker 2: be updated for the digital age. Fine, think about all
Speaker 2: the ways to do that. Yes, that are not this
Speaker 2: because if you wanted to do that, Like you'd have
Speaker 2: to be you'd have to be really fucking incompetent to
Speaker 2: do it this way more or so, and like you're
Speaker 2: not going to tell me, like Barry Weis's a lot
Speaker 2: of things, you're not going to tell me that she
Speaker 2: and Nick Bilton and all the rest of them are
Speaker 2: this fucking dumb that they think that this was the
Speaker 2: best way to change the culture at sixty minutes.
Speaker 3: It's totally vindictive, and none of them have any qualifications,
Speaker 3: Like show me the media companies that either one of
Speaker 3: them have turned around, Show me the experience they have
Speaker 3: in television, a broadcaster, news they got not Yea, it's bad, Goosey.
Speaker 2: It's bad. All right, It's been a long show. But
Speaker 2: before we go, before we go, I have to the
Speaker 2: deep tease, all right. So I'm just going to you
Speaker 2: know some of this.
Speaker 3: You know something I only I thought I had too martinis.
Speaker 2: When that's true, that's true. I did tell you that.
Speaker 2: I'm just gonna read aloud to all of you. An
Speaker 2: email I received on March twenty fifth, a couple months ago. Now,
Speaker 2: oh my god, it's from TKO Events. TKO Events sent
Speaker 2: it to me. John Favreau and the subject line of
Speaker 2: the email is UFC Freedom two fifty, John. We are
Speaker 2: honored to invite you to UFC Freedom to fifty on Sunday,
Speaker 2: June fourteenth, a special evening celebrating our country. This once
Speaker 2: in a lifetime event marks a historic moment, and we
Speaker 2: would love to have you join us. This invitation is
Speaker 2: non transferable and does not include a plus one. We
Speaker 2: need your RSVP by Tuesday, March thirty first, as there
Speaker 2: are significant logistics with the White House. More details to follow.
Speaker 2: So I saw this and it was like, Uh, is
Speaker 2: this a joke? Did someone prank me? And why am
Speaker 2: I invited to the White House? And I'm And then
Speaker 2: I looked and in the CC line of tk Events
Speaker 2: was Ari Emmanuel, who owns TKO Events. And then I
Speaker 2: looked up TKO Events. I'm like, oh, and they own UFC.
Speaker 2: And then and then I did a little digging and
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, so Trump had all his tickets.
Speaker 2: There's four thousand tickets. Trump gets most of them. Some
Speaker 2: go to the military, two hundred go to Ari Emmanuel
Speaker 2: at TKO events, two hundred go to Dana White. And
Speaker 2: Ari chose me because what I thought is he thinks
Speaker 2: I was the other John Favreau. Yes, because way back
Speaker 2: when I was represented at WM and I believe that
Speaker 2: Ari was John's agent, and I think John must like
Speaker 2: UFC fights or whatever. But anyway, I r s v
Speaker 2: p'd yes because I thought, fuck it, I'm going to
Speaker 2: the White House and I'm gonna go in there. I'm
Speaker 2: gonna and I'm gonna and I'm gonna check it out.
Speaker 2: Maybe I'll see my Eddie Stephen Miller or my friend
Speaker 2: Ja d E Vans and chat them up.
Speaker 3: You're gonna climb the octagon.
Speaker 2: Possibilities were unless, so I RSVP'd. I got this follow
Speaker 2: up on April second. Your ticket to UFC Freedom two
Speaker 2: fifty in Washington, d C on June fourteenth is confirmed.
Speaker 2: Ticketing and arrival details surrounding your visit will be sent
Speaker 2: from TKO Events during the week of June eighth. Please
Speaker 2: reach out with any questions and let us know if
Speaker 2: you're no longer able to attend. Thank you. So I'm like, okay,
Speaker 2: it's still happening. A few weeks ago, on May eleventh,
Speaker 2: I got another email ahead of your trip to Washington,
Speaker 2: DC for the historic UFC Freedom to fifty. We are
Speaker 2: collecting identification details from each guest due to the heightened
Speaker 2: level of security that will be in placed throughout the weekend.
Speaker 2: The information is required to ensure there are no issues
Speaker 2: with ticket distribution. So I gave them all my info.
Speaker 2: On May twenty seventh, I got more details, including suggested
Speaker 2: dress code, business formal, a reminder to bring my government
Speaker 2: issued ID, instructions of how to get my ticket the
Speaker 2: week of the fight, a whole thing. So I had,
Speaker 2: I made plans.
Speaker 3: You bought a ticket, bought a ticket to DC.
Speaker 2: To DC like booked a hotel, had a whole meeting here.
Speaker 2: I had a whole meeting here with everyone. It was
Speaker 2: It's Sunday, June fourteenth. The next day I was going
Speaker 2: to Chicago for the Obama Library. It probably not too
Speaker 2: many people go into both of those things, nahdah. It
Speaker 2: was very excited trying to figure out, like how am
Speaker 2: I going to play this? What if I get right?
Speaker 2: What's going on? And then today no another email from
Speaker 2: TKO events. Hi Jonathan. Now, when I gave all my info,
Speaker 2: of course I gave my real info, which is Jonathan
Speaker 2: Edward Favreau. And the only thing that's different between me
Speaker 2: and the other John Favreau is our middle name. He's
Speaker 2: he's he's j O N two, but he's K John
Speaker 2: K Favron. I'm John E. And I think because then
Speaker 2: also they went with my full name. I think then
Speaker 2: they probably when they saw that they finally checked the list.
Speaker 2: Are sincerest apologies, but we've just discovered there was a
Speaker 2: miscommunication about our allotted number of guest invitations for UFC
Speaker 2: Freedom to fifty on June fourteenth. Unfortunately, as a result,
Speaker 2: we are under allotted and no longer able to accommodate
Speaker 2: your attendance. We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.
Speaker 2: Thank you for your understanding. We would love to host
Speaker 2: you at a future event.
Speaker 3: It's perfect for the for the third and Hon, I
Speaker 3: was so close got me. I knew you know what.
Speaker 3: I knew something must have gone awry because you certainly
Speaker 3: wouldn't be broadcasting this.
Speaker 2: No, I was gonna keep it all secret. I wasn't
Speaker 2: gonna say anything until I was safely out of there. Yeah,
Speaker 2: no way was I going to say anything.
Speaker 3: I'm devastated. To anybody who's listening to this, you should
Speaker 3: be watching it on YouTube because Favre's like the way
Speaker 3: his eyes dance when he talks about this.
Speaker 2: It was so it was such a fun story.
Speaker 3: Oh my god's like watching a balloon take flight like
Speaker 3: the Glee.
Speaker 2: I will say that. It was like, it's such a
Speaker 2: fun story. But as I was getting closer, I'm like,
Speaker 2: what is this going to be?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: What am I going to do? Oh?
Speaker 3: We I mean, I really was like, can we put
Speaker 3: a GoPro in your trench coat? Can we? Can we
Speaker 3: put love It in your trench coat?
Speaker 2: I started to figure out because I'm like, you know,
Speaker 2: been to White House events and inside the White House
Speaker 2: they always take people's phones for at least we did. Yeah,
Speaker 2: well but who knows what these people anything but on
Speaker 2: the South Lawn and I know it's high screwed them.
Speaker 2: I'm like, I bet people are gonna be taking pictures
Speaker 2: all over the place in the South Line. So I
Speaker 2: didn't think they were gonna be taking my phone. But
Speaker 2: also I was like, what if I get recognized? Are
Speaker 2: they gonna kick me out? It's going to happen, Like
Speaker 2: am I going to talk to someone? I'm that type
Speaker 2: was going to go up and like yell at someone.
Speaker 3: You know, maybe your shrink bill will be less because
Speaker 3: you had to have a lot of contingencies. But I mean, really,
Speaker 3: the service you could have done our country again climbing
Speaker 3: the octagon unfurling. You know, I'll let the meat cake
Speaker 3: banner over the over the White House Portico. I mean,
Speaker 3: there were so many.
Speaker 2: Part what if?
Speaker 6: What if?
Speaker 2: They? I was like, is there gonna be a lawyer
Speaker 2: on hand?
Speaker 3: Listen? Precautions could have been taken. We would have gotten
Speaker 3: the X X bill team, could have gotten ice was there.
Speaker 2: It's a lot of ways it could have gotten wrong.
Speaker 3: Listen. I mean, I just hope that the mistakes continue
Speaker 3: with their mailing list. This is a lot like I mean,
Speaker 3: maybe you'll be invited to perform at Freedom to fifty.
Speaker 2: Because they confused, which is now just a Trump rally.
Speaker 3: Well, apparently he's the greatest performer in America.
Speaker 2: I do hope that other Jon Favreau gets his invite.
Speaker 3: Now, other John Favreau. This is a holly You have
Speaker 3: a Hollywood audience. If someone out there can talk to
Speaker 3: John Favreau.
Speaker 2: And I well, I did I know John Favreau, but like, well,
Speaker 2: my car, I'm close to him. He's not well clearly
Speaker 2: not close enough that I was going.
Speaker 3: To tell him exactly you were going to take his
Speaker 3: Now he hates you.
Speaker 2: I'm sure, yeah, someone he'll understand. It's a great story.
Speaker 3: If I showed up and just like, yes, well that
Speaker 3: would have been interesting. Someone Robert Downey Junior, are you
Speaker 3: out there, like, have other Favreau give this Favreau his ticket.
Speaker 2: That's a good idea. No plus ones, So yeah, I
Speaker 2: would have to take it anyway. I'm glad that I
Speaker 2: shared that you got it off my chest.
Speaker 3: What a beautiful dessert. Beautiful dessert, fantastically depressing episode.
Speaker 2: That is our show for today. Tommy will be back
Speaker 2: on the Feed on Sunday with a conversation with the Bulwarks,
Speaker 2: will summer about the MAGA media ecosystem and all the
Speaker 2: latest dramas.
Speaker 4: Check that out.
Speaker 2: Have a great weekend. Thanks Alex.
Speaker 3: It'splasure to be here.
Speaker 2: Podsave America is a Crooked Media production. Our show is
Speaker 2: produced by Austin Fisher, Saul Ruben, McKenna Roberts, and Ferris
Speaker 2: Safari with Ree Jerlin, Elijah Cone and Adrian Hill. Our
Speaker 2: team includes Matt de Groat, Ben Hefcote, Jordan Cantor, Charlottelandis
Speaker 2: Krol pel Avive, David Toles, Mia Kelman, Ryan Young, and
Speaker 2: Naomi Single. Our staff is probably unionized with the Writers
Speaker 2: Guild of America East