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Bonus: “Fox News EXPOSED” · Pod Save America

0:20
Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
0:22
Speaker 2: I'm Tommy Detour.
0:23
Speaker 1: We decided to jump into the studio here on a Friday.
0:26
Speaker 1: I mean, here's the thing is we weren't going to
0:28
Speaker 1: have a pod on Tuesday because it's, of course, our
0:30
Speaker 1: President's Day weekend. But late Thursday night, we got a
0:34
Speaker 1: legal filing from Dominion Voting Systems that laid out just
0:39
Speaker 1: some of the extensive evidence uncovered during the discovery process
0:42
Speaker 1: in their defamation lawsuit against Fox News. For those who
0:48
Speaker 1: aren't familiar with the case. Dominion Voting Systems is suing
0:52
Speaker 1: Fox for defamation. They are seeking $ 1. 6 billion.
0:56
Speaker 2: With a B?
0:57
Speaker 1: With a B in damages. There are cases that Fox
1:02
Speaker 1: knowingly spread conspiracy theories that Dominion Voting Machines essentially helped
1:07
Speaker 1: rig the election for Joe Biden, that their hosts said that,
1:11
Speaker 1: that they had guests on that said that, and then
1:13
Speaker 1: they just kept spreading those conspiracy theories knowing they were inaccurate,
1:18
Speaker 1: thus defaming Fox. Dominion voting systems and costing them their
1:21
Speaker 1: reputation and $ 1. 6 billion in damages.
1:25
Speaker 2: My favorite part of the conspiracy is that Dominion was
1:29
Speaker 2: founded in Venezuela to rig elections for Hugo Chavez. Just
1:33
Speaker 2: in case everyone is wondering, Hugo Chavez died in 2013. Yeah,
1:37
Speaker 2: so it's a tough one. It all came from Sidney Powell.
1:40
Speaker 1: You guys might remember Sidney Powell, one of Trump's sort
1:44
Speaker 1: of D-list lawyers that came around at the end. It
1:46
Speaker 1: was like a like a Rudy deputy, basically. I think
1:49
Speaker 1: she was almost going to be like attorney general at
1:51
Speaker 1: some point. Probably.
1:53
Speaker 2: She's one of the people who was in the Oval
1:54
Speaker 2: Office having meetings with the Overstock.com guy and Mike Lindell.
1:57
Speaker 1: Part of that, correct. So the great thing about this
1:59
Speaker 1: lawsuit is you sue Fox News, they go through Discovery,
2:03
Speaker 1: there was all this testimony with Fox executives and hosts,
2:08
Speaker 1: and they got text messages between Fox hosts and Fox
2:12
Speaker 1: executives as well. And so a lot of this was
2:15
Speaker 1: released Thursday night, and I mean... could I was like,
2:19
Speaker 1: even though it wasn't, it shouldn't be surprising to any
2:21
Speaker 1: of us that everyone at Fox asks like this, but
2:24
Speaker 1: I was also, I was still stumped.
2:25
Speaker 2: You know, it is exactly what we always assumed was
2:29
Speaker 2: the case, which is that it is a right-wing organization
2:33
Speaker 2: designed to make money by spreading Republican propaganda, but to
2:36
Speaker 2: see it all laid out in black and white, to
2:38
Speaker 2: see the cynicism, to see them believing one thing and
2:41
Speaker 2: saying another, this clearly was shocking.
2:45
Speaker 1: I know. And it like, this is going to sound weird,
2:47
Speaker 1: but if Fox news was an organization filled with just
2:51
Speaker 1: like ideologically driven people who just really wanted to spread
2:57
Speaker 1: their bullshit and they deeply believed it and they want
3:00
Speaker 1: it to, they want to convince other people that they're
3:02
Speaker 1: right about Republican ideas and Republican politics. Like I would
3:06
Speaker 1: detest that, but that would be one thing. What's clear
3:09
Speaker 1: from these text messages and from this testimony is that
3:13
Speaker 1: this is a company that knows, and this is, The
3:15
Speaker 1: executives know this. The hosts know this. The producers know this.
3:19
Speaker 1: They know that their profits depend on keeping their audience
3:23
Speaker 1: brainwashed with crazy conspiracy theories. And so the disrespect and
3:28
Speaker 1: contempt that they have for their own audience knowingly lying
3:33
Speaker 1: to them so that they can make money, it's like,
3:36
Speaker 1: and it's just all laid out here.
3:37
Speaker 2: And they also know that these lies are damaging to
3:41
Speaker 2: the country. They're damaging to the people saying them. They're
3:43
Speaker 2: damaging to the people hearing them. They're damaging to the
3:46
Speaker 2: institutions of our government, and they just don't care. All
3:49
Speaker 2: they care about is Newsmax potentially taking market share from them.
3:53
Speaker 1: And again, the way that this played out, and we're
3:56
Speaker 1: going to get to some clips and some of the
3:59
Speaker 1: text messages and testimony in just a bit, but the
4:01
Speaker 1: way this played out is Fox News is the first
4:05
Speaker 1: network to call the state of Arizona for Joe Biden.
4:09
Speaker 1: And then what happens is a bunch of Fox viewers
4:12
Speaker 1: are clearly pretty pissed that that Fox, of all places,
4:15
Speaker 1: has called Arizona for Biden. And Fox executives and the
4:19
Speaker 1: hosts start seeing declining ratings as a result of Fox
4:23
Speaker 1: calling Arizona for Biden. And because now the audience is
4:27
Speaker 1: moving on to Newsmax instead.
4:29
Speaker 2: And I think Trump was probably tweeting, hey, turn off Fox,
4:32
Speaker 2: turn on these outlets.
4:32
Speaker 3: Right.
4:33
Speaker 1: So they're losing audience to the people who are even
4:35
Speaker 1: crazier than them. So they're starting to freak out. So
4:37
Speaker 1: then they start getting their shit together and start spreading
4:41
Speaker 1: these conspiracies themselves to win back their audience. from Newsmax.
4:45
Speaker 1: And this is sort of the context for all this. Now,
4:47
Speaker 1: just so everyone knows, the legal standard for the case,
4:50
Speaker 1: the case is going to happen in April. This is
4:52
Speaker 1: just sort of discovery and evidence. Basically, the burden in
4:55
Speaker 1: the case falls on, this is from the New York Times,
4:57
Speaker 1: the burden in the case falls on Dominion to prove
4:59
Speaker 1: that Fox acted with actual malice as the standard. So
5:02
Speaker 1: that means either Fox guests, hosts, and executives knew what
5:06
Speaker 1: was being said on the air was false and allowed
5:08
Speaker 1: it anyway, or the People inside Fox were recklessly negligent
5:12
Speaker 1: in failing to check the accuracy of their coverage.
5:14
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not a lawyer, but like, I mean,
5:18
Speaker 2: I think I think the Fox defense, I started to
5:20
Speaker 2: read their response, but ran out of time. I think
5:22
Speaker 2: they're going to try to say, listen, we were just
5:24
Speaker 2: covering what the other side was saying about the election.
5:28
Speaker 2: And that's newsworthy. And the president was saying it. So
5:30
Speaker 2: how do we not cover it? But it does seem
5:33
Speaker 2: like they were pretty reckless and pretty negligent here. We'll
5:35
Speaker 2: find out.
5:36
Speaker 1: I find out the high bar. OK, so let's get
5:38
Speaker 1: to the first clip here. Here's what viewers were hearing
5:42
Speaker 1: on Laura Ingraham's show shortly after the election.
5:45
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is coup 5.0. And the Department of Justice
5:50
Speaker 3: and the FBI really need to get after it right
5:53
Speaker 3: now and investigate all the reports of fraud. There are
5:56
Speaker 3: hundreds of them. Yeah, well, I hope Attorney General Barr
6:00
Speaker 3: is doing that.
6:02
Speaker 2: Very, very hopeful that he's doing that.
6:04
Speaker 3: Otherwise, we're in big trouble as a country, especially with
6:06
Speaker 3: elections going forward.
6:07
Speaker 1: OK, so that was Sidney Powell on Laura Ingraham's show.
6:10
Speaker 1: She was on Laura Ingraham's show many times. She was
6:13
Speaker 1: on Tucker Carlson's show many times. She was all over
6:15
Speaker 1: Fox News. Largely unchallenged most of the time that she
6:19
Speaker 1: was on Fox News. I think later in the month,
6:22
Speaker 1: Tucker finally was like a little skeptical of her. But
6:25
Speaker 1: she was just on nonstop, unchecked. And here's what Tucker
6:29
Speaker 1: Carlson was texting Laura Ingraham during that same month when
6:33
Speaker 1: Sidney Powell was on Fox all the time. Carlson in
6:35
Speaker 1: a text to Ingraham. Sidney Powell is lying, by the way.
6:39
Speaker 1: I caught her. It's insane. Ingram says, Sydney is a
6:44
Speaker 1: complete nut. No one will work with her. Ditto with Rudy.
6:48
Speaker 1: And then Carlson says, our viewers are good people and
6:51
Speaker 1: they believe it.
6:52
Speaker 2: Yeah. And that's not unrepresentative of what other senior brass
6:57
Speaker 2: at Fox News thought. I think Rupert Murdoch said that
7:00
Speaker 2: what she was saying was really crazy stuff. Hannity said,
7:03
Speaker 2: I did not believe it for one second. So everyone knew.
7:07
Speaker 2: She was nuts.
7:08
Speaker 1: Hannity called her a fucking lunatic. That's a quote from
7:11
Speaker 1: Hannity about Sidney Powell. And Dana Perino, another Fox host,
7:15
Speaker 1: former White House press secretary for George W. Bush, called
7:18
Speaker 1: it insane nonsense. So that's what they all thought of
7:22
Speaker 1: Sidney Powell. Not one of them said that on the air.
7:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think Rupert also said terrible stuff damaging everybody.
7:31
Speaker 1: All right, so then... The great Maria Bartiromo also had
7:35
Speaker 1: Sidney Powell on her show, and she talked about election
7:38
Speaker 1: fraud repeatedly throughout the end of 2020. Let's listen.
7:41
Speaker 3: We have sworn witness testimony of why the software was designed.
7:47
Speaker 3: It was designed to rig elections. We have so much evidence.
7:50
Speaker 3: I feel like it's coming in through a fire hose.
7:53
Speaker 3: Do you have the software in your possession?
7:55
Speaker 2: Do you have the hardware in your possession? How will
7:57
Speaker 2: you prove this, Sidney?
7:59
Speaker 3: Well, I've got lots of ways to prove it, Maria,
8:01
Speaker 3: but I'm not going to tell on national TV what
8:04
Speaker 3: all we have.
8:05
Speaker 2: Now, John, it turns out that the evidence wasn't coming
8:09
Speaker 2: in through a fire hose. It was coming in from
8:12
Speaker 2: a random email from a stranger who described herself as, quote, wackadoodle. Now,
8:18
Speaker 2: Maria Bartiromo knew this, and she booked Sidney Powell anyway.
8:22
Speaker 2: Also in this email was a claim that Justice Scalia said,
8:26
Speaker 2: did not die in his sleep on a hunting trip,
8:27
Speaker 2: that he was killed at an annual Bohemian Grove event.
8:30
Speaker 1: It's another one.
8:31
Speaker 2: And that Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes, who again died
8:35
Speaker 2: in 2017, huddle every day to decide to portray Trump
8:39
Speaker 2: as badly as possible. So the common thread here seems
8:41
Speaker 2: to be blaming things on people who have been dead
8:43
Speaker 2: for a very long time.
8:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, the email that Maria Bartiromo read for her source,
8:49
Speaker 1: her one source for having Sidney Powell on for these claims,
8:52
Speaker 1: they have the Scalia... conspiracy theory uh the woman also
8:58
Speaker 1: claimed to get her info from quote experiencing time travel
9:02
Speaker 1: in a semi-conscious state that allowed her to see what
9:05
Speaker 1: others don't see and hear what others don't hear.
9:08
Speaker 4: Some mushrooms so acid what are we doing so apparently
9:12
Speaker 4: is it joe rogan this this made me feel a
9:14
Speaker 4: little i don't know if it made me feel better
9:16
Speaker 4: or angrier but apparently fox executives all know that maria
9:20
Speaker 4: bergeromo is also crazy oh absolutely you have to watch
9:22
Speaker 4: her show once.
9:23
Speaker 1: And so Gary Schreier, a Fox News executive, said, this again,
9:28
Speaker 1: this was part of the evidence, the problem with Maria
9:31
Speaker 1: is she has GOP conspiracy theories in her ear and
9:34
Speaker 1: they use her for their message sometimes. And that's who
9:37
Speaker 1: they have on the air all the time.
9:38
Speaker 2: I just love that Bart Romo had Powell on on
9:42
Speaker 2: November 8th. And one of the questions was, Sidney, we
9:44
Speaker 2: talked about the Dominion software. I know that there are
9:46
Speaker 2: voting regularities. Tell me about it. Like that's a level
9:49
Speaker 2: of pushback. Spray your conspiracy theories on my audience, please, Sidney.
9:53
Speaker 1: Okay. Here we go. It is truly, truly unbelievable. All right.
9:56
Speaker 1: Here's what the great Lou Dobbs was saying over at Fox. Business.
10:00
Speaker 1: We should point out that Lou Dobbs was forced to
10:03
Speaker 1: leave the network after Fox was hit with the $ 2
10:05
Speaker 1: billion lawsuit from Smartmatic, which is also accusing Fox of defamation.
10:10
Speaker 1: Let's listen.
10:11
Speaker 5: I think most Americans right now cannot believe what we're
10:15
Speaker 5: witnessing in this election. We have across almost every state,
10:19
Speaker 5: whether it's Dominion, EBS, whatever the company, voting machine company is,
10:25
Speaker 5: no one knows their ownership, has no idea what's going
10:28
Speaker 5: on in those servers. It is the most ludicrous, irresponsible,
10:33
Speaker 5: and rancid system ever. imaginable in the world's only superpower.
10:40
Speaker 5: We look like a complete nation of fools.
10:43
Speaker 1: Here's what the president of Fox, president of the network,
10:47
Speaker 1: was saying about Lou Dobbs at the time that was airing. Quote,
10:51
Speaker 1: the North Koreans do a more nuanced show. Oh, my God. Oh,
10:58
Speaker 1: my God.
10:59
Speaker 2: I mean, Lou Dobbs. Lou Dobbs also was on CNN yesterday.
11:03
Speaker 2: for years, years and years and years, primarily just spraying
11:07
Speaker 2: anti-immigrant bigotry onto the airwaves. And like the guy has
11:12
Speaker 2: lost the thread years ago. And so he just got
11:14
Speaker 2: a Fox show. The North, that is just like, it's
11:17
Speaker 2: good stuff. It's really good stuff. So another Fox executive,
11:21
Speaker 2: Ron Mitchell. So at this point, they're looking around at
11:24
Speaker 2: Newsmax and they're looking around at some of these other
11:26
Speaker 2: and OAN and they're worried that they are you know,
11:31
Speaker 2: giving viewers, giving the Fox viewers what they really want
11:34
Speaker 2: and they need to get them back. And so Ron
11:36
Speaker 2: Mitchell starts talking about Newsmax and one of these exchanges
11:39
Speaker 2: and Newsmax is bringing up Gateway Pundit.
11:42
Speaker 1: Gateway Pundit is like the furthest right crazy conspiracy theory place.
11:46
Speaker 1: And Ron Mitchell says this type of conspiratorial reporting might
11:50
Speaker 1: be exactly what the disgruntled Fox News Channel viewer is
11:53
Speaker 1: looking for. And so in saying that we need to
11:56
Speaker 1: get them back. So we need to do more conspiratorial
11:58
Speaker 1: reporting of our own to get them back from Newsmax.
12:01
Speaker 1: And then the Sidney Powell Giuliani press conference happens. And
12:06
Speaker 1: the same Fox News executive, Ron Mitchell, said sarcastically in
12:11
Speaker 1: an exchange, will you be mentioning the international crime conspiracy
12:14
Speaker 1: to steal the election featuring Soros, Maduro, Chavez, Antifa, Cuba
12:18
Speaker 1: and China? Those clowns just put us in a real
12:20
Speaker 1: awkward place where we're going to need to thread the needle.
12:23
Speaker 2: Again, Hugo Chavez has been dead since 2013. I'm really
12:28
Speaker 2: doing my best. John, it's a Friday. It's Friday afternoon.
12:30
Speaker 2: We're having fun here. I'm trying to laugh. But I
12:33
Speaker 2: am also doing my best to prevent steam from coming
12:36
Speaker 2: out of my ears.
12:37
Speaker 1: Yeah.
12:37
Speaker 2: Because people like us who have worked Democratic politics for
12:42
Speaker 2: years have known this is who Fox is for decades.
12:46
Speaker 2: But the hard part is the Main Street media punishes
12:50
Speaker 2: Democrats for saying so. Like, look no further. than the
12:54
Speaker 2: coverage last week of Joe Biden skipping his Super Bowl
12:57
Speaker 2: interview with Fox News. Here's how Politico Playbook led with it.
13:01
Speaker 2: They're like, after days of bickering, Joe Biden will not
13:04
Speaker 2: give an interview, blah, blah, blah, blah. This morning, we
13:06
Speaker 2: have to ask, was that such a good idea? Yes,
13:10
Speaker 2: it's a big audience, but there's no acknowledgement in that coverage,
13:14
Speaker 2: in that analysis, that Fox is an arm, a propaganda
13:18
Speaker 2: arm of the Republican Party and always has been. And
13:21
Speaker 2: like their goal is to damage Joe Biden. They don't even,
13:24
Speaker 2: most of the network doesn't even recognize that he's president currently.
13:27
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, I think, and I think the key
13:29
Speaker 1: here is it's not a conservative network, right? It's not
13:34
Speaker 1: about Joe Biden or Democrats going on a network and
13:39
Speaker 1: debating someone who has a different point, a political point
13:42
Speaker 1: of view than you, right? Like I'm for that. It's
13:46
Speaker 1: like you said, their their mission is to spread conspiracies,
13:50
Speaker 1: keep their audience brainwashed so they can make money. And
13:52
Speaker 1: part of that process is, look, we're going to bring
13:56
Speaker 1: Joe Biden on and make him look as bad as possible.
13:58
Speaker 1: That is exactly what they're trying.
13:59
Speaker 2: Their mission is to find and lift up any culture
14:03
Speaker 2: war issue they can find, usually racial. I will never
14:06
Speaker 2: forget when we were in the White House. Actually, this
14:08
Speaker 2: is well before the White House. Fox News in 2006, right,
14:11
Speaker 2: they were the ones giddily spreading the birther conspiracy theories.
14:14
Speaker 2: They were the ones reporting that Barack Obama, when he
14:17
Speaker 2: was six years old, attended a madrasa, suggesting that he
14:20
Speaker 2: had some like radical Islamic upbringing in his school. But
14:24
Speaker 2: then that all happens. We go through this election cycle
14:27
Speaker 2: where Fox News found one sort of lonely Black Panther
14:31
Speaker 2: outside of a polling place in Philadelphia, the 2008 campaign
14:35
Speaker 2: to suggest that like this was some sort of like
14:37
Speaker 2: radical uprising by the Obama coalition. We get to the
14:40
Speaker 2: White House in 2009, and there was this moment when
14:42
Speaker 2: Obama did five Sunday show interviews but left out Fox News.
14:46
Speaker 2: And it was reported as a snub. It is used
14:48
Speaker 2: as an example of Obama attacking the press in some way.
14:52
Speaker 2: There was another example that same year, October of 2009.
14:56
Speaker 2: The mainstream media reporters in the White House press corps
14:59
Speaker 2: lost their minds because Fox was left out of a
15:02
Speaker 2: series of interviews. with some random treasury official. They were
15:06
Speaker 2: all beating their chests about how fair and balanced they
15:08
Speaker 2: were and how dare you. And as I was preparing
15:11
Speaker 2: for this discussion, I ran into this old factcheck.org article
15:15
Speaker 2: that was well actuallying Obama for calling out Trump's attacks
15:17
Speaker 2: on the media. And here's an actual comparison it made.
15:20
Speaker 2: This is the actual both sides thing. Trump says the
15:22
Speaker 2: press was the enemy of the people, but Obama may
15:25
Speaker 2: never have called Fox News enemies of the people, but
15:27
Speaker 2: he did say that its point of view was ultimately
15:30
Speaker 2: destructive to the US in a Rolling Stone interview. Here's
15:32
Speaker 2: what Obama actually said. The golden age of an objective
15:35
Speaker 2: press was a pretty narrow span of time in our history.
15:38
Speaker 2: Before that, you had folks like Hearst who used their
15:40
Speaker 2: newspapers very intentionally to promote their viewpoints. I think Fox
15:43
Speaker 2: is part of that tradition. It is part of the
15:45
Speaker 2: tradition that is a very clear, undeniable point of view.
15:47
Speaker 2: It's a point of view that I disagree with. It's
15:49
Speaker 2: a point of view that I think is ultimately destructive
15:51
Speaker 2: for the long-term growth of a country that is a
15:53
Speaker 2: vibrant middle class and is competitive in the world.
15:56
Speaker 1: You'll be so soft.
15:57
Speaker 2: You'll be surprised to learn there's a far longer answer
15:59
Speaker 2: than that, John. Yeah, that's factually accurate. Fox News does
16:03
Speaker 2: the bidding of a capricious Australian billionaire.
16:06
Speaker 1: I was going to say, I don't even think, I mean,
16:07
Speaker 1: maybe it was accurate then. I think the point I'm
16:10
Speaker 1: trying to make now is like, it's not just a
16:12
Speaker 1: conservative point of view. It's not just a view that
16:15
Speaker 1: we disagree with. They're spreading conspiracy theories that led to
16:17
Speaker 1: a fucking violent insurrection against the Capitol on January 6th
16:20
Speaker 1: that they know are lies.
16:22
Speaker 2: I think Obama's point was accurate then. Yes, you're right.
16:24
Speaker 2: January 6th proved to be the case for the umpteenth time.
16:27
Speaker 2: And the other fiction... that people in Washington always put forward,
16:32
Speaker 2: the sort of establishment class, the permanent fixtures in Washington,
16:36
Speaker 2: you know, politicians, media, is that Fox is half opinion,
16:40
Speaker 2: but then it's got this straight news side. Let's check
16:43
Speaker 2: in with Fox News straight news guy, editor-in-chief Brett Baer.
16:47
Speaker 2: Two days after the election day in 2020, Brett Baer
16:51
Speaker 2: emailed Fox News president Jay Wallace saying they should rescind
16:54
Speaker 2: Fox's call that Biden won Arizona. Quote, The sooner we
16:58
Speaker 2: pull it, even if it gives us major egg, and
17:00
Speaker 2: we put it back in his column, the better we are,
17:03
Speaker 2: in my opinion. First of all, back in his column, Brett?
17:05
Speaker 1: Yeah.
17:06
Speaker 2: When was it in Donald Trump's column?
17:08
Speaker 1: It wasn't.
17:09
Speaker 2: But John, like later on, we know that Brett's producer
17:12
Speaker 2: was saying, texting him things like, it's dangerously insane, these
17:16
Speaker 2: conspiracy theories. This was Lucas Tomlinson to Brett Baer. And
17:19
Speaker 2: on November 5th, Brett Baer said, there is no evidence
17:22
Speaker 2: of fraud, none. Now, like, did Brett Baer quit? Did
17:26
Speaker 2: he walk out of the building? Did he denounce the
17:28
Speaker 2: opinion side, right? Did he take a principled stand in
17:30
Speaker 2: support of this brave straight news side? Absolutely not.
17:34
Speaker 1: There's a few more examples of that kind of thing
17:36
Speaker 1: in the legal filing. Reporter Kristen Fisher fact-checked the Giuliani-Powell
17:42
Speaker 1: news conference and was reprimanded for it by her boss,
17:46
Speaker 1: saying he told her she needed to do a better job, quote,
17:49
Speaker 1: respecting our audience. respecting our audience by lying to them,
17:52
Speaker 1: letting them believe their lie, the lies that they believe,
17:55
Speaker 1: you have to let them believe that because you don't
17:57
Speaker 1: want to tell the audience what they don't want to hear.
17:59
Speaker 2: Tell them what they want to hear, not what they
18:00
Speaker 2: need to hear.
18:01
Speaker 1: And then a report, this has been sort of widely
18:03
Speaker 1: reported yesterday and today, reporter Jackie Heinrich fact-checked a Trump
18:08
Speaker 1: tweet about Dominion and Tucker Carlson texted Hannity and tried
18:13
Speaker 1: to get her fired. And he said, quote, this is
18:15
Speaker 1: measurably hurting the company. The stock price is down. Not
18:19
Speaker 1: a joke. Not a joke. Not a joke, Tucker.
18:22
Speaker 2: Tucker Carlson.
18:23
Speaker 1: Tucker's mad that the stock price was down because a
18:25
Speaker 1: reporter fact-checked Donald Trump saying that Dominion voting machines had
18:30
Speaker 1: rigged the election. That's the... Now, the question is.
18:33
Speaker 2: It's like, these are one of these moments where you
18:34
Speaker 2: read these things and you're like, how can Fox News
18:37
Speaker 2: go on existing? How long will the rest of Washington
18:41
Speaker 2: play along with this fiction that news should be part
18:44
Speaker 2: of its name? Remember when they used to say fair
18:45
Speaker 2: and balanced? That was their slogan for years, right? Like,
18:48
Speaker 2: what's so frustrating for Democrats is like, we are forced
18:51
Speaker 2: to have this debate over and over and over again. Like,
18:53
Speaker 2: do you engage with Fox or do you write them off?
18:56
Speaker 2: Because there is an audience there, but the mainstream media
18:59
Speaker 2: plays along and they make it harder.
19:01
Speaker 1: They do. I wanted to get to that question though,
19:03
Speaker 1: because I've been thinking about this a lot since this
19:05
Speaker 1: release last night, because I don't think, I think Joe
19:08
Speaker 1: Biden was absolutely right in not going on Fox because
19:10
Speaker 1: they're trying to make him, the president, this is, it's
19:13
Speaker 1: not a place for the president of the United States
19:14
Speaker 1: to go on, right? I know there's a big audience.
19:16
Speaker 1: I get that. But I do think, reading all this
19:20
Speaker 1: made me really angry because there are people out there,
19:24
Speaker 1: relatives of ours, friends of ours who like watch Fox news,
19:27
Speaker 1: who believe this shit. And it's like, how do you
19:29
Speaker 1: reach them if they're, if they're watching Fox? And I
19:31
Speaker 1: do think having some Democrats go on Fox to call
19:35
Speaker 1: them out for their bullshit is effective. Like I think
19:38
Speaker 1: that any Democrat who goes on Fox, anyone, anyone who, any,
19:42
Speaker 1: any never Trump Republican, anyone who believes in democracy, and
19:46
Speaker 1: Goes on Fox should be reading these quotes on air
19:49
Speaker 1: on Fox to the host next time they're on and forever.
19:54
Speaker 1: And like, if it's Democratic politicians, that's fine. If someone
19:57
Speaker 1: wants to go on and do this, that's great. I
19:58
Speaker 1: don't think it rises to the level of having the
20:00
Speaker 1: President of the United States on, but like, next democratic
20:02
Speaker 1: strategist who's on if pete budaj he's great on fox
20:06
Speaker 1: yeah he should do it read these fucking quotes from
20:08
Speaker 1: the legal filing to them on air and like just
20:12
Speaker 1: do it that way.
20:13
Speaker 2: Yeah i mean that that works if you're alive a
20:15
Speaker 2: lot of this is like so i i have a
20:16
Speaker 2: nuance you in this i don't think joe biden should
20:18
Speaker 2: ever go on fox news it's never worth this time
20:20
Speaker 2: at all i wrote an opinion piece right when he
20:22
Speaker 2: took office suggesting as much and got yelled at by
20:25
Speaker 2: a bunch of fox reporters during the campaign this was
20:27
Speaker 2: a debate whether you engage fox And that story has
20:30
Speaker 2: gotten a little distorted because at the time what was
20:32
Speaker 2: being debated in the Democratic primary was whether Democrats should
20:36
Speaker 2: go on Fox News and let them build town hall
20:38
Speaker 2: events around that appearance in the midst of an advertising
20:43
Speaker 2: boycott campaign led by Sleeping Giants and all these great
20:45
Speaker 2: other organizations to try to push back on the bigotry
20:49
Speaker 2: you were seeing on Tucker Carlson, right? Like that debate
20:51
Speaker 2: is long over. I agree with you. I think Mayor
20:52
Speaker 2: Pete is excellent on Fox News. I think he does
20:55
Speaker 2: a great job. But again- The last time Mayor Pete,
20:58
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, Secretary Pete Buttigieg was on, he was dealing
21:01
Speaker 2: with accusations from straight news editor in chief anchor Brett
21:06
Speaker 2: Baer about whether it was appropriate for Chastin to come
21:09
Speaker 2: on an international presidential delegation with him. Why? Because they're gay. Right.
21:15
Speaker 2: Like every other lead of a delegation brings their spouse.
21:19
Speaker 2: It's completely appropriate. It's within protocol. But Brett Baer was
21:22
Speaker 2: somehow pushing Pete on whether it was appropriate for Chasten
21:25
Speaker 2: to come simply because they're in a same sex relationship.
21:27
Speaker 2: Like that's what these people face every time they go
21:29
Speaker 2: on this network. Yeah, but I'm glad that Pete did that.
21:32
Speaker 2: I'm glad he did, too. Because I think that if Pete.
21:34
Speaker 1: Wasn't on there to make his case, which he did
21:36
Speaker 1: very well, and to say, yeah, it is because I
21:38
Speaker 1: have a husband and because I'm gay. If he didn't
21:40
Speaker 1: do that, then Brett or Fox would have run a
21:42
Speaker 1: story without that point of view in it. And that's
21:44
Speaker 1: what the viewers would have got. So I don't think
21:46
Speaker 1: that you lose anything by going on there and arguing.
21:48
Speaker 2: I'm not saying that. My point is good spokespeople should
21:51
Speaker 2: go on all the time, but we have to stop
21:54
Speaker 2: treating like there's this occasional debate that comes up where
21:57
Speaker 2: people would be like, we need that audience. And they
21:59
Speaker 2: treat it like it's an interview that's going to be
22:01
Speaker 2: on the level. That was the framework for the playbook
22:04
Speaker 2: piece and all these other pieces that Joe Biden should
22:06
Speaker 2: go on Fox News and be like, do this Super
22:08
Speaker 2: Bowl conversation. The suggestion was that he'd get a straight
22:10
Speaker 2: interview about issues and that it would be a great
22:13
Speaker 2: chance to inform the public. You have to go in
22:15
Speaker 2: and approach them knowing that this is an organization designed
22:19
Speaker 2: to damage the Democratic Party and treat it accordingly.
22:23
Speaker 1: I completely agree with that. That's my point too, which
22:26
Speaker 1: is you need to go in there and be on
22:28
Speaker 1: war footing with them. Pete could have gone further in
22:33
Speaker 1: my point of view and said, Brett, I know you
22:34
Speaker 1: have a very specific point of view. I know that
22:37
Speaker 1: you have a network that's telling you to do this.
22:39
Speaker 1: You know, like people need to start pulling back the
22:41
Speaker 1: curtain like this legal filing did when they're live on air.
22:45
Speaker 1: I would do a town hall with them because I
22:47
Speaker 1: think that's live. You're on a much more equal footing
22:51
Speaker 1: on a town hall than you are in some like
22:53
Speaker 1: pre-produced segment that they're going to be able to cut
22:55
Speaker 1: however they want.
22:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, the format matters. I mean, the town hall thing,
22:58
Speaker 2: the town hall debate at the time, again, was because
22:59
Speaker 2: of the advertising boycott and people just didn't want to
23:01
Speaker 2: kind of give Fox a lifeline when advertisers were running away.
23:04
Speaker 2: And I, you know, whatever, it's fine. But I think
23:07
Speaker 2: the problem is when you... If Joe Biden went on
23:10
Speaker 2: Fox and was super combative, Fox would then cut a
23:13
Speaker 2: ton of clips of him being super combative and make
23:16
Speaker 2: another series of stories about Joe Biden attacking Fox News.
23:20
Speaker 2: That's what they do. They play the victim. They're very
23:22
Speaker 2: good at making the story about themselves and how they're
23:24
Speaker 2: attacked and how their audience is attacked. And they're always
23:27
Speaker 2: the victim of everything. And I think, like, not falling
23:30
Speaker 2: into that trap is another important piece of this.
23:32
Speaker 1: Yeah, but at some point... This is who they are. Yeah,
23:34
Speaker 1: but at some point, you just got to realize, like, right, if... A,
23:37
Speaker 1: you have to be a really talented politician to do
23:39
Speaker 1: it or a talented speaker or strategist or whoever you are.
23:41
Speaker 1: And B, you have to say to yourself, okay, they're
23:44
Speaker 1: going to do exactly what you just did. But the
23:47
Speaker 1: audience for the Super Bowl, if that's what you pick,
23:49
Speaker 1: the audience for the Super Bowl, the number of people
23:51
Speaker 1: seeing that live is going to be far greater than
23:53
Speaker 1: the in the bubble audience that they clip it for later.
23:56
Speaker 1: And so I want my message to come out.
23:58
Speaker 2: The Super Bowl is not a normal example. I mean,
24:00
Speaker 2: like at the end of the day, if I'm a president,
24:03
Speaker 2: I'm a democratic lawmaker and I have an hour a
24:05
Speaker 2: week to do communications. I just don't think Fox should
24:08
Speaker 2: ever be a part of that hour. There's infinitely better
24:10
Speaker 2: ways you can reach people. It doesn't have to be
24:12
Speaker 2: CNN or CBS or MSNBC. It can be like podcasts,
24:17
Speaker 2: YouTube shows, like getting out with local news. I mean,
24:21
Speaker 2: that is the broader challenge. I think the opportunity for Democrats.
24:24
Speaker 2: But the other challenge that we face as a party
24:26
Speaker 2: for all the conversation about liberal bias in the media, blah, blah, blah.
24:31
Speaker 2: There was a really interesting report in Axios the other
24:33
Speaker 2: day where they got leaked kind of a how-to guide
24:37
Speaker 2: for House Republicans doing oversight hearings out in the field.
24:41
Speaker 2: And one of the recommendations was to embed reporters from
24:43
Speaker 2: Sinclair Broadcasting in those hearings. A lot of people don't
24:47
Speaker 2: know what Sinclair Broadcasting is. It's basically local Fox News.
24:51
Speaker 2: They reach 185 TV stations in 86 markets. That's of
24:54
Speaker 2: last year, I think. And they're also known to do
24:56
Speaker 2: these must-run segments by like Republican partisans in Washington, D.C.
25:01
Speaker 2: that they just blast into every household. And so like
25:04
Speaker 2: that just I think it's another piece of this broader
25:06
Speaker 2: structural disadvantage the Democrats are up against when it comes
25:09
Speaker 2: to bias in the media and like conservative tilt. And
25:13
Speaker 2: it's just like it's why this conversation gets people like
25:17
Speaker 2: you and me and Dan like so animated because we
25:21
Speaker 2: know the scales are actually firmly tilted in. the direction
25:25
Speaker 2: of more conservative outlets or sort of like weaponized partisan
25:28
Speaker 2: outlets from the Republican side. And yet there persists this
25:31
Speaker 2: silly belief that the media is somehow liberal. And it's
25:35
Speaker 2: just not. It's not.
25:36
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, I think there's two audiences that we're trying
25:38
Speaker 1: to convince here. Certainly not the people listening to this
25:40
Speaker 1: podcast because they are firmly on our side. For sure.
25:44
Speaker 1: But you're talking, there's the audience that's watching Fox right now.
25:47
Speaker 1: And I think to reach them, you have to either
25:50
Speaker 1: go on Fox or find other places where they're getting
25:53
Speaker 1: their content information and reach them there. And not just
25:57
Speaker 1: go on and play nice and act like it's on
25:59
Speaker 1: the level, but call out the bullshit that Fox is doing.
26:02
Speaker 1: So I think there's a strategy there. And then I
26:04
Speaker 1: think what you're talking about is convincing the press, the
26:07
Speaker 1: mainstream press, the Washington establishment, that Fox is a propaganda
26:13
Speaker 1: apparatus and they should call it out and they should
26:15
Speaker 1: not pretend that it's just the the right-leaning network that
26:19
Speaker 1: we all have to deal with that's on the up
26:21
Speaker 1: and up. And I think that's sort of a slightly
26:23
Speaker 1: different strategy than going directly to people.
26:25
Speaker 2: My recommendation is don't go on Fox. Don't waste your time.
26:28
Speaker 2: Find other ways to reach people. One. Two, part of
26:32
Speaker 2: the mainstream media problem, part of the Washington culture problem
26:35
Speaker 2: that treats Fox as just your friendly, right-leaning, right-of-center organization
26:39
Speaker 2: with the news side is that they're all chummy and
26:42
Speaker 2: they're all buddies and they all go to the same
26:44
Speaker 2: book parties with each other and they want to get
26:45
Speaker 2: invited on you know, Brett Baer's Sunday show when he,
26:49
Speaker 2: when they have a book coming out, right? And like,
26:50
Speaker 2: that's very hard to get past and it's very frustrating.
26:53
Speaker 1: Yeah. Just a perfect end to this is you might
26:57
Speaker 1: wonder how Fox News has been responding to all this
27:00
Speaker 1: damning information that has come out about them. Well, here's
27:04
Speaker 1: Tucker Carlson just last night.
27:06
Speaker 6: There are so many unanswered questions, some of them lingering. How,
27:10
Speaker 6: for example, did senile hermit Joe Biden get 15 million
27:14
Speaker 6: more votes than his former boss, rock star, crowd surfer
27:18
Speaker 6: Barack Obama? Results like that would seem to defy the
27:22
Speaker 6: laws of known physics and qualify instead as a miracle.
27:25
Speaker 6: Was the 2020 election a miracle?
27:28
Speaker 1: Honestly, we don't know.
27:28
Speaker 6: We don't expect to get an answer to it tonight.
27:31
Speaker 1: From the legal filing, Fox executives privately called Tucker Carlson, quote,
27:35
Speaker 1: crazy Tucker. Tucker Carlson himself acknowledged that the Dominion voting
27:40
Speaker 1: allegations were, quote, ludicrous in a text, totally off the rails,
27:44
Speaker 1: and said this of Donald Trump, he could easily destroy
27:48
Speaker 1: us if we play it wrong.
27:50
Speaker 2: Tucker is the king of just asking questions. And in
27:54
Speaker 2: this case, it's a question that's very easy to find
27:56
Speaker 2: the answer to. I think Joe Biden got more votes
27:58
Speaker 2: than Barack Obama because more people voted and there were
28:00
Speaker 2: more people in the country.
28:01
Speaker 1: Donald Trump in 2020 got millions and millions of more
28:04
Speaker 1: votes than Donald Trump in 2016. Yeah. What do you
28:06
Speaker 1: think happened?
28:06
Speaker 2: It's a thing called population growth.
28:08
Speaker 1: Well, and also it was a higher turnout election. It
28:10
Speaker 1: was the highest turnout election in a century in 2020.
28:13
Speaker 1: That's why he got more votes.
28:13
Speaker 2: But yeah, this is their reaction to a Dominion filing
28:17
Speaker 2: that lays bare just how full of shit all of
28:20
Speaker 2: them are.
28:20
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, they are full of shit and they will
28:23
Speaker 1: not be embarrassed about it. So we have to do
28:25
Speaker 1: it for them. So, uh, for all of your relatives
28:29
Speaker 1: that watch Fox news, if you're crazy uncles that are
28:32
Speaker 1: posting on Facebook, whatever, send them these stories about Fox.
28:36
Speaker 1: Cause I really do think that this is that like
28:39
Speaker 1: watching the people that you see every night on television
28:44
Speaker 1: saying something completely different in private than they are telling
28:47
Speaker 1: you every single night. I do think it, you know,
28:49
Speaker 1: it's not going to work for maybe even most people,
28:51
Speaker 1: but like it's the most effective form of sort of, uh,
28:55
Speaker 1: you know, bringing people back from the brink and deprogramming
28:59
Speaker 1: them than you can have. And that there's like plenty
29:01
Speaker 1: of studies about that. They are all so afraid right now.
29:04
Speaker 1: They're probably less afraid of the actual lawsuit and the
29:06
Speaker 1: damages than they are being exposed to their own audience
29:10
Speaker 1: for being frauds. This is what scares them.
29:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think they have like 4 billion cash on
29:15
Speaker 2: hand and the judgment would be 1.6.
29:18
Speaker 1: They do not want to be exposed as frauds in
29:20
Speaker 1: front of the audience that they need. That's where it
29:23
Speaker 1: comes down to.
29:24
Speaker 2: All right.
29:24
Speaker 1: Well, this was fun. I can't wait for this case
29:27
Speaker 1: to unfold. We'll certainly be covering it here.
29:29
Speaker 2: Thank you, Dominion. Thank you, Hugo Chavez.
29:32
Speaker 1: And thanks, Tucker, of course. pod save america is a
29:38
Speaker 1: crooked media production the executive producer is michael martinez our
29:42
Speaker 1: senior producer is andy gardner bernstein our producers are hayley
29:45
Speaker 1: muse and olivia martinez it's mixed and edited by andrew
29:48
Speaker 1: chadwick kyle seglin and charlotte landis sound engineered the show
29:52
Speaker 1: Thanks to Hallie Kiefer, Ari Schwartz, Sandy Gerard, Andy Taft,
29:55
Speaker 1: and Justine Howe for production support. And to our digital team,
29:58
Speaker 1: Elijah Cohn, Phoebe Bradford, Milo Kim, and Amelia Montuth. Our
30:01
Speaker 1: episodes are uploaded as videos at youtube.com slash podsaveamerica.