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Trump's Dangerous War Games · Pod Save America

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Thanks for watching!
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: On today's show, we'll talk about the White House's big
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: post-State of the Union messaging push, starring J.D. Vance and
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: a hysterical Stephen Miller. We've also got new details about
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: the administration's strategy to use Americans as bait to sell
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: their war with Iran. We'll also talk about the huge
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: news that the Justice Department made a few Epstein files
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: disappear that included allegations of sexual abuse against Donald Trump.
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: And we'll get into why Pete Hegseth is threatening an
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: AI company unless they let the government use their products
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: for unmanned weapons and mass surveillance. Then, as Democrats get
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: some good midterm news, Tommy talks to Shelly Jackson, an
• 1:00
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  Speaker 2: under control of the Ellisons.
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: They're few and far between these days. But more on
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: that later, yes.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, right as we started recording, we found out the
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: news that Netflix has given up because Paramount made a
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• 2:19
  Speaker 1: Which means, which means Barry Weiss is in the Situation Room.
• 2:25
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  Speaker 2: our pro-democracy independent media company, not owned by David Ellison
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: and not run by Barry Weiss and not under the
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: thumb of Donald Trump. All right, let's get to the news.
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: We're all still tired from Trump's nearly two-hour State of
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: the Union address. And the president must be, too, since
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: the White House sent out their newly minted fraud czar, J.D. Vance,
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: to amplify the speech instead of Trump. The VP announced
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: on Wednesday that the federal government would unilaterally cut off
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: $ 259 million in Medicaid funding for the people of Minnesota
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: as collective punishment for some individuals supposedly committing fraud. Vance
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: then traveled to Wisconsin on Thursday to keep pushing the
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: fraud message while charming voters with his signature charisma. Let's
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: take a listen.
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: When you go to the polls in November, I don't
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: want you to just think about all the great things
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: that we've accomplished, all the great things that we've talked about.
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: I don't want you just to think about no taxes
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: on tips and lower gas prices. I want you to
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: think Who is going to protect my money from fraudsters?
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: The job of your government is not to open your
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: borders and allow fraudsters to come in and take advantage
• 3:40
  Speaker 3: of you. The job of your government is to shut
• 3:43
  Speaker 3: the border and shut off the fraud.
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: Kelly said that I'm the coolest vice president in American history.
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: And I said, Kelly, that is a low standard. That
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: is a very low bar.
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: But I do think that I clear that bar.
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: No, no, you did not. Not even close. did not
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: clear the bar.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: I have a lot to say. I don't have to
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: say it today, but at some point about why J.D.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: Vance is an absolutely miserable presidential candidate and that the
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: Democrats should spend the next two years making sure that
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: everyone understands what a fucking gooper he is.
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: I mean, I don't think we have to work too
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: hard at that. I don't think anyone needs a message
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: memo or anything like that. I think we just need
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: to make sure everyone sees him.
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: Right, but we have.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: Or J.D. Vance.
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: That's right. We have to show people J.D.
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: Vance.
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: We have to... You don't even really have to meme-ify
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: him because he is a walking meme.
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: The J.D.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: Vance meme is actually cooler than the J.D. Vance himself.
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: But it's just... He makes Ron DeSantis look smooth.
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: Also, leading with his chin a bit there, you want
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: to think about who let the fraudsters in. I don't know.
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: There's a couple in the White House. One or two?
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: The president has actually been convicted of fraud.
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: Many, many times, yes. He's been convicted of fraud. He
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: has been accused of fraud. Many fraudsters in the administration. Yeah.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: Someone say that J.D. Vance himself is a fraud?
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: J.D. Vance is also a fraud. Donald Trump is actually
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: just stealing taxpayer money himself, just suing his own government
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: and then deciding in favor of himself. He's going to
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: try this with the IRS. He's trying this with the DOJ.
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: So he's stealing some money. He's pardoning some fraudsters. Lots
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: of people who bilked a lot of Americans out of
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: a lot of money now will not have to pay
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: restitution because they got a pardon from Donald Trump because
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: they paid for it. Fraudsters. Fraudsters. It does seem like
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: they are gearing up to make this whole election about fraud.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: What do you make of that? What do you make
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: of that? Are we taking this too lightly?
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: I don't really know, John. I would say in preparation
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: for this pod, which I was going to take deadly seriously,
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: I went back and read The State of the Union
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: because I couldn't watch it again. It is less coherent
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: in written form by far. And the fraud section is
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: particularly incoherent. It starts with Somalia, goes to Minnesota, quick
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: pivot to a tragic story about a car accident, then
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: a new policy proposal on commercial licenses for undocumented people.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: And that's the whole thing. That's the narrative. That's the message.
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: Well, it does show that they're really trying hard to
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: combine the anti-immigrant agenda with or conflate, not combine, with fraud, right?
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: And so they know that people don't like their tax
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: dollars being wasted, particularly on government programs that aren't going
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: to people who actually deserve them. And who deserves them
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: less than murderous immigrants who are here illegally?
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I guess I kind of sort of
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: understand what might possibly resemble a strategy here, which is
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: to basically take Ronald Reagan's welfare queen strategy of the
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: 80s and then marry it with immigration. But it's not
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: to be done in a particularly coherent way. And most
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: people don't really know what they're talking about. Those are
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: things that are not necessarily connected to each other. It's
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: more sort of like– and you can really see this
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: when you read the speech. It is just a series
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: of comments on viral stories in the right-wing media stitched
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: into a speech masquerading as something of a message. And
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: this is one of them, right? They're fascinated by it.
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: Nick Shirley was at the State of the Union, I believe.
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: The guy who originally had the reporting– and I'm doing
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: air quotes for the audio listeners– about this. And so
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: I don't– this is– they don't have a particularly strong
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: hand to play with. I don't think this is better
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: than the other things they're doing, but I think this
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: is probably something that J.D. Vance wants. I think that's
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: why Trump gave it to him. I think that's why
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: he's here. Maybe he thinks it's good for the Republicans,
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: but I think he thinks it's probably good for himself
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: because the Minnesota fraud, immigrant fraud, bullshit narrative they spin
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: is a thing that excites the right-wing media people and
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: the far-right podcasters and megatypes that J.D. Vance is trying
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: to persuade to be on his side in a presidential race.
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: So I think that's kind of how we got here.
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, because I was going to say, I think the
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: fatal flaw in their plan is they're forgetting that they're
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: the ones in power that control the White House and Congress.
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: And so if there are people who are worried that
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: their tax dollars are being wasted and that's why they
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: can't afford anything, instead of just making speeches about it ostensibly,
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: they would have the power to make sure that people's
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: tax dollars are actually being used properly and that people
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: can afford things.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: I mean, theoretically, I guess.
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: It's not Joe Biden and the White House anymore that
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: are running against him. They're the ones who they've had
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: a year now. Later, J.D. Vance said to the pool,
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: I think he said something like, some of this stuff,
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: some of these economic policies, it just takes a while
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: to work through the system.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: I heard him say, someone said the other day, some Republican,
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: that once the plants are built and the people start working,
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: then we'll see the golden age.
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: Once the plants are built, what are they building? I
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: don't know.
• 9:14
  Speaker 4: J.D.
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: Vance said to the Bulls, some of this is that
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: the policies we've already put in place take a little
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: bit of time to work their way through the system.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: Is the car in the ditch, John?
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: Let's start with the car in the ditch. That was
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: our midterm message in 2010. Did not work.
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: We lost 63 seats.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: Did not work. You know, I never liked a car
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: in the ditch, and I didn't know that Obama didn't
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: know that I didn't like it. But then he wrote
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: in his book, That I looked at him like I
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: hated it.
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: And I.
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: Was like, I guess I did not have a good
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: poker face on that one.
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: But also it was terrible and it got longer with
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: every speech because it was a very elaborate metaphor, which
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: with every speech, there'd be a new element of how
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: the car got in the ditch, how the car was
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: getting in the ditch. how dirty the ditch was.
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: By the way, in case you guys missed this part
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: back in 2010, the Republicans are the ones who drove
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: the car into the ditch. And now, and we're trying
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: to get the car out of the ditch.
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: It's not out yet because our policies take time.
• 10:14
  Speaker 5: It's not out yet.
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: Right, but we want to put the car in drive
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: to get out of the ditch, and the Republicans want
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: to put it in R to go back into the ditch.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: That was where he lost me, because that was a
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: Tom Daschle, Evan Bayh classic, too. The DNR. That's been
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: said by one million Democratic politicians at Jefferson Jackson and
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: Dinners for 50 years.
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: Not our greatest moment.
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: We should probably edit this part out of the podcast, honestly.
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: No, no, I think we should keep it in. Well, J.D.
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: Vance had something similar today, which is he's like, Democrats
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: talking about affordability is like, you know, the arsonist complaining,
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: burn down the house or something like some dumb shit
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: like that. So anyway, bad cliches, bipartisan. Why do you
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: think they're having Vance out there doing this instead of Trump?
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: This is really a.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: Great question because normally the president goes out the day
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: after the State of the Union, does a bunch of events,
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: you know, will often travel for the whole week of
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: the State of the Union back in, you know, a
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: different media age, they travel for two weeks. It's just,
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump loves attention. I'm sort of mystified by this.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: He loves attention. You are guaranteed to get attention the
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: day after the State of the Union. My only guess
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: is he's tired.
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: Tired and busy planning a war, maybe.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: We are undertaking at least one and maybe two wars
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: in the coming days.
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Could be that. But I don't think that's it.
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: It could be some of the bigger warmongers in the
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: administration are happy to get J.D. Vance out of there
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: because J.D. Vance... in some instances, isn't as quick to
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: go to war.
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: You think they sent him into Milwaukee so that they
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: could bomb Iran faster?
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: That's a good thing.
• 11:47
  Speaker 6: Who knows?
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: Crazier things have happened.
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: No, no, I'm not saying you're wrong, but you know
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: he's in a signal chat, so he could respond.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: That's true. That's true. Well, it's not like he's making
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: the decision in those signal chats anyway.
• 11:56
  Speaker 7: No, no, he is.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: He speaks until Stephen Miller tells him to stop speaking.
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know. Maybe he's tired. Maybe he just
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: doesn't give a shit.
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: Or maybe that speech was so long, even Donald Trump
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: is sick of hearing Donald Trump talk.
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: I mean, that would be something. That would be something.
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: As for the State of the Union itself, we don't
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: have final numbers yet, but it looks like ratings were
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: down from last year, about 12%. Regardless, the White House
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: and some Republicans are excitedly telling reporters the speech was
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: a home run that will reverberate through November. Here's two
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: representative headlines. One from Politico. The so-to moment that Republicans
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: hope saves the midterms. Wow. And this is one from
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: the Washington Post. Republicans think they laid an immigration trap
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: ahead of the midterms. These headlines are referring, of course,
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: to this moment now captured in a Republican super PAC ad.
• 12:48
  Speaker 7: If you agree with this statement, then stand up and
• 12:52
  Speaker 7: show your support. The first duty of the American government
• 12:56
  Speaker 7: is to protect American citizens, not illegal aliens. These people
• 13:12
  Speaker 7: are crazy.
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: You got us. And with the old Republicans are for you.
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: Democrats are for them. They're reprising the 2024 message, you know.
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: So we were, I know I was, a rather cavalier
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: about this moment when we did our post State of
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: the Union response pod. Were we too cavalier? Is this
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: the magic bullet that's going to save the midterms for
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: the Republicans?
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: I'm actually more cavalier today than I was on Tuesday night.
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: More cavalier.
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: More cavalier. After having seen that ad, it shows why
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: the idea that this is some moment that is going
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: to shape the midterms is idiotic. It is pure stenography
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: from reporters talking to Republican operatives. It doesn't translate into
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: an ad. That ad sucks. It's not really clear what's happening.
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: No one knows the context for it. And even if
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: they did– It would not matter that much because this
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: is not Donald Trump of 2024. This is Donald Trump
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: of 2026 when his immigration approval rating is 12 to
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: 15 points underwater. He is not the efficacy of a
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: message is intrinsically tied to the credibility of the messenger
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: and Trump and the Republicans no longer have credibility on immigration.
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: Democrats don't either. Like now we're almost basically tied between
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: with Trump on who you trust in immigration, but that's
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: a gigantic win for us compared to previous years. And
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: so this is not going to matter in any way, shape,
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: or form. I don't care. It is a dumb person's
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: idea of a clever idea. And it is just like,
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: it's not, it's really not a thing.
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was trying to think about it just to
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: sort of- I really tried for your- I did too. Well,
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: and a few people, a few people were like, oh,
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: was it smart? Ask me genuinely, like, was it smart
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: that he did that? Or was it weird that the
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: Democrats didn't stand up? And again, it's like, like you said,
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: maybe it makes people some people, I guess, think, well,
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: what are Democrats up to? I don't know about that.
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: It does not help Donald Trump at all. It does
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: not because that's not what people, people are angry about ICE. Again,
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: he did not say ICE once during the whole speech.
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: It wasn't a, it wasn't a stand up and show
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: your support for ICE. That's for sure. I also think
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: that most people see, I think you can see through
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: the obvious setup here. I mean, even the, if you
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: agree with this statement, stand up and show your support. Like, yeah.
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: So you know, Democratic president could have been like, if
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: you agree with this statement, stand up and show your support.
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: The first duty of the American government is to protect
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: American citizens, not Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump. Oh, Republicans
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: didn't stand.
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: I mean, that would have been a good idea.
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: You know, Republicans wouldn't stand for it. They wouldn't be
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: able to stand, right? No, I mean, it, And then
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: what would we be led to believe? That they want
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: to protect pedophiles?
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: Wait till you put it in a mediocre ad.
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: Also, it's like, of course the Democrats didn't stand. Of
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: course they weren't going to stand for a bunch of shit.
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: He tried to arrest several of them in the audience.
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: What are we doing? This is not a normal state
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: of the union. You're not going to stand for this shit.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: It's the whole thing. The conversation around it is stupid.
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: It really is Republicans desperately trying to spin something, spin a,
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: find a win in this really incoherent speech that was
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: terrible politics in every other way, shape or form. And
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: some credulous reporters kind of like giving them a place
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: to air their last hopes and dreams for the midterms.
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: Of course, the government's first priority is to protect American citizens. Obviously,
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: it's the highest priority of the American government. Obviously, we
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: know that. This government hasn't even done that. It killed
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: two American citizens.
• 16:50
  Speaker 5: Exactly.
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: In the service of trying to go after undocumented people,
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: it killed, sort of quasi the service of trying to
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: do that, it shot and killed two Americans in the
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: street and then lied about it.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: It has illegally detained, the government has illegally detained at
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: least 170 American citizens. Those are just the ones we
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: know about. And that was as of October of 2025.
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: And that was before Minnesota. It's probably a lot more now.
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: So they have locked up American citizens in jail illegally
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: for weeks at a time in horrifying conditions, killed two
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: American citizens. Yeah, I don't think their priority is protecting
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: American citizens.
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: I don't think people believe it either.
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: Here's another related headline that I want to ask you about, Dan,
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: from the Daily Beast. Stephen Miller melts down in eight-hour
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: Twitter beef with Jon Favreau. My question to you is,
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: do you feel pride, shame, or pity... I want to
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: talk to you about this.
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: I want to talk about this. I think... I don't
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: want this to come across as an intervention because it's
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: not yet. I don't want it to come across as
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: me being critical of you because I'm not. I'm genuinely inquisitive.
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: I just want to say that the photo of me
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: in the piece, the caption is, John Favreau got embroiled
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: in an eight-hour social media spat with Stephen Miller. Not
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: a great look for the host of Offline.
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: No, I would... As I try to tell you, you
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: need to start telling people that offline's title is ironic
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: at this point.
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: Always has been. Always has been. Yeah.
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: It didn't start that way. You were genuinely concerned about
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: people being online. And the product of doing that podcast
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: for years was be more online. But here's the thing.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: We were in the White House. I once told Barack
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: Obama that you had the most common sense of anyone
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: on his team. And that if we brought an idea
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: to you– And the end execution of that is always
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: a speech.
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: Always.
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: And then like me or Axelrod or David Plouffe, we'd
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: go to your office and we would say, John, here's
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: the idea. And you would always be mad that someone
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: assigned a speech without talking about it, which was a
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: very fair point on your part. But if you thought
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: the idea was crazy, I would really question whether– like
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: I was like, oh, that's like a good check. And
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: I generally think you have excellent judgment. So what is
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: going on here? I, I feel great about this one.
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: I'm not just in general.
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: Let's let's like, you are, you wake up in the
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: morning and you're on a mission for Twitter fights with
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: certain people. And I know you are because you're tagging them.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: Like you don't have to tag them.
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: No. Okay. Sometimes I do. I did not tag him
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: at all on this.
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: You quote, in this case. Yeah.
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: Quote tweeted him. Uh, it was about the topic that
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: we're discussing now. And, and specifically because, um, he, he tweeted,
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: and this was, he tweeted on the night of the
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: state of the union. That the seated Democrats and the
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: the the operative line here is um it was a
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: moment that chills to the bone which will live for
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: a thousand years yeah i mean that's an insane yes
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: so it's like okay if you're good so i as
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: we all heard that night thought that the And so
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: I quote tweeted that and said, I think it's genuinely
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: funny how hard they're all trying to make this a thing.
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: And like I just used Miller because he was the
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: most ridiculous one. And then, you know, then he replied
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: to me Wednesday in the afternoon and said, you know,
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: Democrats leapt, clapped, hollered and cheered for raising taxes, but
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: their legs, hands and voices froze in icy contempt as
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: they glowered at the parents of slain children. So that's
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: what he said back to me. Then it just, you know,
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: like when he tweets back, what do you think, I'm
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: just going to leave it there? No, no, I understand.
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: The most powerful government official, more powerful than any of
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: the cabinet members, tweets at me. What, am I supposed
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: to just sit there? And he's also the most repulsive.
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: If he was out there running, if he was the
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: face of the midterms, I think we would all be
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: quite happy.
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: Is that your strategy, to make him the face of
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: the midterms?
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: To use your Twitter account to do it?
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: Have I not said on this podcast that if Donald
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: Trump loses the midterms, that it's going to be the
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: fault of Stephen Miller? No, no, no. Which was such
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: a great point that you then made it a message box.
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I credit you for it.
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: You know, you did. I know you did. But so, yeah,
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: that is my strategy. And look, I think when I
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: told him I found him, he thought that I found
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: the whole thing funny. And I told him I found
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: him hilarious. And then he told me that I was
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: a textbook sociopath, which is, you know, again, leading with
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: the chin. And then he asked if I have any,
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: if I grieve.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: He asked if you grieve for the families and you said,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: I grieve for your family.
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: He said, John, one more time. Do you grieve for
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: these families? And I told him I certainly have sympathy
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: for his. Yeah.
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: I just, how did you feel at the, like in general,
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: at the end of these Twitter battles, do you feel fulfilled, happy?
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: Do you feel like you accomplished a goal? Like, cause
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: I think you have a goal here.
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: My goal was to, to, Well, he has not responded
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: because I asked him. I said, I grieve for anyone
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: who's lost anyone. Of course I do because I'm not
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: a fucking textbook sociopath. And why hasn't the president called
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: the families of Alex?
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: It was a great tweet.
• 22:14
  Speaker 5: We were in a meeting together.
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: I was sitting in the meeting. You were on your
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: phone typing a tweet. I was on my phone looking
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: at Twitter and I saw your tweet. Sorry, Prod Save
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: America production team. But let me ask this other question
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: because many people have asked me this because people bring
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: up your Twitter fights to me a lot.
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: Sure, sure.
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: How does your wife feel about this?
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: Not as great.
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that was the question. That was the question. Because
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: my wife is not married to you, but likes you
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: a lot. She does not feel great about it either.
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: No, Emily thought it was, I got home. I sent
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: her the whole exchange ahead of time before I got
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: in the car to go home. And then when I
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: got home, she's like, first of all, a little nervous again.
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: Another fight with Stephen Miller. I don't know if I
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: like this that much. She's like, but I did laugh
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: pretty hard at the sympathy for his family. She's like,
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: so good. There are some that I, like, whatever, I
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: forget what we were fighting over. I fought with Megyn
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: Kelly about something a couple months ago.
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: Several times you've fought with Megyn Kelly.
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: And I left that one. I'm just like, what was
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: the use of that? Because it's Megyn, like, who cares?
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: It's Megyn Kelly. So that kind of shit, I'm like, eh.
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: Any fight that I've ever gotten in with J.D. Vance
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: or Stephen Miller... Feel great afterwards.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: Okay. Look, if you were finding personal fulfillment here and
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: you end this happier, because time is not a renewable resource.
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: Other right-wing influencers, you should stop me. Not so much.
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: Not great. High-ranking White House officials, I'm not.
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: As long as you feel fulfilled, then I am okay
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: with this. Because everyone needs a hobby.
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: And if this is your hobby- I wouldn't say it
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: was as fulfilling as then going home and hanging out
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: with my family.
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: Of course not.
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: Finally going to bed early for one night. Those things
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: were much more fulfilling.
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: Generally, you do these Twitter fights on work hours. You're
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: not doing it from the zoo with your children. So
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: I think that's a positive. If that starts, we'll have
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: another on-camera intervention here.
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: Anyway, still waiting for Stephen's response. When is the president
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: going to call? Because I thought he grieves for American
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: citizens and I thought that the government's first role is
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: to protect american citizens but apparently it is not all
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: right let's turn to a lighter topic the peace president's
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: next war topic than your twitter fights with a fucking
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: loser yeah what is what is that It's war. It's war, Dan.
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: Real estate bozos Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner met with
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: Iranian officials in Geneva on Thursday to negotiate a new
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: nuclear deal and possibly stave off military intervention. Spoiler alert,
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: didn't go well. No agreement was reached after the first
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: day of negotiations. This comes after Politico reported that the
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: administration is toying with the idea of having Israel, not
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: the U.S. military, launch the first strike against Iran. Why?
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: Here's what a source familiar with the discussions told Politico. Quote,
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: there's thinking in and around the administration that the politics
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: are a lot better if the Israelis go first and
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: alone and the Iranians retaliate against us and give us
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: more reason to take action. I don't know. What do
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: you make of the White House wanting to use American
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: lives as bait to sell the rest of the country
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: on a war with Iran?
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: It seems like it should be a gigantic scandal that
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: they would like to do this.
• 25:40
  Speaker 7: Right?
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: Seems like it should be a big deal. It's not.
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: There's a lot happening today. It's not to even make
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: the A block of this podcast. It literally came after
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: an online feud you had.
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: About the State of the Union. It was an offshoot.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I understand. There's a reason it fell to where
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: it did in the lineup. But it does speak to
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: how impossible this war is to sell to the American people.
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: They cannot do it in any sort of normal way.
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: It's why they're not even trying to do it. They're
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: so desperate for a rationale for a war that the neocons,
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: of which Trump is now one of them apparently, have
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: wanted for decades and decades and decades. They're so desperate
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: to create a pretext for this war that they are–
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: one of the ideas on the whiteboard is let's get
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: some Americans killed so that Americans will be mad and
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: want to go to war with Iran. Seems bad.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: Let's, yeah, I mean, let's let Israel go first. So, because, again,
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: the Israeli government, very popular here. Let's let the Israeli
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: government go first, and then Iran will retaliate and, what,
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: maybe hit an American military base, I guess? And, you know,
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: we're hoping that our defenses will hold and no one
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: will get hurt. But, you know, who knows? Because maybe
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: if an American service member is killed or wounded... Then
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: American people will be like, well, Iran attacked us and
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: killed Americans. And so now we have to attack Iran.
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: And like, honestly, the worst part of it is I
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: could see it working.
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: I don't think it would work. I really don't. I
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: think that the Trump people think the American people are
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: stupid and they're not. If Israel attacks Iran and then
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: Iran attacks an American base, I do not think the
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: American people are then want to sign up for a
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: protracted war in the Middle East.
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: I certainly hope not. I certainly hope not. I talked
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: about this earlier, but I think, I can't remember which
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: podcast I said this on, but the polling was at
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: like 20% of Americans support any kind of action against Iran.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: We talked about this in an actual private conversation that
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: wasn't recorded.
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: There we go.
• 27:51
  Speaker 5: It's wild.
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: But then the CBS poll that dropped the day of
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: the State of the Union asked it with, would you
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: support military action in Iran to prevent them from getting
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: a nuclear weapon? And when you add nuclear weapon, then
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: it was 47 percent approve, 53 percent disapprove. So you
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: can start you basically you can just start seeing their
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: house of lies that they're building this this case on,
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: you know, ballistic missiles that may reach the United States soon.
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: And oh, now what if Iran attacks America as a
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: retaliation for Israel? Oh, now what if there's a nuclear
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: weapon and they're a week away? Like, they're just, you know,
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: it's all the greatest hits from Iraq without any of
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: the effort, really. But, you know, everything's gotten dumber since then, somehow,
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: and the information environment's gotten a lot more awful.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: But American people have gotten a lot more skeptical of
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: foreign interventions. And that question in the CBS poll, I think,
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: in people's minds, is a military strike like Midnight Hammer,
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: or whatever we call it, the other thing.
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: An actual protracted conflict that could cost American lives, could
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: lead to attacks on the homeland or on Americans abroad,
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: could likely lead to a giant spike in oil prices
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: and just general chaos in the world. And just remember,
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: this is a president at 38% approval who is underwater
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: on every single issue, including national security and foreign policy,
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: who may launch United States into a war. He has
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: not explained to a single person why it's happening. And
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: so I think, I just think there's people do not
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: want to go to war and they really don't want
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump to take.
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: Them to war. Yeah, that's, that's true. All right. I'm
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: holding out hope, holding out hope. Although, I mean, I
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: guess hope for public opinion, but I mean, while you're,
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: by the time you're listening to this, by the time.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: You listen to this, it is quite possible that the
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: strike happened because the, the gating issue was they were
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: going to get through these talks on Thursday. We're recording
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: this on Thursday. The talks are over. So at any
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: point something could happen, I would not be surprised if
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: it happened over the weekend or overnight. We don't know.
• 30:05
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: So House Democrats are also planning to hold a war
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: powers resolution vote next week that would force the president
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: to seek congressional authorization before carrying out any military strikes
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: in Iran. Democrats already have the support of Thomas Massey,
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: who sponsored the bill with Ro Khanna. And on Thursday morning,
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: Representative Warren Davidson, a Republican from Ohio, threatened to support
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: the resolution if the White House didn't brief Congress on
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: its justification for the war. The White House, unsurprisingly, is
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: already whipping votes to defeat the resolution. And I think
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: we Democrats have already lost at least Josh Gottheimer and
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: Jared Moskowitz, I think, on this one. So, you know,
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: I don't think we have the votes currently, but I
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: don't know. What do you what do you think? Do
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: you think Democrats there's a chance that Democrats can get
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: enough votes to pass this thing? I don't know.
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: I think it's hard for Republicans to vote to him
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: in the president on a national security issue. So we'll see.
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: You guys got to rant about this on Tuesday. I
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: would like to reclaim my time for a second.
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: Please. Yes, go.
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: What Jared Moskowitz and Josh Gottheimer are doing here is disgusting.
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: Even if you believe against all evidence that Iran is
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: an imminent threat to the United States that demands military action,
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: the idea that you would let this president, this corrupt president,
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: tin pot dictator surrounded by yahoos including a military commanded
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: by a fox news host.
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: Who's drunk who's probably with a reported drinking problem maybe.
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: Wage war in iran without going to congress that you
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: would give up your responsibility your power to try to
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: influence how that war would take place because you want
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: to show yourself to be tough on iran or friendly
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: with Israel or whatever else is just, it is immoral.
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: It's unpatriotic. It is truly, truly disgusting. Like we can
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: disagree about the merits of military action in Iran. You
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: cannot credibly argue that Donald Trump without Congress on his
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: own should unilaterally launch a war with Iran. That is
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: an insane position for a Democrat.
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: Like, I think, I think striking Iran in a war
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: is insane, but like, Let's say that you just genuinely
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: believe it's the right thing to do, right? Well, then, like,
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: what are you afraid of taking it to Congress where
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: you work, where you have been elected to represent people
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: and having the debate there and making a decision as
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: a Congress as the Constitution intended? Yeah.
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: All that War Powers Resolution is doing is saying Donald
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: Trump has to come to Congress first. There is not
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: an imminent threat here. And if there was, then the
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: president has the power to act. But there is not one.
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: We know this because Donald Trump told us quite recently
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: that they obliterated the nuclear program in Iran.
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: And you can, I mean, you know, I yelled about
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: this before, but you can tell that it's bullshit from
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: the line in Godheimer's statement that it's like, you know, this,
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: doing this would show weakness.
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: What are we in fucking 2003 here?
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: Yes. I mean, it's also like, Josh, you were there.
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: You were there. We went through this. He was on
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: the Kerry campaign with me. We went through John Kerry
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: voting for the fucking war in Iraq. Everyone gave President
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: Bush the authorization for the same reasons. We don't want
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: him in the president. We want to give him the
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: authorization for war. I mean, this isn't even that.
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: If you want to vote to authorize the war, I
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: think that is an insane position. But that is a vote.
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: That is you putting your name in and saying, I
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: support this. I'm giving my power from a co-equal branch
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: to authorize this military conflict to try to block the
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: vote from ever happening. to somehow burnish your national security
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: bona fides is disgusting.
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: It's insane. I do not understand it. Well, Dan, good news.
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: Sometime in the near future, our government's wars of choice
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: may not require humans to fight them. I talked about
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: this on Offline last week, but the Department of Defense
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: is threatening Anthropic because the AI company won't let the
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: government use Claude, their AI model, for mass surveillance on Americans,
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: or for firing weapons without human involvement. Axios reported on
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: Wednesday that the Pentagon has taken its first steps toward
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: designating Anthropic a, quote, supply chain risk, which would mean
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: that no company that works with the Department of Defense
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: could also work with Anthropic. The Pentagon typically reserves the
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: supply chain risk penalty for companies that are based in, like,
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: countries that are U.S. adversaries, like China's Huawei. Even more alarming...
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: Elon Musk's XAI signed a deal with the Department of
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: Defense this week that agreed to the standard. Anthropic rejected.
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: So the government's murderous surveillance drones may someday run on grok.
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: And Anthropic in a statement, right, as we were starting
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: to record, said that they in good conscience cannot agree
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: to this. And so they're holding strong. Dan, is this
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: what people voted for? For murderous surveillance drones that can
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: run on grok?
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: To be commanded by Pete Hickseth? No, I don't think
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: it's what people voted for. I mean, this should be
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: honestly one of the biggest stories in the country because
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: it tells us two things. One, it speaks to all
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: of the massive ethical and policy dilemmas that come with
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: the very rapid emergence of AI. It also reveals that
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: the Department of Defense, because I will call it that,
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: not the Department of War, under Donald Trump, would like
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: the power to do mass domestic surveillance.
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: And then just on top of that, at the same
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: time this story comes out, what they want– the Department
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: of Defense argues we want Anthropic to let us do
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: everything we're legally allowed to do. There are only two
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: rules from Anthropic here. No mass domestic surveillance and no
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: autonomous weapons that don't involve humans actually mean they want
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: to make decisions. The latter is technically legal, although quite irresponsible,
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: and I'll get to why it's even more dangerous in
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: a second. But mass domestic surveillance, not legal. And why
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: do they want that? There should be some follow-up questions
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: on that.
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm sure it's only going to be mass domestic
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: surveillance if they go to the FISA courts and they
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: get Article III courts and they get the warrants properly
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: because that's how they've been doing things in the Trump administration.
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: And that's also not mass. Those are individual things. Although, obviously,
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: the Bush administration did do it. with metadata at a
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: very high, high level. And that continued for many years
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: after that. But the other thing is there's this study
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: that came out the other day where they were having
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: all of the AI models play war games against each other.
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: And the big takeaway was AI models are very quick
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: to use tackler nuclear weapons in war games.
• 36:59
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: I mean, because they're not hindered by the moral qualms
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: of it.
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: And it is a way, like it is the fastest
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: way to domination. And this is like the big takeaway
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: is that this is what they do. And now we
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: want to give them the keys to the arsenal. Like
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: it just, it is insane. Also, just on this, it's
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: not just, Pete Hexhead is such a fucking moron. In
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: the meeting with the CEO of Anthropic the other day,
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: he threatened them with two things when they refused. One
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: was what you mentioned, blacklisting the supply list. The other
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: one is that they would use the defense production act
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: who sees control of anthropics AI model. Now those things
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: are in, are in complete conflict with each other. If
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: you are subject to a defense production authors act, uh, acquisition,
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: it's because what you have is so essential national security.
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: The government needs it right now. And the other one
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: in the blacklisting is that you're so dangerous that no
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: one who does business with you can be in contact
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: with the government.
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. I don't know that, um, I don't know
• 38:04
  Speaker 2: that consistency is.
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: What they're going for. This is the future we are
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: living in, and I don't think any of these AI
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: companies are covered in glory. Anthropic, to their credit in
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: this instance, but Anthropic exists, and I just read an
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: incredible book about this called Emperor of AI, which is
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: about open AI. But Anthropic exists because the CEO and
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: the heads of Anthropic and that team are left OpenAI
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: because they thought Sam Altman was abandoning the original mission
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: of OpenAI, which was to guard against risk. Now, they've
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: also commercialized on running a $ 380 billion company right now,
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: but there are a lot of other people who are
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: going to do, like Elon fucking Musk, who are going
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: to do the things that Anthropic.
• 38:50
  Speaker 2: Will not do. I know, and we were talking about this.
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: I mean, Anthropic could be the best actors ever, just
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: in a pretend scenario, that they're only out there. They
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: don't even care as much about making money and they're
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: only there for good.
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: The people who gave them $ 380 billion probably hope they care.
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: About making money. Right, but I'm saying just for the
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: sake of argument, the problem is we're in a very
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: competitive environment and a free market system and there's going
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: to be other companies and whether they're U.S. companies or
• 39:17
  Speaker 2: bad actors overseas and foreign companies, whatever they may be,
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: someone's going to figure out a way to do this,
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: which is why you can't just fucking make a bet
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: on a company being made up of good people. You
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: have to fucking regulate it. it, which this administration is
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: not doing. There is no scenario here where it is
• 39:34
  Speaker 2: not absolutely necessary to regulate artificial intelligence. There's just no scenario.
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: And with statutes, with legislation. Like, yes, the administration, whose
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: current philosophy is no regulations at all, and they're trying
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: to ban... regulations at the state level. But Congress needs
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: to get involved here. And that is dangerous because most
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: of them are still using their AOL accounts. But the
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: fact that AI cannot do mass surveillance and automated weapons
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: should be in law. That's something that should be in
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: law and written. in a way that prevents it. So
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: it's not up to the goodwill of CEOs of multi-billion
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: dollar companies to hold the.
• 40:18
  Speaker 2: Line against this. And the only sliver of good news
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: here is that they can't automatically fire the weapons yet.
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: They don't have that capability yet. I think they don't
• 40:30
  Speaker 2: have the mass surveillance capability yet either, but they're all
• 40:33
  Speaker 2: pretty close.
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: But they are using AI to go through intelligence and
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: do decision-making matrixes. God knows when Elon Musk get the
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: X AI on there, but I'm sure that could be
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: greenlit by Donald Trump any day now.
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, he's too busy making sure that AI can
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: undress images of random people online. So that's what he's
• 40:54
  Speaker 2: focused on. All right. We should also talk about the
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: latest developments in the Epstein scandal.
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: Man, what a pod this is. Honestly, now I'm sort
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: of regretting spending seven, eight minutes on your Twitter habits.
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: Apologies to the listeners.
• 41:20
  Speaker 2: Which is in the news today because the House Oversight
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: Committee took a field trip to Chappaqua, New York, for
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: a closed-door deposition with Hillary Clinton. Bills is scheduled for Friday.
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: Hillary said she had no memory of meeting Epstein, no
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: knowledge of his crimes, and briefly paused the deposition at
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: one point after Lauren Boebert snapped a pic. and leaked
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: it to Benny Johnson because, of course, Hillary later came
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: out and told the press the same thing that she
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: said in her statement, but that also towards the end
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: of the deposition, they started asking her about UFOs and Pizzagate.
• 41:54
  Speaker 2: So that's how the Republicans were using their time in Chappaqua.
• 41:58
  Speaker 2: Stay tuned tomorrow for part two with Bill Clinton. But
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: the much bigger Epstein news this week is that Trump's
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: Justice Department appears to have removed FBI notes from from
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: three interviews that agents conducted in 2019 with a woman
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: who accused Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump of sexually abusing
• 42:19
  Speaker 2: her in 1983 when she was just 13 years old.
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: We know this because the DOJ did release the FBI's
• 42:28
  Speaker 2: initial interview with the woman where she only accused Epstein
• 42:31
  Speaker 2: of abusing her in that initial interview and because they
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: released a summary of the allegations against Trump that just
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: happened to be in an FBI presentation about the Epstein
• 42:41
  Speaker 2: files from last summer. Allegations that were also referenced in
• 42:45
  Speaker 2: an evidence list the prosecutors provided to Ghislaine Maxwell's attorneys,
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: which was also released on the DOJ website. So the
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: existence of those two documents reveals that there were these
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: three interviews that the FBI conducted with the woman where
• 43:00
  Speaker 2: she had made allegations against Donald Trump. But the notes
• 43:03
  Speaker 2: for those three interviews have disappeared from the website. This
• 43:07
  Speaker 2: was first reported by the journalist Roger Sullenberger, and then
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: confirmed by NPR and other outlets. On Wednesday, the Justice
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: Department said it would take another look to see if
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: any documents were improperly tagged and will release anything they
• 43:20
  Speaker 2: find that falls under the requirements of the law. On Thursday,
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: Oversight Chairman James Comer said the committee would be looking
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: into it as well. What do you think, Dan? It's
• 43:29
  Speaker 2: just pretty stunning.
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: What are the odds that the documents we mislabeled would
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: be the ones that included allegations about Donald Trump. Just like,
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: what are the odds?
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: What are the odds? What are the odds? But also,
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: what are the odds that they are still incompetent enough
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: to leave a couple documents in there that reveal the
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: existence of these allegations?
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: We are dealing with criminals. We are not dealing with
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: criminal geniuses. Yeah, that's true. This is the thing that
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: people said about the Epstein files, which is, you know,
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: it's very possible or real that Pam Bonney, Cash Patel,
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: some other person who works for Trump could go in
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: there and take out the Trump stuff. And people kind
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: of said that you, that's crazy. That's conspiracy theory. No,
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: it was like, this is, these guys lie and cheat
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: in every way, shape or form. And they did it here.
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: They're just really bad at it. But if they were
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: slightly better, if they had like third grade competency in criminality,
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: then like no one would ever know this happened.
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: And it's, the documents are currently not, we don't know
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: where they are. And I think, uh, the oversight ranking member,
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: Congressman Garcia, went to go find him, hasn't seen them yet. Like,
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: have they been destroyed? Like, these are fair questions to ask.
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it also seems like this one is not going
• 44:46
  Speaker 2: away because you assume that the victim is out there,
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: the person who made the allegations. She also made allegations
• 44:55
  Speaker 2: against Jeffrey Epstein. They're more substantiated than the allegations against
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump. We should say, of course, they're unsubstantiated so far.
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: But like, You may have to imagine she's out there.
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: Her lawyers are out there. People who know her out there.
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: Like I just, people who conducted the interviews are out there.
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: People who, yeah, the FBI agents are probably out.
• 45:10
  Speaker 7: Right.
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: So it's like, I don't think this is, I don't
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: think this is the last we've heard of this one.
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: Like this is just, it speaks to the volume of
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: insane news in Trump's presidency that we have talked about
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: a war with Iran. We have talked about a, the
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: Fox news host defense secretary trying to use killer robots, um,
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: And now we are talking about a potential– like the
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: Department of Justice going illegally. This is illegal what they
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: did if this was done intentionally.
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: Illegal.
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: It violates the law that was passed requiring disclosure of
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: the records. Went into illegally hide, steal, or destroy records
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: that implicate Donald Trump in a child sex trafficking ring.
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: Like that is what it is. Like whether those allegations
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: are real or not, we don't know. But the cover-up.
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: the attempt to protect him from those allegations is a massive,
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: massive scandal.
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: Also one that like this was known, the NPR story
• 46:11
  Speaker 2: hit the day of the State of the Union because
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: we first talked about this on Jimmy Kill Alive. Yeah.
• 46:17
  Speaker 2: Because there was a question about the Epstein files. And
• 46:20
  Speaker 2: so we brought it up there too. But like, it's
• 46:22
  Speaker 2: wild that then the whole State of the Union happens
• 46:24
  Speaker 2: and we're just like, okay.
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: That's so true of like so many other things. Like,
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: I mean, this just, There's just a different world with
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: a different president, a different media environment where this is
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: all we've talked about for a year and a half now,
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: every single day.
• 46:36
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 46:36
  Speaker 2: I mean, it is wild that, I mean, it's still
• 46:39
  Speaker 2: in the news. I mean, it is a gigantic scandal,
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: like you said, but it is one of the few
• 46:43
  Speaker 2: stories that has sustained itself.
• 46:46
  Speaker 5: For all these months.
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, this all kicked off last summer, really.
• 46:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. So I know we've talked about Trump's
• 46:51
  Speaker 2: plans to steal the midterms quite a bit recently, but
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: there's a new development on that front we should also mention.
• 46:56
  Speaker 2: The Washington Post reports that, quote, pro-Trump activists who say
• 46:59
  Speaker 2: they are in coordination with the White House are circulating
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: a 17-page draft executive order that claims China interfered in
• 47:05
  Speaker 2: the 2020 election as a basis to declare a national
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: emergency that would unlock extraordinary presidential power over voting. So
• 47:15
  Speaker 2: that's fun. One lawyer who's pushing the EO told the
• 47:18
  Speaker 2: Post it would empower Trump to ban mail ballots and
• 47:22
  Speaker 2: voting machines, among other things. So... They're going to use
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: this fake finding that China interfered in 2020 to justify
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: a national emergency, to justify taking the power to run
• 47:33
  Speaker 2: elections away from the states, which is, of course, constitutionally mandated.
• 47:39
  Speaker 2: How real do you think this is? And what's your
• 47:42
  Speaker 2: gut on how the court might respond?
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: There are definitely lunatics outside the White House working on this.
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: There are definitely lunatics inside the White House who are
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: helping them do this. Whether Trump signs it or not,
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: or actually comes out, open question. I really struggle to
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: see what the legal basis for any of this is.
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: As you mentioned, it's in the Constitution. They are, ironically enough,
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: relying on the same statute that the tariffs were used for,
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: the emergency power statute, which has no specific discussion of
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: elections or any of these things. There is no statutory
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: power the president has. even in an emergency over elections.
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: And there is no evidence of foreign involvement. This is
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: based entirely on an intelligence report that Beijing considered, but
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: then decided not to get involved in the 2020 election.
• 48:43
  Speaker 2: That's it. And also, the remedy for Beijing considering But
• 48:48
  Speaker 2: deciding not to get involved in the 2020 election is
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: to ban the mail ballots and voting machines?
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: In the 2026 election. There is some weird thing about
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: how they were– like one of the conspiracy theories is
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: they were going to make driver's licenses, fraudulent driver's licenses
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: for people to vote by mail. But the point is
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: it makes no sense. I can't imagine– like I don't
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: put a ton of faith in the judiciary and the
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: Supreme Court, but this seems quite– like– If you thought
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: their interpretation of the law on the terrorists was absurd,
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: this is like... 10,000 times more absurd than that.
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: I agree with you. And if I were a conspiracy
• 49:28
  Speaker 2: minded myself, I might say that one of the reasons
• 49:32
  Speaker 2: that Trump flew off the fucking handle with that Supreme
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: Court decision, why he was so angry at the Supreme
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: Court and said such crazy shit like they've betrayed their
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: families and they're disloyal and all that shit is because
• 49:45
  Speaker 2: someone told him that that 6-3 majority in that case
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: is probably what you'd get in a case where he
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: tried to declare a national emergency and take over the elections. Yeah,
• 49:58
  Speaker 2: that seems possible.
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: If I was conspiracy-minded, I would also think about that.
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah. But you're right that, like, even if that wasn't
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: going through Trump's mind, I do think that the reasoning,
• 50:10
  Speaker 2: if you look at that case, the reasoning that Roberts
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: and Barrett and the liberals signed on to, and Gorsuch,
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: and the liberals all signed on to, is like, it's like,
• 50:21
  Speaker 2: you can do major questions doctrine, you can use president, like,
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: there's just, you can't, you can't usurp Congress's power that
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: is prescribed to explicitly in the Constitution with a fucking
• 50:34
  Speaker 2: executive order just because you say there's a national emergency.
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: It's literally the exact same thing, right?
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: It's the same reason.
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: Power to administer elections. In this case, states, you're taking
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: power from the states, which is explicitly designated in the Constitution.
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: You can't do that. You couldn't do it with a law.
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: You can't do it with an executive order, just like
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: the tariffs. I think this is, like, what is more
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: disturbing about this is the mentality and the lengths to
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: which this administration is willing to consider to try to
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: avoid what they believe to be a significant ass-whipping coming
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: in November.
• 51:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you can see why rigging the election feels important
• 51:08
  Speaker 2: to them because here's Mike Johnson on Tuesday threatening us
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: with a good time. If we lost the midterms, heaven forbid,
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: if we lost the majority in the House, it would
• 51:17
  Speaker 2: be the end of the Trump presidency in a real effect.
• 51:20
  Speaker 2: Hell yeah, it would be.
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: If that is not in a DCCC fundraising video right now,
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: I mean. And do not text me with it. Do
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: not text me with it. If I get a fucking text,
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: I'm going to say stop. So do not text me
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: with a DCCC. But if you put it in a
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: YouTube pre-roll, that's pretty good.
• 51:39
  Speaker 2: How do fucking Republicans pitch every dumb reporter in D.C.
• 51:43
  Speaker 2: that the moment of the Democrats sitting in the State
• 51:47
  Speaker 2: of the Union, it's going to save the midterms, and
• 51:50
  Speaker 2: then they got the ad out already, and they got
• 51:52
  Speaker 2: all the stories about the bullshit ad that's terrible anyway. And, like,
• 51:55
  Speaker 2: Mike Johnson says that, and we can't make something of that? Yeah, yeah,
• 51:59
  Speaker 2: I mean... Anyway, we also have a new Washington Post-ABC
• 52:04
  Speaker 2: News Ipsos poll that found a 14-point enthusiasm gap working
• 52:08
  Speaker 2: in Democrats' favor for the midterms. 79% of Democrats said
• 52:12
  Speaker 2: they were certain they would vote in the midterms. Only
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: 65% of Republicans said the same thing. That said, the
• 52:17
  Speaker 2: generic ballot in this one is only a two-point Democratic lead.
• 52:20
  Speaker 2: Didn't love that part. But what do you think is
• 52:22
  Speaker 2: going on here? Or do I have to wait till
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: the next episode of Polar Coaster? Because I am a subscriber,
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: which you can be too, at crooked.com slash friends.
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: Actually, John, I hate to do this to you, but
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: you have to wait till the next message box to
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: come out, which you can be a subscriber to at crooked.com
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: slash yes, we did.
• 52:37
  Speaker 5: There we go.
• 52:37
  Speaker 2: Look, I think.
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: I'm not worried about the generic ballot in here. The
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: generic ballot average is about six or seven, depending on
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: which site you look at. But this is a– the
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: Post reveals what is obvious in the electoral data we've
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: seen so far this year. Democrats are incredibly fired up.
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: Republicans are depressed. And swing voters are looking for Democrats.
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: That is what we saw in that special election in Texas.
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: And if you don't want to believe a Post-ABC Ifsos poll,
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: just look at what's happening in Texas right now in
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: the early vote. So there's a day or two left
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: in early voting. As of Wednesday night, in the Democratic primary,
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: early votes cast are 163% of what they were in
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: the 2022 election, Democratic primary. Now, you may say to yourself,
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: I don't remember a particularly competitive Democratic election in 2022
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: in Texas. I don't either. But here's what I will
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: tell you. There is an incredibly contested Republican primary happening
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: right now, which has had tens of millions of dollars
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: spent in the air. I think there's been There might
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: have been $ 100 million spent in that race already. And
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: Democrats have cast– in Texas, a state Donald Trump won
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: by almost 14 points. Democrats have cast 140,000 more early
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: votes than Republicans.
• 53:48
  Speaker 5: As of Wednesday.
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: Do you think some of that is just behavior, like
• 53:53
  Speaker 2: Democrats vote early and Republicans don't though?
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: Maybe, but the Republicans are also trailing their pace from–
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: So you can look at this.
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: The comparison of 2022 is instructive, right? Right.
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: So you can compare now to 2022. Democrats are doing well.
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: The Republicans are not. Or you can compare Democrats to
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: Republicans right now, and Democrats are doing better. But even
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: if Democrats do better, it's a state with more Republicans.
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: So they should be doing better, and they are not.
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: So Democrats are fired up. Like, we know Republicans are
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: more same-day voters, all of that. But there is plenty
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: of evidence that Democrats are very, very fired up, and
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: that is good news.
• 54:24
  Speaker 2: Too big to rig. That's what we got to do.
• 54:26
  Speaker 2: Just got to have more people voting. So it's too
• 54:29
  Speaker 2: hard to declare national emergency and take the voting machines. Sure.
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that makes sense.
• 54:37
  Speaker 5: Oh, that's right.
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: I forgot you said this. We need the voting machines
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: to be so full of ballots that little Kash Patel
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: can't carry them out of the Fulton County.
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we did say that. Again, I forget what I
• 54:47
  Speaker 2: say off mic and on.
• 54:49
  Speaker 7: All right.
• 54:49
  Speaker 2: Speaking of the midterms, when we come back from the break,
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: you'll hear Tommy's conversation with Shelly Jackson about why we
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: need to feel the Democrat in every down ballot race,
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: especially in states like Arizona. where we need to build
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: more electoral power. We'll be right back.
• 55:12
  Speaker 5: My guest today is doing absolutely essential work in Arizona,
• 55:15
  Speaker 5: recruiting and supporting candidates for office. Shelly Jackson, welcome to
• 55:19
  Speaker 5: Pod Save America.
• 55:20
  Speaker 4: Thank you so much for having me. I'm so grateful
• 55:22
  Speaker 4: to be here.
• 55:23
  Speaker 5: We are grateful to you for the work you're doing.
• 55:25
  Speaker 5: So you We have a lot to talk about. You
• 55:27
  Speaker 5: ran for school board and you flipped a seat when
• 55:29
  Speaker 5: you were 24. We need more people like you. Now
• 55:31
  Speaker 5: you run an organization called Instituto, which is doing recruiting, training,
• 55:35
  Speaker 5: ongoing support for people who want to run for office
• 55:38
  Speaker 5: or who organize around really important issues. Instituto is also
• 55:41
  Speaker 5: a key partner, I should say, for our friends over
• 55:43
  Speaker 5: at Vote Save America, who launched this first of its
• 55:46
  Speaker 5: kind candidate recruitment pilot program to get candidates to run
• 55:50
  Speaker 5: for down ballot races in Arizona, North Carolina, and Texas. Now,
• 55:54
  Speaker 5: The filing deadlines in Texas and North Carolina have already passed.
• 55:57
  Speaker 5: But in Arizona, I believe you have until March 23rd
• 56:01
  Speaker 5: if you want to run for office. So go to votesaveamerica.com
• 56:04
  Speaker 5: slash run if you want to learn more. Also, I
• 56:07
  Speaker 5: think the filing deadline has not yet passed in about
• 56:09
  Speaker 5: half of the country. So if you're listening and you're
• 56:12
  Speaker 5: inspired to take the plunge, check out your deadline in
• 56:15
  Speaker 5: your state. But let's start with Instituto. What are the
• 56:18
  Speaker 5: gaps that you guys are filling to help candidates run
• 56:20
  Speaker 5: for office and then, more importantly, to be successful once
• 56:23
  Speaker 5: they win?
• 56:24
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I love this question.
• 56:25
  Speaker 6: And yes, also shout out to the Vote Safe America
• 56:28
  Speaker 6: team and the Pipeline Fund. It's been so incredible to
• 56:30
  Speaker 6: have this partnership. Here in Arizona, a lot of the
• 56:34
  Speaker 6: times when candidates are running for office and probably all
• 56:36
  Speaker 6: across the country as well, they're doing it with very
• 56:39
  Speaker 6: little support. They're going in, maybe excited to help their community,
• 56:43
  Speaker 6: but don't know where to start and end up missing
• 56:45
  Speaker 6: a lot of gaps along the way. But aside from
• 56:48
  Speaker 6: like the logistical pieces of running for office, For women,
• 56:52
  Speaker 6: for people of color, there's also these pieces around funding, right?
• 56:56
  Speaker 6: Having a support system that are also super essential to
• 56:59
  Speaker 6: making sure a candidate can win and that they also
• 57:02
  Speaker 6: have the morale they need to move things along the way.
• 57:05
  Speaker 6: And so at Institute, though, we do a couple of things.
• 57:08
  Speaker 6: We help identify candidates. So we are always on the
• 57:10
  Speaker 6: search and we're always looking to find new people who
• 57:13
  Speaker 6: want to get involved.
• 57:14
  Speaker 4: And sometimes just tapping people on the shoulder is needed.
• 57:17
  Speaker 6: A lot of the times people don't even see themselves
• 57:19
  Speaker 6: as someone who.
• 57:20
  Speaker 4: Can make change.
• 57:21
  Speaker 6: And even for myself, let me tell you, I did
• 57:24
  Speaker 6: not have on my bingo card that I was going
• 57:26
  Speaker 6: to run for office. Someone asked me and then they
• 57:28
  Speaker 6: asked me again and again. And so being able to
• 57:32
  Speaker 6: have someone actually tap you on the shoulder is super essential.
• 57:35
  Speaker 6: So that's one of the things that we do is
• 57:36
  Speaker 6: we just straight up ask people. And then after that,
• 57:39
  Speaker 6: we are supporting them with trainings. making sure they have
• 57:42
  Speaker 6: the skills needed to run, making sure that we're also
• 57:44
  Speaker 6: talking through with them. How are you thinking about your finances?
• 57:48
  Speaker 6: If you're running for school board, you don't get paid.
• 57:50
  Speaker 6: If you're running for the state legislator, I believe the
• 57:53
  Speaker 6: most they make is about.
• 57:55
  Speaker 4: $ 27, 000. And that's a really hard job, right?
• 57:58
  Speaker 6: So we have the conversations and we provide the resources
• 58:00
  Speaker 6: for people to make informed decisions. And then once they
• 58:03
  Speaker 6: get into office, we also have a co-governance fellowship. And
• 58:07
  Speaker 6: this really helps support the now elected thinking through what
• 58:12
  Speaker 6: does it look like to govern? What does it look
• 58:14
  Speaker 6: like to do this job well? And what does it
• 58:15
  Speaker 6: look like to do it with community to make sure
• 58:18
  Speaker 6: that we're also not moving on our own and being
• 58:20
  Speaker 6: harmful once we get into office?
• 58:22
  Speaker 5: That's great. I mean, so Turning Point USA is also
• 58:25
  Speaker 5: based in Arizona. Folks probably heard of it. It's the
• 58:28
  Speaker 5: organization started by Charlie Kirk. It funds a ton of
• 58:32
  Speaker 5: grassroots youth activism to bring people into the MAGA movement. Now, obviously,
• 58:36
  Speaker 5: I disagree completely. politically with them on like everything, but
• 58:40
  Speaker 5: I am very impressed by the work they have done.
• 58:43
  Speaker 5: What kind of support do you think Turning Point is
• 58:45
  Speaker 5: providing on the Republican side that Democrats are missing on
• 58:49
  Speaker 5: the progressive side?
• 58:51
  Speaker 4: Ooh, I love this question.
• 58:54
  Speaker 6: Also cringing at the fact that they started in Arizona.
• 58:59
  Speaker 4: Don't love that. But you know what?
• 59:02
  Speaker 6: One thing I think that they are doing that we
• 59:05
  Speaker 6: can think about more on our side is creating low.
• 59:08
  Speaker 4: Barriers of entry.
• 59:09
  Speaker 2: Hmm.
• 59:10
  Speaker 6: A lot of the times on our side, we start
• 59:12
  Speaker 6: to do purity tests. We start to create these really
• 59:15
  Speaker 6: high bars just for people to get involved. And sometimes
• 59:18
  Speaker 6: we just end up pushing people away instead of inviting
• 59:21
  Speaker 6: them in. And I do think at Turning Point, They
• 59:24
  Speaker 6: are on campuses. They are all over. And they're welcoming
• 59:28
  Speaker 6: any and everyone. And then once they get into the door,
• 59:30
  Speaker 6: I think they push them. I think they share this
• 59:34
  Speaker 6: ideology and this narrative that they have. And the more
• 59:38
  Speaker 6: people are there, the more they start to adopt it.
• 59:40
  Speaker 6: But I think sometimes on our side, we forget about
• 59:43
  Speaker 6: that or we expect people to be at a certain
• 59:45
  Speaker 6: place right away. And that's just not where most people are.
• 59:49
  Speaker 5: That is such a good point about the barrier to entry.
• 59:51
  Speaker 5: Because In a lot of ways, the barrier to entry
• 59:53
  Speaker 5: for a turning point event is like going to a
• 59:55
  Speaker 5: big event that feels like a party where everyone is
• 59:58
  Speaker 5: welcome and they bring you in this giant funnel. And
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 5: then eventually they could try to get you to run
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 5: for office or be an activist or whatever it might be. Now,
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 5: Arizona is a really important swing state in like every
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 5: single election. One would like to think that, you know,
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 5: National Democrats, the National Democratic Party, maybe big donors are
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 5: just chucking resources at you guys. Is that happening? Do
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 5: you hear from like the DNC, Super PACs, anybody?
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 4: You know what?
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 6: This year is actually really interesting in Arizona when it
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 6: comes to the funds, because this will be the first year,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 6: I think, in about 14 years that we haven't had.
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 4: We won't have a Senate race. Right.
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 6: So for the last few cycles, we've had a really
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 6: big top of the ticket race that has been helpful
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 6: to garnering support. We know that when we get big
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 6: funds like that, it really helps other candidates that are
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 6: down ballot as well. But this year we don't have
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 6: a Senate race or anything like that. So I think
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 6: we are already starting to see some differences. The money
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 6: is not flowing in the way that it has in
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 6: the past. I'm still trying to hold out hope that
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 6: it is coming and it is on its way because,
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 6: as you know, we have other races that are still
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 6: important here.
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 4: In our state.
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 5: Yeah, absolutely. So back to you. You ran when you
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 5: were 24. You ran for school board. You flipped a seat.
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 5: You said you had to be asked and asked and
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 5: asked again. I mean, what made you want to run
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 5: for office? And what did you learn from that experience
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 5: that might inspire or just inform listeners who are thinking
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 5: about doing the same thing?
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 4: Yeah. So you know what?
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 6: I'm someone who never thought I was going to be
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 6: in politics, in social justice. So I definitely never thought
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 6: I was going to run for office. So we can
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 6: just start there. I never saw myself like that. I
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 6: grew up thinking I was going to be a nurse
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 6: because my grandma was a nurse. I wanted to be
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 6: just like her. And I got to my.
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 4: Senior year of high school and realized that I like
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 4: taking care of her.
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 6: I don't think I would actually like taking care of
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 6: other people.
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's fair. Yeah.
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 6: So I was in this crossroads, but I had a
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 6: dance teacher who was like, look, Shelly, you've danced your
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 6: entire life. Why don't you become a dance teacher? And
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 6: I said, Sounds like a plan. So I went to
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 6: school for.
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 4: Dance and dance education.
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 6: And during that time, I actually had the opportunity to
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 6: teach dance all over Arizona, working with an organization. And
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 6: that was really eye-opening for me and was my entry
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 6: point to really critically thinking about systems and resources. And
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 6: I started to wonder why when I'm in Scottsdale or
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 6: when I'm in Chandler, these students get X, Y, and Z.
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 6: But when I'm on the South side in the neighborhood
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 6: I grew up in, We actually don't have as much
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 6: as many accesses to after school programs or the arts
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 6: or these other essential pieces that I was seeing in
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 6: other places. And so that had already kind of like
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 6: opened up my mind. And that's how I started to
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 6: get into organizing. I was really lucky that a former
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 6: teacher of mine at the time was now a state representative.
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 6: And he had posted on Facebook one day. I'm looking
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 6: for young black organizers to get involved. And I was like,
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 6: I don't know what that means, but I'm there. And
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 6: I started organizing on all the things. And so to
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 6: fast forward, 2020 comes around.
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 4: It's the pandemic.
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 6: Candidates all over are struggling to get on the ballot, right?
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 6: Because in order to get on the ballot, you have
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 6: to get signatures. A lot of the times people get
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 6: signatures by standing outside of a grocery store, right?
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 4: Asking, can you sign this thing? Or knocking on someone's door.
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 6: But people didn't have the ability to do that because
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 6: everyone was staying inside. So then we end up getting
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 6: to a place in my district in Roosevelt where we
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 6: had three open seats, but only one person had actually
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 6: made it on the ballot, which was just wild. So
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 6: in that situation, people can now start to run as
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 6: a write-in. And I didn't think anything of it. I
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 6: was watching what was happening and I was hoping for
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 6: the best. But what ended up happening was MAGA folks
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 6: in our neighborhood said, hey, this is an easy way
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 6: for us to be on this district. So they started
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 6: running as writing candidates. And at the time, they were
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 6: the only ones. So we were going to end up
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 6: in a place where we now had a majority MAGA district.
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 6: And people started calling me. And I was ignoring their
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 6: calls because I had a feeling. I had a feeling
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 6: what they were going to ask. And then I started
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 6: to answer. And folks kept saying, hey, we're in this moment.
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 4: We need you.
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 6: You're from here. You taught in the district, right? You
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 6: have an education background.
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 4: And I said no. And I said no for a
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 4: couple of weeks.
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 6: And it really got to a point where I was like,
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 6: am I going to be okay with whatever happens if
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 6: I'm not there? Am I going to be okay with
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 6: students missing out on more resources? Am I going to
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 6: be okay with this ideology being pushed that's also going
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 6: to show our black and brown students that they don't
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 6: belong in their own neighborhoods? And then I said, no,
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 6: I'm not okay with that. And I finally ended up
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 6: saying yes. So I'm really grateful that people kept pushing me.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 6: And we were able to do really great things. Two
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 6: years in, I became the board president. So I spent
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 6: my last two years actually leading the district and working
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 6: on the ground with really great people. But it was
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 6: hard to see myself in that position because I had
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 6: never thought of it for myself. To your point, I
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 6: was also 24 years old. And I did hear a
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 6: lot of rhetoric around well, young people can't do this, right?
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 6: Or we need more qualified people. But I'm lucky that
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 6: I had finally got to a place of, no, me
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 6: being young is exactly why I am qualified, right?
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 4: These are actually things that make me ready. They're not
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 4: barriers to doing the work.
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 5: That's an amazing story. I mean, yeah, I'm sure you've
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 5: noticed that a lot of the elected Democrats are super old.
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 5: A lot of them pay lip service to the idea
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 5: of this next generation of leaders, but it's not clear
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 5: they're doing much about it. What kind of things do
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 5: you think are keeping young people from running? And like,
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 5: what do they need to get over those hurdles and
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 5: take the plunge like you did?
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 4: Yeah, you know what?
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 6: I think that a lot of it is apathy. I
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 6: think if you're a young person and you're looking at
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 6: what's happening, you're kind of like, well, this is just
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 6: how things are. And this is how things have been
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 6: in a really long time. And so that may be
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 6: a reason why folks don't even want to get involved,
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 6: let alone running for office. I think something that young
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 6: folks should remember is that if we see things as
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 6: they are as not.
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 4: Working, it's because we're not at the table.
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 6: Because the people who have been in office are the
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 6: ones continuing to make the rules. And the conditions show
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 6: that it's not changing material conditions for everyday people. The
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 6: conditions show that cost of living continues to rise and
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 6: that they need fresh voices, fresh people who are ready
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 6: to provide a different perspective and like really shake things up.
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 6: What I hope is that young people start to see
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 6: their apathy as like a superpower. I don't think apathy
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 6: actually has to mean we do nothing, right? I don't
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 6: think apathy means that we kind of just sit and
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 6: watch things go. I think it's, actually a nudge towards like,
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 6: I'm not feeling it. And in order to be able
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 6: to have a different outcome, I actually have to do
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 6: something and investigate what is that something?
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 4: Is it running for office?
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 6: Is it organizing? You know, is it joining a protest?
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 5: That's great. I love it. Last question for you. So,
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 5: you know, you've done all this work sort of finding
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 5: these candidates, recruiting them, training them, helping them succeed when
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 5: they get there. Are there any like stories or people
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 5: you've met that really inspired you or that, you know,
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 5: I don't know, maybe open your eyes that like, about
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 5: how different someone could be for running or like how,
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 5: just like the range of places people are coming from
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 5: to run for office because of your organization.
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 6: So many amazing people that are coming up. One person
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 6: that I want to highlight that's not from this season,
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 6: if you will, but has just won a city council seat.
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 4: Her name is Ana Hernandez.
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 5: I love it. This season, this season on running for office.
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 4: Exactly. Um, I think a lot about Ana Hernandez.
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 6: Uh, she is someone who first ran, um, for a
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 6: state Senate seat in a very democratic district, but she
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 6: had an incumbent who had been there for a really
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 6: long time, but he was very status quo. He wasn't
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 6: getting things done. He wasn't holding the line on different issues.
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 6: And she came in and everyone said that she had
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 6: no chance of winning and.
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 4: She won and she won by a lot.
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 6: And while she was there, she led the charge against
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 6: the abortion fight that we were having in the state
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 6: of Arizona and was able to make a ton of
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 6: different change. And now she's at the city council fighting
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 6: And she is someone who is loud. She's like super authentic.
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 6: She brings her family everywhere. And I think it is
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 6: just so beautiful to see. And I think so against
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 6: status quo. So I mentioned her a lot, but someone
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 6: I actually want to highlight who's from the VSA program.
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 4: She came through the pipeline. She heard you all on
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 4: the podcast and she said, Oh, I'm interested. Her name
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 4: is Caitlin.
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 6: And she is from New York, now living in Arizona
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 6: and has an education background and was watching what we're
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 6: seeing across the country on authoritarianism and the attacks on democracy,
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 6: heard the podcast and was like, well, maybe I can
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 6: do something about it.
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 4: She reached out to our team.
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 6: We had several conversations with her and she shared with
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 6: us more about the district she was living in. She's
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 6: in a school district where they have appointed a lot
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 6: of seats. So that's a fun fact, right? People don't
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 6: know that when there's not a seat, like let's say
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 6: a seat goes uncontested or someone steps down from the seat,
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 6: then someone else appoints that seat. And Arizona, specifically in
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 6: Maricopa County, we have a county superintendent.
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 4: Her name is Shelly Boggs. I don't claim her, A
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 4: different Shelly. It's spelled with an I. Okay.
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 2: Not a fan.
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 5: Not a fan.
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 4: Mine is spelled with an EY.
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 6: But Shelly Boggs has been appointing MAGA folks to school
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 6: boards all across the state. And so now she's in
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 6: a district that's actually very blue, but a good chunk
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 6: of her school board members representing her are MAGA red.
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 6: And so once she heard the podcast and talked to us,
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 6: she actually decided, yeah, I can do this and I
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 6: can change my district and I can put students first.
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 6: And now she's running for office and we're really excited
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 6: about her.
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 5: God, I love that story. That is such a great story.
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 5: And your point about them appointing people to these seats
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 5: if no one runs is why we have to run
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 5: people everywhere in every election all the time, especially this
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 5: year when, fingers crossed, things might go well. So again,
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 5: if you're in Arizona, you still have until March 23rd.
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 5: If you want to register, go to votesaveamerica.com slash run. Shelley,
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 5: where can people learn more about Instituto or Chippin to
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 5: help you guys out?
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 4: Oh, that's a great question.
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 6: So folks can go to instituto.io to both donate and
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 6: learn more about our trainings. Everything is on that website.
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 6: And from there, let's talk. Let's figure out how we
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 6: can get you running and support you along the way.
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 5: Well, Shelly, thank you for the work you're doing. Thanks
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 5: for doing the show. And I hope to talk to
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 5: you again soon.
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 4: Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 2: That's our show for today. Thanks to Shelly Jackson for
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 2: coming on. If you're interested in running in Arizona... Head
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 2: to votesaveamerica.com slash run to get more info. I'll be
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 2: back in the feed on Sunday with a conversation with
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 2: Maine Senate candidate Graham Plattner.
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 5: Bye, everyone.
• 1:10:52
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