Latest / Pod Save America / Trump's 2nd Term: Military in the Streets, Mike Johnson in the Sheets

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Trump's 2nd Term: Military in the Streets, Mike Johnson in the Sheets · Pod Save America

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 3: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: On today's show, Nikki Haley burns the boats and says
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: she plans to stay in the race no matter what
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: happens in Saturday's South Carolina primary. Joe Biden provides student
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: debt relief to another 150,000 Americans. And later, Wisconsin Democratic
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: Party Chair Ben Wickler talks to Dan about the new
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: legislative maps that have finally ended one of the worst
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: gerrymanders in the country. But first, the MAGA establishment continues
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: to make it very clear that a second Trump term
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: would be much more extreme than the first. The man
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: who's heading to trial for paying hush money to a
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: porn star he had an affair with spoke at the
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: National Religious Broadcasters Convention on Thursday, just a few days
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: after Politico reported that a Trump-aligned think tank is planning to, quote,
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: infuse Christian nationalist ideas in his administration should the former
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: president return to power. What are those ideas? Not a
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: lot of details just yet, but based on what we've
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: heard from Russell Vogt, the former senior Trump official and
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: potential White House chief of staff who's spearheading the project,
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: and former Trump official William Wolf, a Christian nationalist who
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: works with Vogt, they want to ban the following. Abortion,
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: abortion pills, surrogacy, no-fault divorce, and sex education in schools.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: They also want to repeal policies that support gay people,
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: trans people, and single mothers. And... If people take to
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: the streets to speak out against any of this, they
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: want Trump to use the military against protesters. Here's a
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: clip of Trump supporter Jack Posobiec speaking at CPAC, where
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: Trump is also scheduled to speak this weekend.
• 1:57
  Speaker 4: I just wanted to say welcome to the end of democracy.
• 2:01
  Speaker 4: We're here to overthrow it completely. We didn't get all
• 2:03
  Speaker 4: the way there on January 6th, but we will endeavor
• 2:06
  Speaker 4: to get rid of it and replace it with this
• 2:09
  Speaker 4: right here.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: We'll replace it with this right here.
• 2:12
  Speaker 3: Amen.
• 2:13
  Speaker 4: That's right, because all glory, all glory is not to government,
• 2:17
  Speaker 4: all glory to God.
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: He was he was pointing to a crucifix. So all
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: in all, great stuff from the limited government freedom lovers.
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: The Center for the Renewal of America, which is the
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: think tank that put out the document that says Christian
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: nationalism is a top priority in a second Trump term. They,
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: of course, told Politico that their reporting is false. The
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: Trump campaign, vote, Wolf, all refused to respond. Wolf even
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: deleted tweets about his policy ideas. But what do you think, Dan?
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: What are the chances that this agenda becomes reality if
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Trump becomes president again?
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: I feel like Wolf deleting his tweets is sort of
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: the smoking gun here.
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: You think so? Yes.
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: Look, I think we should take this threat deadly seriously.
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: The right-wing learned the lesson of the first Trump term, right?
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: They view him as, particularly the evangelical Christian nationalist part
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: of the Republican Party, views Trump as this obviously imperfect
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: vessel for their policy agenda. But a useful one. A
• 3:16
  Speaker 3: useful one, a very useful one.
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: Useful but imperfect, yeah.
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: But they got much less done than they possibly could
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: have during Trump's first term because he just hired a
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: bunch of yahoos, right? He was just hiring people out
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: of Fox News green rooms left and right. There was
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: no plan. And that's what all of this is connected
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: to the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025, which is to ensure
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: that the people at all levels of the Trump administration-
• 3:40
  Speaker 3: are people who are going to be smart enough to
• 3:43
  Speaker 3: implement this right-wing agenda, that no stone will go unturned.
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: They recognize the missed opportunity of the first term, and
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: they're not going to let that happen again. And as
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: we know, Donald Trump, not a details guy. He's not
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: interviewing the person who is the number three in command
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: at the Health and Human Services Agency. He's not interviewing
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: the people who are on the Domestic Policy Council of
• 4:00
  Speaker 3: the White House or working on issues related to reproductive
• 4:04
  Speaker 3: health or freedom. This is essentially what Trump did with
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: the Federal Society in his judicial nominations. He's going to
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: do with his White House and agency staff, with the
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: Heritage Foundation, which means that Russell Vogt and Mr. Deleted
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: Tweets over here are going to get a chance to
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: put their agenda in place. And we know how the
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: regulatory process works. You can do a lot of really
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: damaging stuff under the radar. And by the time people
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: figure out, it's way too late.
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: Also, if you have a Republican Senate and Mike Johnson
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: as Speaker of the House, the guy who, you know,
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: he and his son monitor each other's porn intake on
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: their phones, you can do even more than you can
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: just as president. And look, maybe you think that a
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: thrice-divorced guy who cheats on his wife with porn stars
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: isn't all that into Christian nationalism. Fair. But he knows
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: he needs Christian nationalist support. He delivered for them with
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: three Supreme Court justices and Dobbs like no other Republican
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: president has. They will say that themselves. And all these
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: people are going to get positions with real power, like
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: you said, if he becomes president again. He's not a
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: details guy, but also all it takes to get Trump
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: to do something that you want is to kiss his ass,
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: which they know. They can go into the Oval. They
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: can tell him he's wonderful. Oh, sign this bill. It's
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: going to do this. He's going to do it. He's
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: going to do it. So there were three bullets on
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: the document that Politico obtained. Christian nationalism. That was one
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: of the bullets. Insurrection Act. And refusing to spend money
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: authorized by Congress. This is a new thing that all
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: these groups, the Heritage Project, the Christian Nationalists, they all want.
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: So this is how the president, this is how a
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: President Trump in a second term gets around Congress. The
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: Congress passes something. And then he just ignores what they passed. So,
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: I mean, I think this is like a recipe for
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: a situation that could actually deteriorate quite quickly. You have
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: a lunatic president surrounded by right-wing Christian nationalists who ignores Congress,
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: ignores the courts, and sends the military out to deal
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: with anyone who opposes him. I mean, it's not— this is—
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: It sounds like dystopian, far-fetched shit, but I really don't
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: think it is when you start reading what these people
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: are saying and you know that these are the people
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: who are going to be in the White House and
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: running the government in a second term.
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: And I think what's really, you are exactly right about
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: the dystopian vision of what this could become, right? Checks
• 6:31
  Speaker 3: and balances, out the door, right? Everything that is supposed
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: to curtail the power of a rogue executive is gone
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: under this plan.
• 6:39
  Speaker 5: Absolutely.
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: Absolutely. What I think we also have to do is
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: be able to make it a little more peaceful and
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: easier for people to understand, which is how are these
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: things going to affect your life? And I think this
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: is where even if Democrats hold the Senate or we
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: take the House back and Trump does not have the
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: majorities he needs to pass a national abortion ban, every
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: part of that federal government that can do anything possible
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: to make it harder to access an abortion in this
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: country will do that. That is what's going to happen.
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: He's going to try to, he can take an executive
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: action to ban abortion pills, Mifepristone, where, and 50% of
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: women get their abortions through abortion pills. He's already, they've
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: already got that plan. And that, he doesn't need Congress
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: for that.
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: There's a whole raft of draft executive orders, presidential memorandum
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: written by Christian nationalists, think tanks, and Donald Trump will
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: sign them and he will not read a single one
• 7:34
  Speaker 3: of them, right? This is, I mean, this is very,
• 7:37
  Speaker 3: very real. And I think it's very important that Democrats
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: talk about this because- Donald Trump does have, as you
• 7:42
  Speaker 3: point out, this thrice-divorced New Yorker that he– New Yorker? Well,
• 7:48
  Speaker 3: I mean, Donald Trump does not code to people who
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: see him as a far-right evangelical Christian nationalist. He just doesn't.
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: That's not how people see him. And so they think
• 8:01
  Speaker 3: of him as– you see this in focus groups when
• 8:04
  Speaker 3: you bring up abortion. Focus group participants among swing voters
• 8:07
  Speaker 3: will tell you that they believe Trump is not only–
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: personally pro-choice, they are sure he has paid for abortions.
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: And so he is able to get away with things
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: that other Republicans can't on these issues that have driven
• 8:21
  Speaker 3: Democratic turnout in elections where Trump was not on the ballot.
• 8:24
  Speaker 3: And so every opportunity we have to make the case
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: about how his administration, regardless of what he personally believes
• 8:30
  Speaker 3: or doesn't believe, that doesn't matter. What matters is what
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: he does and what he has done. What he did
• 8:35
  Speaker 3: do was be the person who made it so that
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: Roe v. Wade was overturned. what is going to happen
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: are all these things that are in this agenda. And
• 8:43
  Speaker 3: we just have to bring that down to people because otherwise,
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: if you don't explain it specifically, it's going to sound
• 8:48
  Speaker 3: like partisan noise to people.
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: No, I completely agree. And, um, it's the agenda. If you,
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: if all of the things that I mentioned, extremely unpopular
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: with the majority of Americans, there's one group that's been
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: drifting away from Democrats who, who will probably also hate this,
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: which is young men. Uh, it does seem unlikely to
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: me that the guys who love, uh, Barstool Sports and
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: Joe Rogan are going to be into banning birth control
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: and porn and all the other crazy shit that the
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: Christian nationalists want to do. These guys aren't letting their
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: dads monitor their porn like Mike Johnson and his kid.
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: That's a double porn monitoring reference in this podcast. Good job.
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: Can't get enough of Covenant Eyes. And, you know, some
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: people are like, well, Republicans are saying, you know, they're
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: for birth control and contraception. Well, Republicans in Congress just
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: last year blocked a bill that would have enshrined the
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: right to birth control into federal law. Why? Why are
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: they doing that? Like, this is just like what happened
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: before Dobbs, too.
• 9:50
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: Which or right after Dobbs.
• 9:52
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: Which is some people say, oh, don't worry. It's going
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: to states are going to do their own thing. It's
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: not going to be as bad. And then, you know,
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: how many years later? we're about to talk about the
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: IVF case in Alabama, we are seeing the downstream effects
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: of what happens when right-wing nationalists, right-wing Christian nationalists, burrow
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: into government, are given power, and decide to force their
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: agenda on the rest of the country. And if you
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: don't think that's what's going to happen when Donald Trump
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: becomes president, right, could some of it not happen? Yeah.
• 10:23
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: He's lazy. Who knows? But a bunch of it is
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: really could happen, this agenda. And I do think it's
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: like incredibly important for Democrats to talk about it a
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: lot from now until November. We just got another preview
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: of what a Christian nationalist agenda might look like. A
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: week ago, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that embryos created
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: in an IVF lab count as children under the state's
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: wrongful death of a minor act. This is a big
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: win for abortion opponents who argue that life begins at conception. Already,
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: three Alabama hospitals, including the University of Alabama at Birmingham,
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: have hit pause on all IVF care as a result
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: of the ruling. So for people in Alabama who are
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: considering IVF as their best or only shot at having
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: a child, or have frozen embryos awaiting genetic testing, or
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: are going through already the very expensive... uncomfortable, sometimes painful
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: IVF process right now. This is just, it's devastating news.
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: Dan Playbook also called this a quote, nightmare scenario for
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: the GOP. So one in six Americans have had fertility issues.
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: Pew says that more than 40% of Americans have personally
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: used fertility treatments of some kind. And more than 86%
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: of Americans support IVF, including around 80% of people who
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: consider themselves pro-life or evangelicals, according to polling shared by
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: none other than Kellyanne Conway. How do you think this
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: issue plays out beyond what's happening in Alabama?
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: Look, I think if you get a poll from Kellyanne
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: Conway that says 86% of people support IVF, that seems
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: pretty bad for Republicans. Um, I think that we should
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: treat this much like the Christian national... The two stories
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: we're talking about here are absolutely interconnected. The people who
• 12:12
  Speaker 3: are trying to staff Donald Trump's administration to put in
• 12:14
  Speaker 3: place this Christian national agenda want to take what Alabama
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: did and make it national. They want to at least
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: make it so that this is a national policy. Maybe
• 12:21
  Speaker 3: it becomes a policy that states can do. Either way,
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: access to IVF is under tremendous threat if Donald Trump
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: is elected president. And It doesn't matter what Donald Trump
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: says about this. He might say he doesn't agree with it.
• 12:35
  Speaker 3: He probably doesn't know what it is. But we should
• 12:40
  Speaker 3: take this very seriously. And people will say, well, this
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: is one kind of narrowly written decision, and it's Alabama,
• 12:47
  Speaker 3: and there's a history of that sort of stuff in Alabama.
• 12:50
  Speaker 3: That's how Roe v. Wade got overturned. It was the
• 12:54
  Speaker 3: work of right-wing state-level activists working at a process to
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: get cases that end up before the Supreme Court. Now,
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: this court case is not yet headed to the Supreme Court,
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: but it very well could be. And if Donald Trump
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: is President of the United States, what side do you
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: think the Department of Justice is arguing on? Do you
• 13:10
  Speaker 3: think it's on the side for access to healthcare choices
• 13:12
  Speaker 3: for women, or do you think it's on the side
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: of what the Christian Nationalists, who staff as government, want?
• 13:16
  Speaker 3: And so I think we should take it very seriously.
• 13:17
  Speaker 3: We should talk about it. And this is one of
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: those things that just anecdotally in your life, you know
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: is breaking through. People who, in my life, who follow politics,
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: but don't obsess about it like we do, who don't
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: generally bring up politics to me, have brought this up.
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: You see it on social media, people who don't generally
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: post about politics posting about this because so many people
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: have used IVF, contemplated using it, did research on it
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: to see if they were going to have to use it,
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: know people who used it. And the things that really
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: break through in this era of politics are the things
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: that have a direct impact on people's lives. They're not
• 13:52
  Speaker 3: theoretical policy positions taken by the government or tax policy.
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: It's I can do one thing today, and if these
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: people get elected, I can't do it tomorrow. And that's
• 13:59
  Speaker 3: why Dobbs was such a consequential moment in politics. And
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: I think IVF is, it comes from Dobbs, but is very,
• 14:06
  Speaker 3: is of the same vein. And it is a very,
• 14:09
  Speaker 3: I think this is one of those moments that it
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: could be very impactful.
• 14:14
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: I mean, Republican politicians right now, as we are recording this,
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: are tripping over themselves to say that they support IVF
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: and they don't agree with this. And, you know, some
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: Republican told Politico, like, I don't know why we're talking
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: about this. No Senate candidates, Republican Senate candidates have supported this,
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: have said that they're against IVF, all this kind of stuff.
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: But it is, like you said, it is an example
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: of the conservative legal system doing whatever the hell it
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: wants and Republican politicians enabling conservative judges to do whatever
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: the hell they want. This is what happens. when you
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: legislate religious beliefs that haven't been validated by science or medicine.
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: You are free to believe, as Nikki Haley said she
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: did in response to this news, that an embryo is
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: morally equivalent to a newborn baby. But if you turn
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: that religious belief into a law, if you decide that
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: you need to make an embryo legally equivalent to a
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: newborn baby, you get a decision like Alabama's, which is
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: currently preventing people from having children through IVF, which Nikki
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: Haley said she supports just today. This is the logical
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: conclusion of what the Supreme Court set out in Dobbs.
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: And all of these Republican politicians, right, like they think
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: they have their religious belief that life begins at conception
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: and and that embryos are humans, and that fetuses are
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: all human, and all this kind of stuff. And it's like,
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: and they want to give them the same legal rights.
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: And once you jump to giving them the same legal rights,
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: you get things like the Alabama Supreme Court making a
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: decision on IVF that is now ending the practice in
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: the state of Alabama. You get women who are fighting
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: for their lives because they have a pregnancy that could
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: kill them and not being able to get an abortion.
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: because some fucking judge has to figure out whether the
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: doctor can save the life of the mother or not.
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: I mean, you can have your religious beliefs. It is
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: totally fine. But the idea that we now have to
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: enshrine your religious beliefs into law has led to all
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: kinds of pain and suffering in this country and will
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: continue to if we go down this path. And the
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: Biden campaign just put out a clip of Trump announcing
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: his nomination of a judge who, in 2020, who was
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: deemed not qualified by the American Bar Association. She now
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: has a lifetime appointment on the federal bench. He considered
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: her for the Supreme Court and she is anti-IVF and anti-surrogacy.
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: And do you think Trump knew that when he was
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: saying it? Probably not because he doesn't get, like you say,
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: he's not a details guy. He doesn't give a shit.
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: But the Federalist Society wanted the judge. And so Trump said, sure,
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: here's your judge. And then we get decisions like this.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: And then you get Republican politicians like, what? Someone asked
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: fucking dipshit Tommy Tuberville about this, and he was like, oh, no, yeah, no,
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: I support the Alabama Supreme Court. Oh, no, no, I
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: want IVF. Babies are good. Oh, let me look at
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: the bill. And the reporter's like, there is no bill.
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: What are you talking about? There's no bill. This is
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: just a decision for the Supreme Court. They don't know
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: what the fuck they're talking about, which is why they
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: shouldn't be involved in decisions, healthcare decisions, that families are
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: making with their doctors. It's crazy.
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: It's a bunch of... weird politicians who want to be
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: involved in what you read, what you can say, who
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: you love, who you can marry, how you have sex,
• 17:45
  Speaker 3: when you have kids, your health care decisions. That's what
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: they want. They want to be in your life. And
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: I think that that is something that was a very
• 17:53
  Speaker 3: effective political argument for Democrats for a long time. It
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: has sort of gotten lost in the Trump era as
• 17:56
  Speaker 3: we talk, rightfully so, about the fall of democracy and
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: authoritarianism and all those other things. You still got a
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: bunch of politicians, men, who weirdly want to get deeply
• 18:06
  Speaker 3: involved in people's personal issues.
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: And, but it's the, I see, I think it, it connects. Oh, absolutely.
• 18:14
  Speaker 7: Absolutely.
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: With the authority. And that's why, that's why the weird
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: Christian nationalists are talking about the fucking insurrection act, because
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: it's not enough for Republican States and Republican legislatures and
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: governors to pass these laws. They want to send the
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: military into blue States and blue cities and And if
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: you don't agree with their fucking right-wing agenda, they are
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: going to force it, literally force it on you with military,
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: with the United States military. And if that sounds dystopian,
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: it is not. It is exactly what Trump and the
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: people who are going to serve in his second term
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: want to do. Okay, in case Trump's Christian nationalist government
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: waiting hasn't freaked you out enough, the Love Thy Neighbor
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: crew also has some pretty terrifying immigration plans. The Washington
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: Post reports that Trump and Stephen Miller, yeah, he's going
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: to be back, want to launch, quote, the largest domestic
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: deportation operation in American history. This would go far beyond
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: migrants who recently crossed the border and would target an
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in this country. These are
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: immigrants who've lived here for decades, who came here as kids,
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: who work and pay taxes. The plan involves, again, sending
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: the military and law enforcement into cities, rounding up immigrants,
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: putting them in new internment camps, and then deporting them
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: to countries where many of them have never even lived
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: because they've been in this country for so long. Here's
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: Trump talking about it during his town hall with Laura Ingraham.
• 19:45
  Speaker 3: How do you plan to deport the millions of people?
• 19:49
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's probably 12, 13 million people under Biden
• 19:52
  Speaker 3: alone that have come here. And how will it work?
• 19:56
  Speaker 6: It's going to work that we get the bad ones
• 19:58
  Speaker 6: out first. They're coming in from prisons. They're coming in
• 20:00
  Speaker 6: from jails and mental institutions.
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: How will you find them?
• 20:04
  Speaker 6: We're going to find it through local police. Look, the
• 20:06
  Speaker 6: local police, they're so phenomenal. I love them.
• 20:09
  Speaker 7: They love me.
• 20:09
  Speaker 3: I think I have 97 percent support.
• 20:11
  Speaker 5: They know everything.
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: So Trump and and Stephen Miller wanted to carry out
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: this massive deportation operation in the first term. They couldn't
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: get it done for various reasons. They got some pushback
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: from local law enforcement, particularly in blue states and cities.
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: Got some pushback from the bureaucracy, the federal government bureaucracy.
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: This is why they're always railing against the deep state.
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: They got some pushback from the courts, but they think
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: they have learned some lessons this time and will be
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: able to pull it off in a second term. What
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: do you think?
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: I think they certainly learned some lessons, just like the
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: right-wing folks learned some lessons about how to use Trump
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: to implement their agenda. Trump also learned some lessons from
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: his first term, right? In the first term, he had
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: two kinds of people. He had loyal knuckleheads who couldn't
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: get shit done, and he had disloyal, quasi-serious, quasi-effective people.
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: And the lesson of what his failed effort to overturn
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: the election is he needs true diehard loyalists who will
• 21:11
  Speaker 3: effectively carry out his agenda. He can't have people like
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: Bill Barr. I can't believe I'm just citing Bill Barr
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: in this case, but Bill Barr stopping him from doing
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: things or is one of his many defense secretaries. But
• 21:22
  Speaker 3: he also has to have people smarter and better than
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: like Jeff Clark to actually get the stuff done. And so,
• 21:27
  Speaker 3: and this is, you see this in the Trump campaign
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: this time around, He has hired real people to run
• 21:33
  Speaker 3: a real race. And I think there will be people
• 21:35
  Speaker 3: who can actually get this shit done in his White House.
• 21:39
  Speaker 3: And so we should take all these things seriously and
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: all the reporting about what a second Trump presidency would
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: look like. We got to take that seriously because that
• 21:46
  Speaker 3: stuff can and will happen. This is what he wants
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: to do. And I think he has a much better
• 21:51
  Speaker 3: chance of getting it done this time than last time.
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: The Post has done some great reporting on this in
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: this piece. The Times also did reporting on this a
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: couple months back. And it is maybe the immigration plans,
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: the Trump immigration plans are maybe the most detailed of
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: all the plans we've heard. Stephen Miller gave like a
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: long interview to Charlie Kirk about this, where he sounded
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: like a fucking lunatic.
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: What a sentence.
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: Was very open about what they want to do. In
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: the post story, there's a quote about Trump and Miller's
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: plans in their first term that they didn't completely carry out. Quote,
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: their ideas were psychotic. You're talking about officers in tactical
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: gear going into communities, being videotaped in the streets, putting
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: kids in car seats carrying baby formula. Then what do
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: you do with those families? Are you going to go
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: into neighborhoods in Philly, New York, Baltimore, and start tugging
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: people out of communities? That's what they want. It puts
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: law enforcement and the communities at risk. That quote is
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: from the chief of staff at ICE, Jason Hauser. Not
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: exactly a bunch of libs at ICE, the people who
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: carry out the deportations. Here's what David Leopold, former president
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, told Ron Brownstein about
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: this in The Atlantic. What this means is that the
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: communities that are heavily Hispanic or black, those marginalized communities
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: are going to be living in absolute fear of a
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: knock on the door, whether or not they themselves are undocumented.
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: What he's describing is a terrifying police state, the pretext
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: of which is immigrations. Literally, As people are leaving for
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: work or their kids are going to school, they're going
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: to see mass deportation centers with children and mothers who
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: are just in the community working and thriving. I just,
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: I've been thinking about this for a while because it
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: is a very, I think when people think about deportations,
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: they think about, you know, undocumented immigrants crossing the border.
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: There's this border crisis that's getting all the attention right now.
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: So they think people who are just, you know, just
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: coming over from the border and they get stopped and
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: they figure out what to do with them. Do they
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: get asylum? Do they not? What Trump and Miller are
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: talking about is undocumented immigrants that have the 11 million,
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: most of whom have been here for a long, long time.
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: By the way, a lot of these undocumented immigrants are
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: living in families and in homes with people who are citizens.
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: So you're also going to see images of parents being
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: torn away from their children who have citizenship. But also,
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: by the way, Trump and Miller want to revoke birthright citizenship,
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: which is in the 14th Amendment, so that children... who
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: were born in this country to undocumented immigrants don't have
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: their citizenship anymore. But so there's going to be families
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: torn apart. There's going to be people who are at
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: work on jobs taken out of their workplaces, dragged through
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: the streets in internment camps. And what happens if, you know,
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: Trump's sends National Guard in or the military, local law
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: enforcement doesn't want to cooperate, the governor's National Guard, in a,
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: in a blue state doesn't want to cooperate with the
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: red state national guard that, uh, Stephen Miller was talking
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: about Trump sending red state national guard, uh, into blue
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: states that didn't want them. So he said, Oh, if there's,
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: if there's immigrants, undocumented immigrants that we want to round
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: up in Maryland, but the Maryland governor, but Wes Moore
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: doesn't want to use the Maryland national guard to help
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: round up those immigrants, we'll have Glenn Youngkin send the
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: Virginia National Guard into Maryland. What the fuck are they
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: talking about? This is insane. Can you imagine the clashes
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: between various national... This is like... I'm telling you, it's.
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: Have you seen the trailer for the Civil War movie?
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: I have.
• 25:35
  Speaker 5: I have.
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: They picked a very good or very bad year to
• 25:40
  Speaker 3: release it, depending on how you think about it.
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: Again, it's like I always go back and forth. It's
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: a tension. You don't want to freak people out too
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: much and sound like a crazy person. But it's like
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: you read what these people are saying. You think about
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: the power that they're going to have. And you think
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: about the guardrails that have already come off. And it
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: might not definitely happen, but it's a pretty big risk.
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: It's a real challenge because Sarah Longwell had this. tweet
• 26:07
  Speaker 3: the other day that was something like, I continue to
• 26:10
  Speaker 3: believe we're underreacting to the urgency of this moment, or
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: the threat of this moment, or whatever it is. I
• 26:14
  Speaker 3: think that's very true. We absolutely are. We are sleepwalking
• 26:18
  Speaker 3: right into something very, very dangerous. You already see Jamie
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: Dimon and Bill Ackman and these people just sort of
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: already walking themselves towards, we're going to be okay with
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: Trump because we're going to get our tax cuts. You
• 26:30
  Speaker 3: see it happening, but at the same time, the voters
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: we need to persuade don't really believe us when we
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: talk about it in this way, in part because they
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: just lived through the Trump presidency and they didn't send
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: the Virginia National Guard to go fight the Maryland National
• 26:44
  Speaker 3: Guard over taking out some nine-year-old immigrant children, right? It's just,
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: so it is a real challenge, but you are correctly
• 26:54
  Speaker 3: identifying the natural conclusion to what the Trump people are
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: telling us they're going to do. And we should take
• 27:01
  Speaker 3: them seriously when they say it.
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I do think that to that very good point,
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: There are incidents and images from the first Trump term
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: that I do think people should be reminded of, like
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: the family separation crisis towards the end. Certainly, even before
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: January 6th, when Trump wanted to send the military out
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: into Lafayette Park to use them against the protesters after
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: George Floyd was murdered. We got pretty close a couple
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: times at the end of Trump's first term. to some
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: of this stuff, which I think will help people to
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: understand that it is very possible that he continues to
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: act like that in his second term. Absolutely.
• 27:46
  Speaker 3: That's what January 6th is, why it's so essential to
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: this election.
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: All right, believe it or not, Trump still has a
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: primary opponent who says she isn't going anywhere. Nikki Haley
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: is within spitting distance of Trump ahead of Saturday's South
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: Carolina primary. Just a margin of error 30 points behind, Dan,
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: according to FiveThirtyEight's polling average. But if she's going down,
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: she's going down in flames. Haley gave a speech on
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: Tuesday vowing to stay in the race even if she
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: loses tomorrow. Let's listen.
• 28:24
  Speaker 5: Some of you, perhaps a few of you in the media,
• 28:28
  Speaker 5: came here today. to see if I'm dropping out of
• 28:31
  Speaker 5: the race.
• 28:33
  Speaker 7: Well, I'm not.
• 28:34
  Speaker 5: Of course, many of the same politicians who now publicly
• 28:37
  Speaker 5: embrace Trump privately dread him. They know what a disaster
• 28:43
  Speaker 5: he's been and will continue to be for our party.
• 28:47
  Speaker 5: They're just too afraid to say it out loud. Well,
• 28:51
  Speaker 5: I'm not afraid to say the hard truths out loud.
• 28:56
  Speaker 5: I feel no need to kiss the ring. I have
• 28:58
  Speaker 5: no fear of Trump's retribution.
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 29:02
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: So no real suspense about Saturday's results.
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: I mean, slow down, buddy. Slow down. Just anything's possible.
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: Anything's possible. Anything's possible.
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: I mean, I know you're going to be just glued
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: to the Kornacki cam watching those precinct level results come in.
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I'm not a model for all you people.
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: You people out there should consume political coverage, preferably in
• 29:31
  Speaker 3: podcast format, but yes.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: Is there a Trump margin of victory that would surprise you?
• 29:38
  Speaker 3: I think anything over 40 or under 20.
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: Oh, okay. So if he wins by over.
• 29:42
  Speaker 3: Over 40 or by less than 20.
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's about right.
• 29:46
  Speaker 3: It doesn't change the outcome of this. There are a
• 29:48
  Speaker 3: bunch of polls that came out today like Trump's up
• 29:50
  Speaker 3: by like 50 in Vermont, 50 in Maine. We know
• 29:54
  Speaker 3: where this is going. But just be interested to see
• 29:57
  Speaker 3: if Haley can somehow improve her performance from New Hampshire
• 30:00
  Speaker 3: in a much tougher state, even if it's one she
• 30:02
  Speaker 3: governed for six years.
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm sort of wondering if she... This is embarrassing
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: to say, but I think if she gets over 40%,
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: I would be surprised at how well she did. That's
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: what I'll say.
• 30:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure.
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: Because she's sort of pulling in the low 30s. And
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: then if he, but conversely, if he gets, and this
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: is sort of what you were just saying, like if
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: he gets over 70%, which he could, then that's, yeah,
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: that's telling.
• 30:29
  Speaker 3: That's the math of 20 and 40. Yep, that's right.
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: That's right. So really the only suspenseful question here is,
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: What's Nikki Haley's endgame? After that speech, I think it's
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: getting harder to see her endorse Trump, but who knows?
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: She also just said in an interview with NPR that
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: she has even more concerns about Biden as president than Trump. So,
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: I don't know. What's going on? I know we talked
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: about this before, but, you know, just to like to
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: do a gut check every other pod on Nikki Haley's endgame.
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: She sounds less than like someone who's going to endorse Trump.
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: I tweeted something about this, which I haven't been tweeting
• 31:10
  Speaker 3: that much recently, so I did it. I even put
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: in there, I'm preemptively prepared to be disappointed. But she
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: doesn't sound like someone who's going to endorse Trump based
• 31:16
  Speaker 3: on one of these clips we just played. And everyone's like,
• 31:19
  Speaker 3: you naive fucker. Thoughtful ones. People who definitely did very
• 31:24
  Speaker 3: well in reading comprehension in school.
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: You see me jump into a tweet thread and you thought, ah,
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: John's having a good time. I'm going to go in too.
• 31:32
  Speaker 3: I was like, the way John has been spending his
• 31:34
  Speaker 3: weekends recently on Twitter, I should try to do that too.
• 31:39
  Speaker 3: But then I remembered. being myself when I was doing
• 31:43
  Speaker 3: political commentary for CNN at the Republican convention in 2016,
• 31:47
  Speaker 3: and watching Ted Cruz stand on stage and telling people
• 31:49
  Speaker 3: to vote their conscience while being booed mercilessly, and then
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: endorsing Trump like two weeks later. And that famous photo
• 31:57
  Speaker 3: of him sadly making phone calls on Trump's behalf. And
• 32:00
  Speaker 3: I listened to our friends at The Bulwark and their podcast,
• 32:04
  Speaker 3: and they are negative on Nikki. I think Tim Miller
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: has it at less than 1% chance that she doesn't
• 32:09
  Speaker 3: endorse Trump.
• 32:10
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: Tim and JVL both have it like under 1%. Sarah.
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: It's like 35%.
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: I'm really the Sarah of this pod. Sarah's at like 35%.
• 32:21
  Speaker 3: But it's always good to check in with Republicans because
• 32:23
  Speaker 3: Democrats are the ones who have Aaron Sorkin-like fantasies about
• 32:26
  Speaker 3: Republicans saving them. And then you go listen to the
• 32:29
  Speaker 3: bulwark or other never Trump Republicans and some things they
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: can disabuse you of those pretty quickly. I have no
• 32:34
  Speaker 3: idea what she's doing. I think she likes running for president.
• 32:35
  Speaker 3: I think she's probably pretty personally offended at the way
• 32:37
  Speaker 3: Trump has talked about her and her family. She probably
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: can't imagine that she is losing by this much to
• 32:42
  Speaker 3: this guy. I imagine she has some money commitments through
• 32:45
  Speaker 3: Super Tuesday from her Super PAC donors, which is why
• 32:48
  Speaker 3: she said that. But she's definitely not voting for Joe Biden.
• 32:51
  Speaker 3: She's not going to be on stage with Chris Christie,
• 32:55
  Speaker 3: Liz Cheney, John Lovett.
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: Mitt Romney.
• 32:57
  Speaker 7: Yes.
• 33:00
  Speaker 3: John Lovett moderating a panel at the DNC with Liz Cheney,
• 33:03
  Speaker 3: Chris Christie. John Kasich coming back from wherever he is.
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: Now that his pal Tim Scott's going to be VP.
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: The best I could hope for from her is to just...
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: She's definitely not endorsing Joe Biden. She just said she
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: thinks he's more of a threat than Trump, so whatever.
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: But she could, at the very least... She could just say,
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: I'm out. I'm out. And I'm just going away. I'm
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: not saying anything. And Trump is bad. Biden's bad. And
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: that's it. And I think that would be, I would
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: take that. I would take that.
• 33:37
  Speaker 3: I mean, what would they get you?
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: I think, I mean, this is back to our friends
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: at the Bulwark, but like, I do think that her
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: saying all these things about Trump, and then endorsing him
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: does give some of these Republican voters a permission structure
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: to go ahead and vote for Trump, even if they
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: don't like him.
• 33:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I agree with that. I agree with that. And
• 34:00
  Speaker 3: remember back previous election cycles when I had my imaginary
• 34:03
  Speaker 3: super PAC and I had a lot of ideas that
• 34:05
  Speaker 3: I was hoping billionaires would fund? Yeah. Well, I'm back
• 34:08
  Speaker 3: because I got one, which is we should be doing
• 34:12
  Speaker 3: calls into battleground states to ID people who want to
• 34:17
  Speaker 3: vote for Nikki Haley. Now, we're going to have some
• 34:18
  Speaker 3: real voters like when Michigan votes on Tuesday, but even
• 34:21
  Speaker 3: some of these states who may be voting out for
• 34:23
  Speaker 3: Super Tuesday, anyone who says they're voting for Nikki Haley
• 34:27
  Speaker 3: should be put at least for a time being in
• 34:29
  Speaker 3: our persuasion universe of people we can go get, either
• 34:31
  Speaker 3: to convince them to vote for Joe Biden or to
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: convince them that voting for Donald Trump is a bridge
• 34:36
  Speaker 3: too far for them. And so if Nikki Haley were
• 34:40
  Speaker 3: to endorse, I think that makes that not impossible because
• 34:43
  Speaker 3: I think a lot of her voters would be quite
• 34:44
  Speaker 3: disappointed in that outcome. But I think it makes it
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: a little bit harder. And it gives Trump a weapon
• 34:48
  Speaker 3: to go bring some of those people back.
• 34:50
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: No, I think that's a good idea. Maybe it didn't.
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: Who gave Nikki Haley some money? Reid Hoffman? Can he
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: do that? Who else could do that? If you're listening. Yeah. No,
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: I think that's a great idea. All right, before we
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: get to your interview with Ben Wickler, let's talk quickly
• 35:09
  Speaker 2: about our elderly president who just keeps doing whatever he
• 35:13
  Speaker 2: can to help the American people. Joe Biden's out there
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: just fighting every day to... transform more lives. President Biden
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: announced a new round of student debt relief this week
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: that will benefit 150,000 people enrolled in the save repayment plan.
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: Biden has now canceled the debt of 3.9 million borrowers
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: since he took office. So Republicans reacted to this news
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: by accusing Biden of violating the law in order to
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: buy votes. Why should I be paying for these these
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: student loans and the Supreme Court said no. And now
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: he's a, he's a fascist because he's, he's rejecting the
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: Supreme Court's ruling and just doing it anyway. Ridiculous. And
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: then some lefties are saying, you know, helping 4 million
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: borrowers isn't enough. Like, sure, of course it's not enough,
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: but this is what he can do because there is
• 36:08
  Speaker 2: the law. Can this guy catch a break or what?
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: I don't know. You gotta feel for Biden sometimes. I
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: really do.
• 36:14
  Speaker 3: All the time. You have to feel for him all
• 36:15
  Speaker 3: the time. He, he, made a bold decision to try
• 36:18
  Speaker 3: to cancel student debt. Then the Supreme Court overturned his decision.
• 36:22
  Speaker 3: And he said and promised on that day he would
• 36:24
  Speaker 3: do everything he could within his power to try to
• 36:28
  Speaker 3: help as many people as possible. And he has been
• 36:30
  Speaker 3: pulling every lever of the federal government to help as
• 36:33
  Speaker 3: many people as possible. And it's just the reminder that
• 36:38
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden is what we want in politicians, right? He
• 36:40
  Speaker 3: is trying to do everything he can. He can't fix everything.
• 36:43
  Speaker 3: There is no magic wand. He can't make the Supreme
• 36:45
  Speaker 3: Court go away. He doesn't have a majority in Congress
• 36:49
  Speaker 3: that could pass a legislative solution to this. What he
• 36:52
  Speaker 3: has is the tools he's using to help as many
• 36:54
  Speaker 3: people as possible. Is it all the help everyone needs?
• 36:56
  Speaker 3: Absolutely not. Is it better than nothing?
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: No one's saying it is.
• 37:00
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden's not, right?
• 37:01
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 37:03
  Speaker 3: Just imagine, how many dollars of student debt do you
• 37:06
  Speaker 3: think President Donald Trump will cancel starting in January of 2025?
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: Trump who tried to eliminate the very program that made
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: possible the relief that Joe Biden just announced.
• 37:19
  Speaker 7: Yes.
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: And so, and for all the fucking blue check marks
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: in my mentions, these morons who are, who are just
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: getting all this wrong and all the right wing idiots
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: who are saying that this is like defying a Supreme
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: court order, two sets of borrowers got relief from this
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: latest announcement. One, public servants and including military members. And
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: George Bush, George W. Bush signed a law saying that
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: public servants get their loans canceled after 10 years of service,
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: but the law was administered poorly and people weren't getting
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: the benefits. So Biden goes back and fixes the law.
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: And that's why all these people got relief. So entirely
• 37:56
  Speaker 2: within the law. And number two is people who are
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: on income-based repayment plans. So according to that law, after
• 38:04
  Speaker 2: 20 years of payments, If you still have a balance,
• 38:07
  Speaker 2: the government's supposed to cancel the balance if you've been
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: paying all along. But that actually wasn't happening. So Biden
• 38:13
  Speaker 2: went back, fixed that too, and are now sending people
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: checks who like overpaid or who still have the outstanding balance,
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: canceling the balance. So again, both of the sets of
• 38:23
  Speaker 2: people who got relief entirely within the letter of the
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: law has nothing to do with what the Supreme Court said. Idiots.
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: I'm spending too much time on Twitter.
• 38:34
  Speaker 5: I know.
• 38:35
  Speaker 3: I know. I got a podcast for you to listen to.
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: What podcast?
• 38:41
  Speaker 3: It's called Offline. It's hosted by a previously smart fellow. Yeah.
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: You know what? I'm getting back on. I'm done. I'm
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: going back on Twitter all the time. I'm getting in fights.
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: I'm going to regress all the way back to 2012, 2013,
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: whenever I left the White House. I'm going all the
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: way back.
• 38:59
  Speaker 3: I was just thinking about this today. I was already
• 39:02
  Speaker 3: preemptively preparing for my having to eat crow during the
• 39:06
  Speaker 3: New Year's resolution episode at the end of this year.
• 39:08
  Speaker 3: I've decided my New Year's resolution was to reestablish my
• 39:12
  Speaker 3: attention span by spending less time online. And in some ways,
• 39:14
  Speaker 3: I am doing that. I'm trying to put my phone
• 39:16
  Speaker 3: away for periods of time. But We got an election coming.
• 39:19
  Speaker 3: I got to follow the news. I got to be
• 39:21
  Speaker 3: in there. Just got to do it.
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: I got to do it. Also, I forgot too, because
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: I have a I have a toddler who I'm, you know,
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: I'm chasing Charlie around all the time. When I'm doing that,
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: it's very hard to be on my phone, which is
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: a good thing. But now we have Teddy, we got
• 39:35
  Speaker 2: the newborn. And when you're holding the newborn and you're
• 39:38
  Speaker 2: just trying to rock him to sleep, there's nothing else
• 39:40
  Speaker 2: to do, but look at your phone.
• 39:42
  Speaker 3: Can I give you a tip that I picked up
• 39:44
  Speaker 3: with our kids?
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: What's that?
• 39:45
  Speaker 3: Play games.
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: Oh.
• 39:48
  Speaker 7: Play games.
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: Because I was- Teddy can't play any games.
• 39:51
  Speaker 3: No, you're playing games on your phone. If you're holding
• 39:54
  Speaker 3: the child- I mean, theoretically, you could pick up a
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: hardcover book and read it with one hand, but if
• 40:00
  Speaker 3: you're going to hold this device in your hand and
• 40:02
  Speaker 3: you don't want to be on Twitter when you're doing it,
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: play games. That's my advice to parents and newborn who
• 40:09
  Speaker 3: have a phone addiction problem who also don't want to
• 40:11
  Speaker 3: be red-pilled by Elon Musk.
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: Play games- Better than arguing over an Ezra Klein essay.
• 40:20
  Speaker 7: Yes.
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: Play games, argue over Ezra Klein essay. So it goes,
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: Ezra Klein essay is worse. Then play games is slightly better.
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: Then reading a book is better than that. And then
• 40:31
  Speaker 3: just sitting quietly with your own thoughts is the impossible
• 40:33
  Speaker 3: ideal to aspire to.
• 40:36
  Speaker 2: Please. That's terrifying. That's more terrifying than a Trump second term.
• 40:40
  Speaker 6: Okay.
• 40:40
  Speaker 2: Before we go to break. Reminder that everyone should check
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: out Vote Save America's anxiety relief program. You set up
• 40:46
  Speaker 2: a recurring monthly donation at the level that feels right
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: for you. VSA will send 100% of it to the
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: grassroots organizations and down-ballant races that need it most. Each month,
• 40:56
  Speaker 2: you'll also get a report about where your dollars went.
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: It's great. Head to votesaveamerica.com to sign up now. Paid
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: for by Vote Save America, votesaveamerica.com, not authorized by any
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: candidate or candidate's committee. Speaking of anxiety relief, if you're
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: like me and polling makes you crazy... you have to
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: check out Dan's new show, Polar Coaster. I think you
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: talked to Harry Enten on the latest episode about Joe
• 41:20
  Speaker 2: Biden being old. Is that true?
• 41:22
  Speaker 3: We talked about what the polling tells us about Joe
• 41:24
  Speaker 3: Biden being old. We talked about the Ezra Klein column
• 41:28
  Speaker 3: and what the polling tells us about Biden's electability and
• 41:30
  Speaker 3: the electability of other Democrats. And just in general, look,
• 41:35
  Speaker 3: we're addicted to the polls. We're going to follow them.
• 41:37
  Speaker 3: We're going to be happy when they're up. We're going
• 41:39
  Speaker 3: to be sad when they're down. But if you want
• 41:41
  Speaker 3: to understand what you should worry about, what you shouldn't
• 41:44
  Speaker 3: worry about, why you shouldn't panic about any of it,
• 41:47
  Speaker 3: I highly encourage you to listen to Polar Coach or
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: subscribe to Friends of the Pod so you can. You'll
• 41:53
  Speaker 3: get access to a whole bunch of stuff, including this podcast,
• 41:55
  Speaker 3: and support this company as it's building out the progressive
• 42:00
  Speaker 3: response to the right-wing noise machine. You try to feel
• 42:03
  Speaker 3: that leave episode being a little bit smarter about polling,
• 42:06
  Speaker 3: understanding in context, and maybe even sometimes feeling a little
• 42:08
  Speaker 3: bit better about things.
• 42:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe. And if you're listening to this right now
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: and you're like, oh, why are you talking about Biden's age?
• 42:16
  Speaker 2: If you can't handle hearing about Biden's age, then between
• 42:20
  Speaker 2: now and November, you should probably close your ears and
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: your eyes and not pay attention to politics. Because there
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: are constructive ways to talk about it. It is an issue.
• 42:30
  Speaker 2: It's going to be an issue. Just fucking deal with it, everyone.
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: We're going to get through it, okay?
• 42:36
  Speaker 3: And in this episode, you know what? If you were
• 42:39
  Speaker 3: thinking about listening to Blockbuster, ignore everything John just said.
• 42:42
  Speaker 3: I thought him taking his response to his Twitter.
• 42:45
  Speaker 5: Thread- Oh, no.
• 42:46
  Speaker 6: Oh, no.
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: An idea I disagree with. Oh, I'm going to melt.
• 42:49
  Speaker 3: I'm going to melt. It's horrible.
• 42:51
  Speaker 7: It's horrible.
• 42:52
  Speaker 3: Harry Enten's very smart. We help explain what the polling
• 42:55
  Speaker 3: really tells us about Biden's age and not just Biden's age,
• 42:59
  Speaker 3: but Biden's age in comparison to Trump being nearly as
• 43:02
  Speaker 3: old and full of crimes. So come listen.
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: Full of crimes.
• 43:06
  Speaker 7: What did he say?
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: He said something to Laura Ingraham. During the town hall
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: about D.C. And he's like, we're going to have powerful
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: crime in D.C. again. Powerful crime. Guy's fucking nuts. He's nuts.
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: Don't make him president.
• 43:18
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 43:18
  Speaker 2: So check out Polar Coaster. Fantastic podcast, Dan. You have
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: to be a member of Friends of the Pod to listen.
• 43:24
  Speaker 2: So just sign up at Crooked.com slash friends. You get
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: Polar Coaster. You get all kinds of other great content from.
• 43:29
  Speaker 7: All of us.
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: When we come back, Dan talks to Wisconsin Democratic Party
• 43:33
  Speaker 2: Chair Ben Wickler.
• 43:46
  Speaker 3: On Monday, Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers signed into law new
• 43:49
  Speaker 3: electoral maps that helped undo years of Republican gerrymandering. It's
• 43:52
  Speaker 3: a huge win for Democrats in a state where the
• 43:54
  Speaker 3: legislature has been under Republican control for more than a decade.
• 43:57
  Speaker 3: Ben Wickler, who needs no introduction on this podcast, but
• 44:00
  Speaker 3: is the chair of the Wisconsin Democratic Party, and he's
• 44:02
  Speaker 3: here to tell us more about it. Ben, welcome back
• 44:05
  Speaker 3: to Pod Save America.
• 44:06
  Speaker 7: Dan, it is great to be back. And I cannot
• 44:09
  Speaker 7: tell you how different it already feels to live in
• 44:13
  Speaker 7: an actual democracy. So I'm here bursting with enthusiasm and
• 44:17
  Speaker 7: gratitude for everything that the Vote Save America volunteers have
• 44:21
  Speaker 7: done in election after election after election to make this
• 44:24
  Speaker 7: moment possible.
• 44:25
  Speaker 3: I was actually, when I saw this news, I was
• 44:27
  Speaker 3: thinking about the first ever show that we did in Madison,
• 44:30
  Speaker 3: which was on either our first or second tour we
• 44:33
  Speaker 3: ever did back in 2018. And the topic of that
• 44:36
  Speaker 3: show was gerrymandering and efforts to undo what the Republicans
• 44:40
  Speaker 3: had done there. And so the fact that it's five
• 44:43
  Speaker 3: years later, but you guys got this victory is just
• 44:46
  Speaker 3: absolutely unbelievable. So tell us, I know you worked on
• 44:48
  Speaker 3: it for years. Tell us how you got here.
• 44:50
  Speaker 7: So it starts in 2011 when, uh, the tea party
• 44:56
  Speaker 7: wave had swept Scott Walker and the Republican legislative majorities
• 44:59
  Speaker 7: into office and Republicans immediately used the redistricting cycle to, uh,
• 45:06
  Speaker 7: construct behind closed doors at a lobbying firm here in Madison,
• 45:09
  Speaker 7: where a lot of Republicans like to hang out with
• 45:12
  Speaker 7: the kind of computational redistricting experts, the maps of their dreams,
• 45:17
  Speaker 7: which they passed into law and locked in Republican hypermajorities
• 45:21
  Speaker 7: for the foreseeable future. 2012, Democrats won in a landslide, Republican,
• 45:26
  Speaker 7: the gerrymander held. And even though they lost most of
• 45:28
  Speaker 7: the votes, they still had many, many more than half
• 45:30
  Speaker 7: of the seats. We elected Governor Evers in 2018 by 1.1
• 45:35
  Speaker 7: percentage points. More than one point is a Wisconsin landslide.
• 45:38
  Speaker 7: So we were all thrilled. This is a huge effort. But,
• 45:42
  Speaker 7: you know, at the same time as he won statewide
• 45:44
  Speaker 7: and Democrats swept every single statewide office for the first
• 45:46
  Speaker 7: time since 1982. And in that same year, Democrats won
• 45:52
  Speaker 7: 54% of the votes for state assembly. Republicans got 63%
• 45:55
  Speaker 7: of the seats. We win more than half. They get
• 45:58
  Speaker 7: almost two thirds of the seats.
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: It was incredible.
• 46:00
  Speaker 7: As plain as day for anyone watching what was going on.
• 46:04
  Speaker 7: And in 2020, the battle was to stop Republican supermajorities,
• 46:08
  Speaker 7: which we did not by much. We flipped two assembly
• 46:11
  Speaker 7: seats in an incredibly intensive battle. But that year was
• 46:17
  Speaker 7: the year preceding the next census. So maybe there was
• 46:20
  Speaker 7: going to be a chance. And in 2021, the governor
• 46:23
  Speaker 7: created a People's Maps Commission to take testimony from people
• 46:26
  Speaker 7: all over the state and try their hand at drawing
• 46:29
  Speaker 7: maps that would actually be fair. Republicans completely ignored them,
• 46:33
  Speaker 7: drew hyper-gerrymandered maps, passed them through the state legislature. The
• 46:36
  Speaker 7: governor vetoed them. Because of the Save the Veto campaign
• 46:39
  Speaker 7: and work by the Assembly and Senate Democrats, the governor's
• 46:43
  Speaker 7: veto survived and it went to the state Supreme Court.
• 46:46
  Speaker 7: So we get to 2022, or I guess the fall
• 46:49
  Speaker 7: of 2021, and the right-wing majority in the state Supreme
• 46:52
  Speaker 7: Court announces how they will solve the impasse between the
• 46:55
  Speaker 7: state legislature and the governor. You have the Republicans and
• 46:58
  Speaker 7: the state legislature pushing for gerrymandered maps. You have a
• 47:01
  Speaker 7: Democratic governor saying he won't sign anything but fair maps.
• 47:04
  Speaker 7: The state Supreme Court decides or announces out of whole thought,
• 47:07
  Speaker 7: there's no legal basis for this, that they will choose
• 47:09
  Speaker 7: the maps that make the least changes to the Republican
• 47:13
  Speaker 7: hyper gerrymander from 2011. Of course.
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: Why wouldn't you?
• 47:16
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 47:17
  Speaker 7: Right. Just like the framers intended. So- So that was
• 47:23
  Speaker 7: the basis that they would choose the maps. The governor's
• 47:26
  Speaker 7: team and the state legislature get to work. The governor
• 47:28
  Speaker 7: proposes a set of maps that makes very small changes,
• 47:31
  Speaker 7: but still doubles the number of competitive districts. And he
• 47:34
  Speaker 7: proposes maps for Congress and for the state legislature. And
• 47:38
  Speaker 7: the Republicans don't really complete the assignment. They propose their
• 47:42
  Speaker 7: hyper-gerrymandered maps to the state legislature again. The state legislature says, well,
• 47:46
  Speaker 7: we did say we'd choose the maps of the lease changes.
• 47:48
  Speaker 7: So they go with the governor's maps in that moment.
• 47:51
  Speaker 7: And then Republicans throw a Hail Mary pass to the U.S.
• 47:53
  Speaker 7: Supreme Court, which in an unsigned shadow docket opinion, meaning
• 47:58
  Speaker 7: no argumentation from either side, no nothing, the U.S. Supreme
• 48:01
  Speaker 7: Court strikes down the state legislative maps, sends it back
• 48:04
  Speaker 7: to the state Supreme Court. State Supreme Court says, oh, well,
• 48:06
  Speaker 7: I guess we can't use those and chooses the Republicans' maps.
• 48:09
  Speaker 7: So suddenly the maps that the governor vetoed that were
• 48:12
  Speaker 7: obviously rejected by our political process that build in a
• 48:16
  Speaker 7: Republican supermajority in the state Senate and almost a Republican
• 48:19
  Speaker 7: supermajority in the state assembly they're chosen by our Supreme Court,
• 48:23
  Speaker 7: which is supposed to be the neutral arbiter of the law,
• 48:26
  Speaker 7: in the final moments before candidates have to start running
• 48:29
  Speaker 7: in their districts. And Republicans come in for the kill.
• 48:33
  Speaker 7: The Republican plan at this point was to get supermajorities
• 48:36
  Speaker 7: in both legislative chambers at the same time as they
• 48:38
  Speaker 7: were trying to defeat Governor Evers in 2022, which would
• 48:41
  Speaker 7: allow them to dismantle our democracy. They were openly uh
• 48:46
  Speaker 7: throwing around their plans to dismantle the wisconsin elections commission
• 48:49
  Speaker 7: which is a bipartisan body that's at the top of
• 48:51
  Speaker 7: our election administration system they were coming up with there's
• 48:54
  Speaker 7: a bill that one legislator proposed that would allow them
• 48:57
  Speaker 7: to cancel the results of an election if the margin
• 49:00
  Speaker 7: of victory was less than the number of absentee ballots
• 49:02
  Speaker 7: in the election i mean just unbelievable stuff that was
• 49:07
  Speaker 7: the situation in 2022 and in that moment we were
• 49:08
  Speaker 7: at chillingly reminded when we looked through the records that
• 49:13
  Speaker 7: the last time a Democrat had won a governor's race
• 49:16
  Speaker 7: when there was a Democratic president because Wisconsin is a
• 49:18
  Speaker 7: swing state that you know has the the typical thing
• 49:21
  Speaker 7: of the party in power wins the midterms. The last
• 49:23
  Speaker 7: time a Democrat had won a governor's race with a
• 49:25
  Speaker 7: Democratic president was 1962 when JFK won with a 70%
• 49:32
  Speaker 7: approval rating, won by a single percentage point. So the
• 49:35
  Speaker 7: chance in 2022 that we'd win the governor's race the
• 49:39
  Speaker 7: odds were against us. And we went for it. I mean,
• 49:42
  Speaker 7: people in every corner of Wisconsin working their hearts out.
• 49:45
  Speaker 7: We reelected Governor Evers by 3.4 percentage points. He ran
• 49:48
  Speaker 7: an extraordinary campaign. It was just absolutely made the case.
• 49:52
  Speaker 7: And for me, it's a template for what's possible in
• 49:54
  Speaker 7: the presidential race. And in the state legislature, Republicans got
• 49:57
  Speaker 7: their supermajority in the state Senate. And they came in,
• 50:00
  Speaker 7: they thought they were going to get the supermajority in
• 50:02
  Speaker 7: the state assembly. But a flood of volunteers, a ton
• 50:06
  Speaker 7: of work, everyone doing everything they could, we held off
• 50:08
  Speaker 7: Republican supermajorities in the state assembly by 2,499 votes. It
• 50:14
  Speaker 7: was 0.01% of all the votes cast in the state.
• 50:17
  Speaker 7: And that meant Republicans could not simply unilaterally impose whatever
• 50:22
  Speaker 7: maps they might want. And at that point, we had
• 50:25
  Speaker 7: six months until a Supreme Court race to determine the
• 50:27
  Speaker 7: majority on the state Supreme Court. So once again, we
• 50:31
  Speaker 7: got everyone together. We held together the kind of core
• 50:33
  Speaker 7: team from the governor's race, people who now had survived
• 50:36
  Speaker 7: election cycle after election cycle, thousands upon thousands of volunteers,
• 50:40
  Speaker 7: including people listening to this podcast who had volunteered in
• 50:43
  Speaker 7: the Supreme Court race in the spring of 2020, in
• 50:45
  Speaker 7: the presidential race in the fall of 2022, in the
• 50:49
  Speaker 7: superintendent of public instruction race in the spring of 2021,
• 50:51
  Speaker 7: local elections in 22, the fall elections in 22. We
• 50:52
  Speaker 7: went back to it. And in the spring of 2023,
• 50:54
  Speaker 7: we won a jaw-dropping double-digit landslide in the state Supreme
• 51:02
  Speaker 7: Court race. Janet Protasewicz became the majority-making justice on our
• 51:06
  Speaker 7: state Supreme Court, sending Dan Kelly, who was a consultant
• 51:09
  Speaker 7: on the fake elector scheme, into the dustbin of political history.
• 51:13
  Speaker 7: And boom, we were in a new day. And as
• 51:16
  Speaker 7: soon as she took the oath of office in August,
• 51:18
  Speaker 7: an organization, Law Forward, which did amazing work arguing that
• 51:21
  Speaker 7: these maps were unconstitutional, they brought a case that said
• 51:25
  Speaker 7: that the Republican Supreme Court chosen map didn't meet the
• 51:29
  Speaker 7: constitutional standard and the Supreme Court reviewed it. But as
• 51:34
  Speaker 7: soon as that case was brought, Republicans started plotting to
• 51:37
  Speaker 7: impeach our newly elected justice, which we all realized they
• 51:41
  Speaker 7: had the votes to do. They just needed a simple
• 51:43
  Speaker 7: majority in the state assembly. If they use their full
• 51:47
  Speaker 7: two-thirds majority in the state Senate, they could actually throw
• 51:49
  Speaker 7: her out of office. But if they did that, the
• 51:51
  Speaker 7: governor would appoint a replacement. So it looked like they
• 51:53
  Speaker 7: might be plotting to impeach her and then sit on
• 51:55
  Speaker 7: their hands and because an impeached justice of the Supreme
• 51:59
  Speaker 7: Court is suspended until the Senate and the state Senate
• 52:02
  Speaker 7: holds a trial. So this was this incredibly devious plot
• 52:07
  Speaker 7: to abuse our constitution in order to stop an actual
• 52:10
  Speaker 7: review of their totally illegitimate power. And the Democratic Party
• 52:15
  Speaker 7: of Wisconsin, our allies, we launched a campaign called Defend Justice,
• 52:18
  Speaker 7: where we organized in Republican legislative districts, voters to tell
• 52:22
  Speaker 7: their legislators, absolutely do not do this. Do not become
• 52:26
  Speaker 7: the first legislators anywhere in the country to impeach a
• 52:28
  Speaker 7: judge before they ruled on something to stop them from
• 52:31
  Speaker 7: making that ruling. And it worked. The GOP backed down.
• 52:35
  Speaker 7: They realized that they were facing a whirlwind that they
• 52:37
  Speaker 7: could not control. And they backed off. The Supreme Court
• 52:41
  Speaker 7: did look at the maps. They did determine they were unconstitutional.
• 52:43
  Speaker 7: They struck them down in December. And they told the
• 52:46
  Speaker 7: state legislature and the governor, if you can agree on
• 52:48
  Speaker 7: new maps that meet our constitutional standards, great. And if
• 52:52
  Speaker 7: you can't, we're going to ask people to submit maps
• 52:54
  Speaker 7: to us and we'll choose the maps. So a bunch
• 52:57
  Speaker 7: of folks submitted maps, all the parties to the lawsuit.
• 53:00
  Speaker 7: They had the gold-plated nonpartisan redistricting experts review them. Surprise, surprise,
• 53:04
  Speaker 7: the maps submitted by Republicans were partisan gerrymanders. The others
• 53:08
  Speaker 7: were fair. And the consultants said they were virtually indistinguishable
• 53:12
  Speaker 7: from each other. And at that point, as we ticked
• 53:15
  Speaker 7: down the clock, the Republicans in the legislature said, well,
• 53:18
  Speaker 7: I guess we'll pass the maps now. that the governor
• 53:20
  Speaker 7: actually proposed. First, they tried to change them to protect
• 53:22
  Speaker 7: their incumbents. The governor vetoed that. Then they actually passed
• 53:26
  Speaker 7: the governor's maps, facing a Supreme Court decision that they
• 53:29
  Speaker 7: couldn't control, and they were afraid of facing accountability in
• 53:33
  Speaker 7: the court system. So they passed the maps, and on Monday,
• 53:36
  Speaker 7: the governor signed them. And Wisconsin's new fair maps are law.
• 53:40
  Speaker 7: And what happened last time, where the U.S. Supreme Court
• 53:42
  Speaker 7: overruled the state Supreme Court, That cannot happen now because
• 53:46
  Speaker 7: this was passed through the traditional process of how a
• 53:49
  Speaker 7: bill becomes a law. These are Wisconsin statute now. The
• 53:52
  Speaker 7: old maps are null and void moot history. And candidates
• 53:56
  Speaker 7: are coming out of the woodwork at this very moment.
• 53:58
  Speaker 7: I spoke to one just a little while ago who's
• 54:01
  Speaker 7: gearing up to announce a run. It is so, so
• 54:03
  Speaker 7: exciting that democracy is finally here because people fought and
• 54:07
  Speaker 7: fought and fought in election after election after election after election,
• 54:10
  Speaker 7: even after everything went wrong over and over again. That resilience,
• 54:15
  Speaker 7: that persistence, that dedication to the idea of democracy prevailed,
• 54:19
  Speaker 7: and here we are.
• 54:20
  Speaker 3: That is the lesson of this whole story is change
• 54:23
  Speaker 3: takes time, but it can happen if we engage in
• 54:26
  Speaker 3: a political process over and over again, we fight hard,
• 54:30
  Speaker 3: we move the ball forward, and then you have a
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: day like Monday. So there's been some suspicion from folks
• 54:36
  Speaker 3: outside of Wisconsin who are under the belief, correct, I think,
• 54:40
  Speaker 3: that the Republicans in the Wisconsin legislature are Not great.
• 54:46
  Speaker 3: Help explain to me why they agreed to these maps
• 54:50
  Speaker 3: and why the governor did not send it, as some
• 54:53
  Speaker 3: have said, to the Supreme Court on the thought that
• 54:54
  Speaker 3: you could get a more favorable map that way.
• 54:58
  Speaker 7: This was this moment right before the finalization of the
• 55:01
  Speaker 7: maps where there were, I think, good faith disagreements and
• 55:03
  Speaker 7: good faith suspicions of bad faith on the Republican side.
• 55:07
  Speaker 7: There are two dimensions of disagreement. One is, what is
• 55:12
  Speaker 7: the channel of greatest legal risk. So if the governor
• 55:15
  Speaker 7: signs the maps, then in theory, someone could try to
• 55:19
  Speaker 7: sue in a federal circuit court. And these are rock
• 55:22
  Speaker 7: solid legally. They're impregnable from a legal perspective. But if
• 55:28
  Speaker 7: judges go rogue, they do whatever they want. It's Calvin ball.
• 55:31
  Speaker 7: And so a lot of folks were worried that the
• 55:34
  Speaker 7: Republicans had some kind of trick up their sleeve, some
• 55:36
  Speaker 7: judges in their pocket who were going to find some
• 55:40
  Speaker 7: ludicrous basis to strike them down. And by the time
• 55:42
  Speaker 7: that could be corrected on appeal, the election cycle would
• 55:46
  Speaker 7: be passed. The other risk, of course, is that the
• 55:49
  Speaker 7: US Supreme Court would do what it did last time.
• 55:51
  Speaker 7: And the governor had to weigh those two risks against
• 55:53
  Speaker 7: each other and determine that, in his judgment, the legal
• 55:57
  Speaker 7: risk was much lower if the bills are enacted and
• 56:00
  Speaker 7: signed into law. So that's one piece. The other is,
• 56:04
  Speaker 7: There were four different maps that the nonpartisan experts reviewed
• 56:08
  Speaker 7: that the Supreme Court was considering. Of those, they're all
• 56:12
  Speaker 7: pretty much fair. The governors make it a little bit
• 56:15
  Speaker 7: harder in the first year to win an assembly Democratic
• 56:19
  Speaker 7: majority than some of the other maps, and then it
• 56:21
  Speaker 7: takes two years to have a chance to win the
• 56:23
  Speaker 7: Senate majority. In one of the other maps, it's a little,
• 56:27
  Speaker 7: I think, harder in the assembly, but there's different levels
• 56:32
  Speaker 7: in the Senate and the assembly for either side. And
• 56:34
  Speaker 7: there's one map that had different numbered Senate districts where
• 56:37
  Speaker 7: it would have been possible for Democrats to win a
• 56:39
  Speaker 7: majority in the Senate in 2024, as well as the assembly. So,
• 56:43
  Speaker 7: you know, from one perspective, maybe the Republicans were doing
• 56:46
  Speaker 7: the thing that could slow down the march of democracy
• 56:50
  Speaker 7: and accountability a little bit. You know, I think the
• 56:54
  Speaker 7: difference between the maps is much less than the difference
• 56:56
  Speaker 7: between any maps and any of these maps and no maps.
• 57:00
  Speaker 7: And so if there's a legal risk, The number one
• 57:04
  Speaker 7: priority is to prevent the possibility that Republicans will pull
• 57:07
  Speaker 7: a fast one and block any new maps at all
• 57:11
  Speaker 7: for an election cycle.
• 57:12
  Speaker 3: As you indicated, Wisconsin is the quintessential 50-50 state, right?
• 57:17
  Speaker 3: Every election, as you said, comes down to like a
• 57:20
  Speaker 3: point if you're lucky, as you said, Governor Evers won
• 57:22
  Speaker 3: by a landslide at 1.8 points or whatever it was.
• 57:26
  Speaker 3: But prior to these new maps, the Republicans had two-thirds
• 57:30
  Speaker 3: of the seats in the legislature, right? And in elections
• 57:33
  Speaker 3: where Democrats were winning at the state level, they were
• 57:36
  Speaker 3: losing– they were getting issues at two-thirds of the seats.
• 57:40
  Speaker 3: What is that breakdown now post-maps? Is it more like
• 57:43
  Speaker 3: the 50-50 of the state?
• 57:45
  Speaker 7: Now it is very close to 50-50. Now, if either
• 57:48
  Speaker 7: side wins by three points, by every single analysis, if
• 57:52
  Speaker 7: you win by three points, you win a majority in
• 57:54
  Speaker 7: the legislature. And in the 2012 and 2020, election cycle,
• 58:01
  Speaker 7: Democrats won by more than that and still lost almost
• 58:04
  Speaker 7: two-thirds of the seats in the state assembly. That is
• 58:07
  Speaker 7: unthinkable now. So Democrats have to do a little bit
• 58:10
  Speaker 7: better than 50% to be able to win an assembly
• 58:13
  Speaker 7: majority in 2024. And so that's what we're going to
• 58:16
  Speaker 7: shoot for. I mean, it should be the case that
• 58:19
  Speaker 7: both sides try to win most of the votes and
• 58:20
  Speaker 7: get most of the seats if they do. And you
• 58:23
  Speaker 7: can see in district after district after district, There's now
• 58:26
  Speaker 7: a realistic shot for Democrats to win seats and for
• 58:29
  Speaker 7: those seats to add up to a majority of the
• 58:30
  Speaker 7: seats in the state assembly. And there's four, at least,
• 58:33
  Speaker 7: state Senate seats where we have a really good shot
• 58:35
  Speaker 7: this election cycle. If we do that, then 2026, we
• 58:38
  Speaker 7: have a shot at a Senate majority and potentially a
• 58:40
  Speaker 7: Democratic trifecta. And of course, the Republicans also have a shot.
• 58:44
  Speaker 7: And that's how it's supposed to work. That's all we've
• 58:45
  Speaker 7: been fighting for is an equal level playing field. And
• 58:49
  Speaker 7: that's what we finally got.
• 58:50
  Speaker 3: I mean, this is all such great news. Let's talk
• 58:52
  Speaker 3: a little bit about some of the other races coming
• 58:53
  Speaker 3: up this fall. Tammy Baldwin is up for reelection. She
• 58:57
  Speaker 3: got an opponent a couple weeks ago. Talk to me
• 59:00
  Speaker 3: about this person. How much do we have to worry
• 59:02
  Speaker 3: about this?
• 59:04
  Speaker 7: So at one level, if you just watched Eric Hovde
• 59:08
  Speaker 7: announce his campaign for US Senate, where in his launch
• 59:11
  Speaker 7: tweet and launch ad, he didn't mention the state that
• 59:13
  Speaker 7: he's running in, which raises some questions because the guy
• 59:17
  Speaker 7: lives in California in a gigantic mansion overlooking the Pacific Ocean.
• 59:21
  Speaker 7: He was rated one of Orange County, California's most influential
• 59:24
  Speaker 7: people three years in a row. But nonetheless, he is
• 59:27
  Speaker 7: running in Wisconsin, and this is who Mitch McConnell thought
• 59:31
  Speaker 7: was their best shot. It didn't inspire a great deal
• 59:35
  Speaker 7: of confidence in the Republican battle plan. At the same time,
• 59:40
  Speaker 7: this is Wisconsin, and Eric Hovde runs a bank in
• 59:44
  Speaker 7: California that makes a huge amount of money. He is
• 59:46
  Speaker 7: a centimillionaire, at least. We'll see what his financial disclosure
• 59:49
  Speaker 7: forms say, but he's been saying– that he will spend
• 59:51
  Speaker 7: tens of millions of dollars of his own money on
• 59:53
  Speaker 7: this race. And that means we have to take this
• 59:56
  Speaker 7: very seriously. That's what Ron Johnson did, who actually lived
• 59:59
  Speaker 7: in the state at the time. In 2010, he announced late,
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 7: he announced in the election year, he bought a ton
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 7: of ads portraying himself as Mr. Reasonable Businessman. And he
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 7: was able to define himself because of the fortune that
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 7: was spent by him and on his behalf. And he
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 7: sailed into a U.S. Senate seat that we haven't been
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 7: able to win back. So we need to treat this
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 7: as though it's a 50-50 race. And I'm so glad
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 7: it's Tammy Baldwin, who's our champion of the Senate, who's
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 7: up against him because she genuinely connects with voters in
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 7: every part of Wisconsin, across every line of difference, across geography,
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 7: across ideology. There are dyed-in-the-wool Republicans who know that they
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 7: have their jobs because Tammy Baldwin fought for them, that
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 7: they have health insurance because Tammy Baldwin fought for them.
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 7: So we're going to make sure that everyone knows about
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 7: what she's done and what she will do She's the
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 7: lead sponsor of the bill that will restore the protections
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 7: of Roe versus Wade to this entire country if Democrats
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 7: get a trifecta in 2024. Eric Hovde, last time he
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 7: ran for office, he said he was 100% pro-life and
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 7: thought life begins at conception and all abortions should be banned.
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 7: So there's a night and day difference between these two candidates.
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 7: And go to TammyBaldwin.com, chip in, get involved, volunteer for her,
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 7: go to WisDems.org. Help us at the state party. We're
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 7: going to be helping Tammy, President Biden. We're going to
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 7: flip two house seats as our game plan. And we'll
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 7: be working hand in glove with Greta Neubauer in the
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 7: state assembly and Diane Hesselbein in our state senate. These
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 7: are names that you will come to know of champions
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 7: who are fighting to make Wisconsin actually work for everybody.
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 7: This is an all-hands-on-deck election where we're going to try
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 7: to build reverse coattails where the local candidates help turn
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 7: out voters to help us win up and down the
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 7: ballot and vice versa. It's all one big fight. for
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 7: freedom and democracy in the Badger State.
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 3: I think that is a great place to end there.
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 3: I will just endorse what Ben said. I have been
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 3: a monthly donor to the Wisconsin Democratic Party for going
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 3: on years now. There is no better way to spend
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 3: your money than to give it to the Wisconsin Democratic
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 3: Party because you can have the full faith that Ben
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 3: is going to invest in organizing strategies that work. There's
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 3: a proven record of success here. And we know, as
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 3: exhausting as this is for Ben and everyone in Wisconsin,
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 3: that this election will once again come down to Wisconsin.
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 3: We will be waiting for you guys to count those votes.
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 3: Hopefully it happens a little less dramatically than it did
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 3: in 2020. But that's when we will find out that
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have been reelected. It'd be
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 3: because of the work in Wisconsin, the work that everyone
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 3: has done. So support Ben, support the Wisconsin Democrats. Ben,
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 3: congratulations on this victory. And I know we're going to
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 3: talk to you a bunch before this election is over.
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 7: Dan, thank you so, so much. And for everyone who
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 7: has made phone calls, who's chipped in, who's become a
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 7: monthly donor, who's helping us with our local elections this
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 7: April 2nd in Wisconsin right now, everyone who's doing this work,
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 7: this victory is yours. You took a state that was
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 7: functionally a democracy desert and turned it into a democracy.
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 7: And now in that democracy, we can win and pass
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 7: policies that make a difference in people's lives. So thank you.
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 7: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 2: Thanks to Ben Wickler for joining. Everyone have a fantastic
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: weekend and we'll have a brand new show for you
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: on Tuesday morning. Bye everyone.
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 3: Bye everyone.
• 1:03:13
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• 1:03:55
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