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“Everyone was in the loop." · Pod Save America

0:20
Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
0:22
Speaker 2: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
0:23
Speaker 1: Later on the pod, Dan's interview with Democratic digital strategist
0:26
Speaker 1: and the co-founder of Acronym, Tara McGowan. Before that, we'll
0:30
Speaker 1: talk about the escalating impeachment probe and Michael Bloomberg's entry
0:33
Speaker 1: into the presidential race. A few other pods you'll want
0:36
Speaker 1: to check out this week from us. The second episode
0:39
Speaker 1: of Tommy's special Pod Save America on the Ground in
0:41
Speaker 1: Iowa series drops tomorrow. On Tuesday, Tommy takes us inside
0:46
Speaker 1: a caucus and lets us know exactly how it works.
0:49
Speaker 1: It's a great episode. There's also a very funny episode
0:52
Speaker 1: of Love or Leave It from over the weekend you
0:54
Speaker 1: should check out. On Wednesday, you'll hear a Thanksgiving mailbag
0:57
Speaker 1: episode that Tommy Lovett and I have already recorded, as
1:00
Speaker 1: well as an interview I'm doing with our good friend
1:02
Speaker 1: Adi Barkin. And in case you missed it, check out
1:05
Speaker 1: last Thursday's epic episode of Hysteria featuring Gloria Steinem, who
1:09
Speaker 1: was here at Crooked Media headquarters. Highly, highly recommend the conversation.
1:15
Speaker 1: Check it out. Finally, Stacey Abrams needs our help. We're
1:20
Speaker 1: trying to raise another million for Fair Fight 2020 to
1:22
Speaker 1: help protect the vote. which Fair Fight has already done
1:25
Speaker 1: in Louisiana and Kentucky, where Democrats just won. It is
1:28
Speaker 1: incredibly important to help them be on the ground now
1:33
Speaker 1: in advance of 2020. So please go to votesaveamerica.com slash
1:37
Speaker 1: Fair Fight to help us crush our new goal. And
1:41
Speaker 1: of course, if you preorder Dan's new book on Trumping America,
1:46
Speaker 1: you will be able to help Fair Fight through buying
1:49
Speaker 1: the book as well.
1:50
Speaker 2: John, I didn't even put book promo in the outline.
1:53
Speaker 2: You did it for me. Fucking, I really appreciate that.
1:55
Speaker 2: Happy Thanksgiving.
1:55
Speaker 1: I just did it off the cuff. I just did
1:57
Speaker 1: it off the cuff. It just came to me. It
1:58
Speaker 1: was inspiration.
2:00
Speaker 2: You just made it into the Pfeiffer family Thanksgiving dinner,
2:04
Speaker 2: what I'm thankful for. So congratulations.
2:07
Speaker 1: Fantastic. All right, Dan, the impeachment hearings are over for now, but...
2:14
Speaker 1: New evidence and new co-conspirators just keep coming out of
2:17
Speaker 1: the woodwork, potentially including the top Republican on the committee
2:23
Speaker 1: that's been running the impeachment inquiry. That's right. Devin Nunes
2:28
Speaker 1: might have been part of the same election rigging scheme
2:31
Speaker 1: that he's supposed to be investigating as part of the
2:33
Speaker 1: Intel committee. Over the last two years, reports say that
2:37
Speaker 1: Nunes has been conspiring with corrupt Ukrainian officials to take
2:41
Speaker 1: down Joe Biden. He met with them in Vienna in 2018,
2:46
Speaker 1: and his staffers scrapped a 2019 trip when they found
2:49
Speaker 1: out that they'd have to notify Adam Schiff and instead
2:52
Speaker 1: met via Skype. And how do we know all this, Dan?
2:55
Speaker 1: Where are these reports coming from?
2:58
Speaker 2: The Internet.
3:02
Speaker 1: More than the Internet, Dan. It's coming from Lev Parnas,
3:06
Speaker 1: the indicted Soviet-born mobster who says that Trump pulled him
3:09
Speaker 1: aside at the White House Hanukkah party. and gave him
3:12
Speaker 1: a James Bond-style mission to get dirt on Biden in Ukraine.
3:15
Speaker 1: And now his lawyer is telling reporters, this is what
3:19
Speaker 1: he wants to testify. And by the way, he doesn't
3:23
Speaker 1: just want to testify, he has records about all of this.
3:28
Speaker 1: So what was your reaction to this story about Devin
3:31
Speaker 1: Nunes' involvement, and how big of a deal do you
3:33
Speaker 1: think this is?
3:34
Speaker 2: I mean, even by the standard of Devin Nunes', incredible
3:41
Speaker 2: corrupt stupidity, this is pretty mind-blowing, is he sat there
3:44
Speaker 2: for days pretending as if this was all some sort
3:49
Speaker 2: of hoax, and he was in on the crime to
3:51
Speaker 2: begin with, reportedly in on the crime. We can talk
3:54
Speaker 2: about whether I believe this or not, but it is
3:57
Speaker 2: certainly very credible given how Nunes and his staff have handled,
4:03
Speaker 2: have behaved since the day Trump was elected, We remember
4:06
Speaker 2: him heading over the White House to tip people off
4:08
Speaker 2: about the Russia investigation, hiding in bushes. When that was discovered,
4:14
Speaker 2: his staffer, Kash Patel, who came up in the Fiona
4:18
Speaker 2: Hill hearings as someone who was involved in Ukraine policy
4:22
Speaker 2: in ways in which they probably shouldn't have been. So
4:24
Speaker 2: it is certainly credible, I guess, given what we've seen
4:28
Speaker 2: from Nunes and his staff thus far.
4:31
Speaker 1: Yeah. And look, it explains a few things. One, why
4:36
Speaker 1: Devin Nunes looked so bad of shape earlier in the
4:39
Speaker 1: week when Eric Swalwell asked for a previously reported Daily
4:43
Speaker 1: Beast story about how Parnas helped arrange calls in Europe
4:45
Speaker 1: for Nunes to be read into the record. So explains that.
4:50
Speaker 1: You know, and then Devin Nunes, of course, is asked
4:53
Speaker 1: about this by Maria Bartiromo, another big Trump supporter, posing
4:57
Speaker 1: as a journalist, over the weekend. And Devin Nunes doesn't
5:02
Speaker 1: deny it. He doesn't deny it. He basically just says...
5:05
Speaker 1: He is planning to sue CNN and the Daily Beast,
5:08
Speaker 1: which is how he rolls now when someone talks about
5:13
Speaker 1: him or reports things that Lev Parnas' lawyer said.
5:16
Speaker 2: But he said he could discuss it because it involved
5:18
Speaker 2: criminal activity, which seems to be a little bit of
5:22
Speaker 2: a tell, if you will.
5:24
Speaker 1: Well, in his mind, the criminal activity is on behalf
5:28
Speaker 1: of the news organizations who, again, reported what this guy's
5:32
Speaker 1: lawyer is saying. Now, I mean, the question, you know,
5:36
Speaker 1: you raised is, should we trust Lev Parnas? And, you know,
5:40
Speaker 1: what do you think?
5:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, look, I think we have to take it with
5:43
Speaker 2: a grain of salt, but it is credible. It fits
5:47
Speaker 2: with the pattern and helps explain Nunes' very specific reaction
5:52
Speaker 2: when Eric Swalwell brought this up. It does honestly speak
5:56
Speaker 2: to the immense stupidity that if this were true, that
6:01
Speaker 2: he would sit on the committee this whole time and
6:03
Speaker 2: just leave himself open to this. He could have easily
6:07
Speaker 2: recused himself, which is probably what everyone in the Republican
6:10
Speaker 2: Party would have wished since he was kind of sort
6:13
Speaker 2: of layered by Jim Jordan to begin with. So I
6:15
Speaker 2: don't think we should assume this is 100% true, but
6:21
Speaker 2: I think it at least fits with the pattern of behavior.
6:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, and look, The other thing we know is ABC
6:27
Speaker 1: News reported on Sunday that the House Intelligence Committee is
6:31
Speaker 1: already in possession of videos, photos and audio recordings handed
6:36
Speaker 1: over by Parnas that include Giuliani and Trump. We, of course,
6:41
Speaker 1: don't know if Devin Nunes is part of that as well.
6:43
Speaker 1: But it certainly seems at this stage that the whole
6:48
Speaker 1: Parnas affair is much more of a Michael Cohen style
6:52
Speaker 1: thing than something else. because as we know, you know,
6:55
Speaker 1: Michael Cohen said he was going to flip on Trump
6:58
Speaker 1: and everyone's like, well, who knows if he's telling the
6:59
Speaker 1: truth or not, he's a liar. And then of course,
7:01
Speaker 1: Michael Cohen had all the receipts. You know, it does
7:04
Speaker 1: seem like if Parnas is turning over evidence anyway, it wouldn't,
7:09
Speaker 1: it wouldn't really make sense for him to lie about
7:11
Speaker 1: this stuff. And here's the other thing you need to know. Like,
7:15
Speaker 1: of course, from Devin Nunes' perspective, right? Like the source
7:19
Speaker 1: of all of these conspiracy theories is the same, right?
7:23
Speaker 1: And so like, John Solomon, you know, pretend reporter that
7:27
Speaker 1: used to write for The Hill and a bunch of
7:29
Speaker 1: right wing conspiracy theorists.
7:30
Speaker 3: Right.
7:30
Speaker 1: Like how long have they been pushing this bullshit narrative
7:34
Speaker 1: that somehow Joe Biden did something corrupt in Ukraine? And
7:37
Speaker 1: so it would totally make sense for not only Donald
7:39
Speaker 1: Trump and Rudy Giuliani, but the other crazy right wing
7:44
Speaker 1: Trumpist assholes in Congress like Devin Nunes to completely buy
7:47
Speaker 1: into this. And Devin Nunes thinking to himself, like, yeah, well,
7:50
Speaker 1: in twenty eighteen. Joe Biden's going to run for president
7:53
Speaker 1: and I'm going to get to the bottom of this
7:54
Speaker 1: conspiracy theory that I've heard from John Solomon that, you know,
7:58
Speaker 1: he had some corrupt activity in Ukraine. So I might
8:00
Speaker 1: as well send some of my fucking staffers over there
8:02
Speaker 1: and go meet with the fired corrupt prosecutor myself in
8:06
Speaker 1: hopes that I can get some dirt.
8:08
Speaker 2: I mean, the odds that Devin Nunes took a selfie
8:12
Speaker 2: with a fired prosecutor under a welcome to Vienna sign
8:15
Speaker 2: with the hashtag Biden time is like at least 50 percent.
8:21
Speaker 1: The other thing we know is, you know, Adam Smith,
8:23
Speaker 1: who is the House chair, top Democrat on the Armed
8:26
Speaker 1: Services Committee, was interviewed over the weekend. And he said
8:30
Speaker 1: Devin Nunes will likely face an ethics investigation over this news.
8:34
Speaker 1: That would be Devin Nunes' second ethics investigation in just
8:38
Speaker 1: a couple of years. The first he was ultimately cleared.
8:43
Speaker 1: leaking classified information during the Mueller hearing. So that's great.
8:48
Speaker 1: We should also mention that documents released late on Friday
8:52
Speaker 1: by the State Department show that Secretary of State Mike
8:55
Speaker 1: Pompeo got on the phone with Rudy Giuliani at least
8:58
Speaker 1: twice in March to talk about the smear campaign against
9:01
Speaker 1: former Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch. And Pompeo asked Rudy to send
9:04
Speaker 1: over a packet of his nutty conspiracy theories, which Rudy
9:08
Speaker 1: did in an envelope with the Trump markings on it. Dan,
9:14
Speaker 1: how significant is Pompeo's role here?
9:16
Speaker 2: Well, it's not surprising. I mean, of course. Of course,
9:19
Speaker 2: Mike Pompeo, who is the ultimate political hack, Trump ass-kisser,
9:24
Speaker 2: of course he would be involved. There's no way he would, like,
9:27
Speaker 2: he would have too much FOMO to not be involved
9:29
Speaker 2: in the criminal conspiracy. So he's definitely there. I mean,
9:33
Speaker 2: so let's just, like, yes, it, like... it says so
9:36
Speaker 2: much that it's not a surprise, right? Like, it's not
9:38
Speaker 2: a surprise that he's involved, not a surprise that he
9:40
Speaker 2: has lied about it. Remember when he went on the
9:44
Speaker 2: Sunday show right after the reports about the whistleblower came out,
9:47
Speaker 2: and he basically pretended to have no knowledge of any
9:50
Speaker 2: sort of conversation with the Ukrainians, only to then find
9:53
Speaker 2: out days later that he was on the call? I mean,
9:56
Speaker 2: it just like, it sort of speaks to our lowered expectations. But, like,
9:59
Speaker 2: if you just sort of do the roll call of
10:01
Speaker 2: criminality here, so involved in this criminal conspiracy in some way, shape,
10:06
Speaker 2: or form, either the crime itself or the cover-up, you
10:08
Speaker 2: have the Attorney General, the President, the Vice President, the
10:13
Speaker 2: Secretary of State, the Director of National Intelligence, the White
10:16
Speaker 2: House Chief of Staff, and the White House, and the
10:19
Speaker 2: president's personal attorney all have somehow been involved in this,
10:22
Speaker 2: and now possibly also the top-ranking Republican on the House
10:25
Speaker 2: Intelligence Committee. The easier question to answer is, who wasn't
10:30
Speaker 2: involved in Washington?
10:32
Speaker 1: Yeah, when Trump mega-donor-turned-ambassador Gordon Sondland testified that, quote, everyone
10:37
Speaker 1: was in the loop, he wasn't kidding. I mean, we're
10:41
Speaker 1: not making this shit up. Gordon Sondland testified that all
10:45
Speaker 1: of these people, minus Nunes, Although who knows what he knows.
10:49
Speaker 1: But certainly Pompeo were in the loop. And, you know,
10:53
Speaker 1: and Fiona Hill basically the next day sort of backs
10:56
Speaker 1: up Sondland. And she's like, well, I hadn't realized it
10:57
Speaker 1: at the time. But yes, there were some of us
10:59
Speaker 1: who were doing foreign policy, national security or thought we
11:02
Speaker 1: were doing that. But then there was another group of
11:04
Speaker 1: people who include apparently most people in the upper echelons
11:09
Speaker 1: of the government who were doing a domestic political errand,
11:13
Speaker 1: as she said, for Donald Trump. And it seems like
11:16
Speaker 1: Mike Pompeo was part of that. Um, meanwhile, we got
11:20
Speaker 1: Rudy Giuliani who's been out there on television saying that
11:23
Speaker 1: he has, he has some kind of insurance policy in
11:27
Speaker 1: his words that will stop Trump from throwing him under
11:30
Speaker 1: the bus. Uh, on Saturday, he sought to clarify this
11:34
Speaker 1: on Twitter. Uh, here's his tweet, all caps, truth alert.
11:38
Speaker 1: That's how you know something good's coming. Uh, the statement
11:42
Speaker 1: I've made several times of having an insurance policy if
11:45
Speaker 1: thrown under the bus is sarcastic. and relates to the
11:48
Speaker 1: files in my safe about the Biden family's four-decade monetizing
11:53
Speaker 1: of his office. If I disappear, it will appear immediately
11:59
Speaker 1: along with my RICO chart. What the fuck is he
12:03
Speaker 1: talking about?
12:04
Speaker 4: Rudy Giuliani, America's mayor, ran for president, This is what
12:14
Speaker 4: he has been reduced to.
12:15
Speaker 1: If I disappear, magical files will be released.
12:19
Speaker 2: But they're the files that Trump and Barr want to
12:21
Speaker 2: come out where they two actually exist.
12:23
Speaker 1: I know, I know, I know.
12:25
Speaker 2: He's going to end up in a black site on
12:28
Speaker 2: a barge off of Poland where people are demanding the
12:32
Speaker 2: RICO chart. Like, it makes... I mean, it's so... stupid
12:37
Speaker 2: and sad and his, like, he, I mean, I don't know.
12:41
Speaker 2: I don't know what's sad. Sad's not the right word.
12:43
Speaker 2: It is, I mean, it's sort of infuriating that this
12:46
Speaker 2: person has a, apparently a large amount of influence in
12:50
Speaker 2: American politics.
12:52
Speaker 1: A huge amount and not apparently based on the testimony
12:55
Speaker 1: of every Trump administration official who has gone before Congress.
12:59
Speaker 1: Rudy Giuliani was directing our fucking Ukraine policy and here
13:04
Speaker 1: he is not making any making less sense than even
13:08
Speaker 1: Donald Trump in a tweet. I mean, this man is
13:10
Speaker 1: seriously unwell. Not well.
13:13
Speaker 2: Did you read Olivia Nuzzi's story this morning about what.
13:16
Speaker 1: It's like to text with Giuliani?
13:19
Speaker 2: It is so funny. Apparently he, in addition to butt-dialing
13:26
Speaker 2: reporters and leaving crimes on voicemails, he also, he's very
13:31
Speaker 2: big into using, you know, like the the reactions on
13:35
Speaker 2: the iPhone, like the like and the thumbs up, like
13:38
Speaker 2: the thumbs up and the exclamation point. And he will
13:40
Speaker 2: often like go back like 37 texts and like some
13:43
Speaker 2: of his own statements. And he, he sometimes will send
13:48
Speaker 2: to reporters just things that aren't for them at all.
13:51
Speaker 2: Like he sent one reporter a picture of him on
13:52
Speaker 2: a boat smoking a cigar.
13:53
Speaker 1: Or something like that.
13:55
Speaker 2: And then he quoted some White House reporters saying the
13:58
Speaker 2: best time to get Rudy is like eight or nine
14:01
Speaker 2: when he's quote a little loosened up, but not yet unhinged.
14:05
Speaker 1: Oh my God, that's the sweet spot, huh?
14:08
Speaker 2: Just like a couple of drinks in.
14:11
Speaker 1: I mean, we should note the import of this is
14:14
Speaker 1: that Rudy Giuliani is currently under federal investigation. And there
14:19
Speaker 1: could be a situation where he is indicted or charged
14:22
Speaker 1: with something. And then the question is, what will he
14:26
Speaker 1: say about Donald Trump? Do you think Rudy goes down
14:30
Speaker 1: for Trump? I don't know.
14:32
Speaker 5: Why do you think.
14:34
Speaker 2: Trump and the Republicans haven't thrown Rudy under the bus.
14:38
Speaker 2: I mean, other than because of the insurance.
14:42
Speaker 1: No, I mean, obviously the insurance policy he's talking about
14:44
Speaker 1: is fucking nonsense. But I do think that the reason
14:49
Speaker 1: that Trump hasn't, I mean, Trump is doing something very unusual,
14:52
Speaker 1: which is he's not throwing Rudy under the bus, but
14:55
Speaker 1: he's also not talking about him anymore or defending him.
14:58
Speaker 1: And in that middle ground, what that tells me is
15:01
Speaker 1: Trump knows full well that Rudy knows everything. and could
15:06
Speaker 1: be very damaging to him and doesn't want to piss
15:08
Speaker 1: him off, but also doesn't want to have a ton
15:11
Speaker 1: of association with him anymore because he is under federal
15:14
Speaker 1: investigation and could very well be in big trouble. That's
15:18
Speaker 1: my thought. What do you think?
15:19
Speaker 2: I think that is certainly part of it. Trump has
15:23
Speaker 2: been crime adjacent most of his adult life and has
15:25
Speaker 2: managed to stay out of prison, so he's more thoughtful
15:28
Speaker 2: about how not to go to jail than he is
15:30
Speaker 2: on almost any other issue. But I also think this
15:34
Speaker 2: is a little bit of the trap of the perfect
15:35
Speaker 2: call defense, which is because Trump can never admit doing
15:40
Speaker 2: anything wrong, even slightly wrong, he's forced to stick by
15:45
Speaker 2: Rudy and Mulvaney, right? Two people who could easily throw
15:48
Speaker 2: under the bus and blame for this. And the most typical,
15:50
Speaker 2: in any other normal, normal seems so fucking quaint, but
15:54
Speaker 2: any normal political situation, there would be a fall person, right?
15:58
Speaker 2: It would be, we would decide, Republicans would go to
16:00
Speaker 2: Trump and they would say, the best way to protect
16:03
Speaker 2: you is to get rid of Rudy. Like someone has
16:05
Speaker 2: to take the fall because we need to be able
16:06
Speaker 2: to blame someone other than you. So we're going to
16:08
Speaker 2: blame Rudy for being overly enthusiastic in his service of
16:13
Speaker 2: you and crossing some lines. And we're going to blame
16:15
Speaker 2: Mulvaney for allowing the security aid to be held up
16:20
Speaker 2: in creating this problem. And Mulvaney is going to go
16:22
Speaker 2: and we're going to shit on Rudy and he's going
16:24
Speaker 2: to be persona non grata for a while. But Trump
16:25
Speaker 2: can't allow that to happen because he can't admit that
16:28
Speaker 2: anything went wrong. And so he has put himself in
16:31
Speaker 2: this Very strange position.
16:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, strange is one word for it. Let's talk about
16:38
Speaker 1: the evolving Republican response to impeachment, beginning with the target
16:43
Speaker 1: of the investigation, Donald Trump. On Friday, he wanted us
16:47
Speaker 1: all to know just how little he cares about impeachment
16:49
Speaker 1: by calling his spokespeople at Fox & Friends and ranting
16:52
Speaker 1: for 53 minutes straight, no commercials. Here is a clip.
17:00
Speaker 7: They have the server, right, from the DNC, Democratic National Committee.
17:04
Speaker 3: Who has the server?
17:05
Speaker 7: The FBI went in and they told them, get out
17:07
Speaker 7: of here. You're not getting we're not giving it to you.
17:09
Speaker 7: They gave the server to CrowdStrike or whatever it's called,
17:12
Speaker 7: which is a country which is a company owned by
17:15
Speaker 7: a very wealthy Ukrainian. And I still want to see
17:19
Speaker 7: that server. You know, the FBI has never gotten that server.
17:22
Speaker 7: That's a big part of this whole thing. Why did
17:25
Speaker 7: they give it to a Ukrainian company?
17:26
Speaker 3: Are you sure they did that?
17:29
Speaker 1: Are you sure they gave it to Ukraine?
17:31
Speaker 7: Well, that's what the word is. That's what I asked
17:33
Speaker 7: actually in my phone call, if you know. I mean,
17:35
Speaker 7: I asked it very point blank because we're looking for corruption.
17:39
Speaker 1: That's what the word is. That's what the word is.
17:42
Speaker 1: Fucking nonsense. Nonsense. Every word of that was complete nonsense.
17:48
Speaker 1: And you can tell because even Fox and Friends was...
17:52
Speaker 1: He has stumped Steve Doocy. He has made Steve Doocy
17:57
Speaker 1: question him.
17:59
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm sure Trump's going to call into Fox
18:01
Speaker 2: and Friends a thousand more times before the election, and
18:03
Speaker 2: I hope he does. But the next time I'm positive
18:07
Speaker 2: the producers of Fox and Friends will not just spend
18:09
Speaker 2: the whole time on a reaction shot as Ducey and
18:12
Speaker 2: Kilmeade and the other person, uh, like they're trying so
18:17
Speaker 2: hard not to look horrified and like keep a straight face,
18:20
Speaker 2: but they can't cause they know they're facilitating just absolute stupidity.
18:26
Speaker 2: I mean, it's like, it's a truly mind boggling thing.
18:29
Speaker 2: It is worth noting that a server is not a thing.
18:33
Speaker 2: It is 2019 meet the cloud too.
18:36
Speaker 1: I mean, that is the craziest part of all of this.
18:38
Speaker 1: The man thinks we talked about this before, uh, but
18:41
Speaker 1: it is not said nearly enough. It is not printed
18:44
Speaker 1: nearly enough in the stories about this. The man thinks
18:48
Speaker 1: that a physical server is lost somewhere in Ukraine. And
18:53
Speaker 1: he doesn't realize that when the FBI checked this out,
18:56
Speaker 1: they were checking fucking cloud compute. The emails are in
19:00
Speaker 1: the cloud. There is no physical server. The president may
19:03
Speaker 1: be impeached over asking, forcing, extorting The Ukrainian government, to
19:09
Speaker 1: look into a conspiracy about a server that does not exist,
19:12
Speaker 1: he is the president of the United States.
19:16
Speaker 2: Also, another important point. CrowdStrike, not a Ukrainian company.
19:20
Speaker 1: An American company.
19:21
Speaker 2: Based in Sunnyvale, California.
19:25
Speaker 1: Guy that owns it, Russian-born. Just nothing to do. Nothing
19:31
Speaker 1: to do with the Ukrainians at all. No server, not
19:35
Speaker 1: in Ukraine, not owned by Ukrainians. FBI already checked it out. Check, check, check, check.
19:41
Speaker 1: Donald Trump still believes this. Republican members of Congress still
19:44
Speaker 1: believe this, like fucking Devin Nunes, Senator John Kennedy, who
19:48
Speaker 1: started spouting this bullshit. on TV. I mean, it's fun
19:52
Speaker 1: to mock this, but why is this CrowdStrike conspiracy really problematic?
19:59
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, other than the complete blithering idiocy of
20:04
Speaker 2: the president as a political party, as the New York
20:06
Speaker 2: Times reported over the weekend... this conspiracy theory is part
20:11
Speaker 2: of a Russian intelligence operation to try to avoid blame
20:17
Speaker 2: for the 2016 election interference. That's exactly what they're doing.
20:20
Speaker 2: And they just must wake up every day and be like,
20:25
Speaker 2: I cannot believe these people believe it. When they started this,
20:29
Speaker 2: a lot of things, it's about just creating doubt on
20:33
Speaker 2: the fringes of the internet. And here you have the
20:35
Speaker 2: president of the United States calling into a national television program,
20:37
Speaker 2: just echoing it. You have all of the Republicans in
20:40
Speaker 2: a nationally televised congressional hearing echoing it, even though all
20:45
Speaker 2: of the intelligence agencies of the government of said president
20:49
Speaker 2: run by appointees of said party have said that it
20:52
Speaker 2: is not true and they still do it. It is,
20:53
Speaker 2: I mean, it is mind is just mind bogglingly stupid
20:58
Speaker 2: and dangerously so.
21:00
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, there's, There's also an interesting line from
21:02
Speaker 1: the New York Times story said the Russian intelligence officers
21:06
Speaker 1: conveyed the information about this conspiracy to prominent Russians and
21:10
Speaker 1: Ukrainians who then used a range of intermediaries like oligarchs,
21:14
Speaker 1: businessmen and their associates to pass the material to American
21:17
Speaker 1: political figures and even some journalists who were likely unaware
21:21
Speaker 1: of its origin, the official said. Interesting that the New
21:24
Speaker 1: York Times wrote about this since one of the journalists
21:27
Speaker 1: who did write about this conspiracy theory now works for
21:31
Speaker 1: the New York Times, Ken Vogel, at the time he
21:32
Speaker 1: was at Politico and wrote the famous Politico story about
21:35
Speaker 1: the Ukrainian involvement in the 2016 election, which has since
21:38
Speaker 1: been debunked, but has been read by just about every
21:41
Speaker 1: Republican defender of Donald Trump during this impeachment process. So
21:45
Speaker 1: I thought that was interesting.
21:46
Speaker 2: Well, John, as you know, Ken Vogel can do no
21:48
Speaker 2: wrong because Ken Vogel told us that.
21:51
Speaker 1: I mean, props to the New York Times for even
21:53
Speaker 1: in a very oblique way, admitting that one of the
21:57
Speaker 1: people who currently works for their news organization got snowed
22:01
Speaker 1: by a Russian intelligence operation. I mean, this is what,
22:04
Speaker 1: the sad part here and the scary part is, this
22:07
Speaker 1: is what the Russians, as you said, this is what
22:09
Speaker 1: the Russians could only dream about, right? That this Ukrainian
22:13
Speaker 1: conspiracy theory, all they want, they don't expect that everyone
22:17
Speaker 1: in the United States will suddenly believe this. They want
22:20
Speaker 1: to just sow just enough doubt and make this a
22:23
Speaker 1: partisan divisive issue so that eventually democrats and you know
22:28
Speaker 1: the intelligence community in the median everyone else believe the
22:31
Speaker 1: truth which is the russians were involved in the election
22:33
Speaker 1: but one major political party an entire conceived conservative media
22:38
Speaker 1: infrastructure and the president states all believe now something different
22:42
Speaker 1: or the very least they think that the ukrainians were
22:44
Speaker 1: involved in addition to the russians you have some republicans
22:47
Speaker 1: and that why i believe that the russians were part
22:49
Speaker 1: of this but you know maybe the ukrainians were part
22:51
Speaker 1: of this to who knows all a Russian intelligence operation.
22:55
Speaker 1: That's what they're all falling for right now.
22:57
Speaker 2: I mean, there's a term to describe this, which is
22:59
Speaker 2: called useful idiots, which is how you, how you describe
23:02
Speaker 2: people who become part of an intelligence operation without knowing
23:06
Speaker 2: they are a part of it. And that is the
23:08
Speaker 2: entire Republican party right now. They are, I mean, like,
23:12
Speaker 2: this is not to delve into like, you know, sort
23:16
Speaker 2: of Russia conspiracy things that, this is a very simple
23:19
Speaker 2: fact that this is that the Republicans are saying something
23:22
Speaker 2: that is known not to be true. And there, and
23:25
Speaker 2: it is the thing that Russians want them to be saying.
23:28
Speaker 1: That's right. That's exactly right. Um, so in addition to
23:31
Speaker 1: just defending Donald Trump, uh, Republicans have also started to
23:35
Speaker 1: launch a counterattack over the last, uh, several days. Um,
23:39
Speaker 1: on that Fox and friends call, Trump got very excited
23:42
Speaker 1: about an FBI inspector general report. He said will be
23:45
Speaker 1: historic when it's released in early December. Um, The inspector
23:49
Speaker 1: general at the FBI, who is independent, was looking into
23:53
Speaker 1: whether law enforcement officials abused their power when they asked
23:57
Speaker 1: courts to allow surveillance of Trump campaign official Carter Page.
24:01
Speaker 1: According to the Washington Post, the report will say that
24:04
Speaker 1: the FBI did not abuse its power, that the surveillance
24:08
Speaker 1: was warranted, but that a low-level FBI employee who no
24:12
Speaker 1: longer works there may have altered an email that was
24:16
Speaker 1: part of the surveillance application. Now, the Post story says
24:19
Speaker 1: even without that altered email, the surveillance should have been
24:24
Speaker 1: approved anyway. And so it shouldn't have substantively changed the
24:28
Speaker 1: decision by the courts. But how big of a deal
24:32
Speaker 1: will the Republicans make of this?
24:34
Speaker 2: They will make a huge deal. And I suspect that
24:38
Speaker 2: not all, but a decent portion of the media will
24:40
Speaker 2: follow along because this just now automatically lends itself to,
24:46
Speaker 2: he said... he said story, right? Like both sides, quote unquote,
24:51
Speaker 2: like if you want to do both sides journalism, it's
24:53
Speaker 2: very easy here because it's like the fundamental fact is
24:57
Speaker 2: everything the Republicans have been saying is wrong. There was
25:01
Speaker 2: no quote unquote coup. There was no attempt to overthrow
25:03
Speaker 2: a presidency. There was no criminality involved. There was no conspiracy.
25:08
Speaker 2: There was nothing. There was a counterintelligence operation that was
25:13
Speaker 2: signed off on by federal judges, right? because there was
25:18
Speaker 2: probable cause to do that. And then there was a
25:22
Speaker 2: low-level bureaucrat who altered an email, and those two things
25:26
Speaker 2: will be treated as of equal import, and that is
25:29
Speaker 2: unfortunate and alarming.
25:31
Speaker 1: Wouldn't they shouldn't? Because if the reports about the report
25:35
Speaker 1: are true, the report will actually blow a hole through
25:39
Speaker 1: multiple conspiracy theories that Republicans have been pushing for quite
25:43
Speaker 1: a while now. They keep saying that like, oh, the
25:46
Speaker 1: Democrats funded this dirty dossier from Christopher Steele, and that's
25:50
Speaker 1: why there was an investigation into Donald Trump and his campaign.
25:54
Speaker 1: And the Washington Post says, this report will say, no,
25:57
Speaker 1: absolutely not. This investigation was not started because of the dossier.
26:02
Speaker 1: These application for surveillance did not get approved because of
26:06
Speaker 1: any information in the dossier. And that while the dossier existed,
26:09
Speaker 1: and maybe some of the information in the dossier wasn't correct,
26:12
Speaker 1: none of the investigation into Donald Trump's campaign happened because
26:17
Speaker 1: of Christopher Steele or this fucking dossier. And that is
26:20
Speaker 1: basically the foundation of the Republican conspiracy that the Russia
26:26
Speaker 1: investigation was a hoax. That was the foundation of that.
26:29
Speaker 1: And this report could completely blow a hole in that.
26:31
Speaker 2: Well, it's like the original, I think the Post broke
26:34
Speaker 2: this story, I believe, on Friday or time has basically
26:38
Speaker 2: been a flat circle since we started group threading at
26:40
Speaker 2: the crack house of dawn, but I think it was Friday. Um, the, uh,
26:46
Speaker 2: and the story led with the FBI attorney, if I
26:50
Speaker 2: remember this correctly, uh, with the FBI attorney altering the document.
26:54
Speaker 2: And I get like, I sort of understand from a
26:56
Speaker 2: journalistic perspective why that's the case, because that like a
27:00
Speaker 2: FBI employee doing something wrong and getting fired for it
27:03
Speaker 2: is quote unquote news. Um, But the context of this
27:07
Speaker 2: is so important because the actual news is the primary
27:11
Speaker 2: talking point of the president of the Republican Party over
27:12
Speaker 2: three years has been undermined by the inspector general appointed
27:17
Speaker 2: by his attorney general. That should be the end of that.
27:26
Speaker 2: Context is often more important than what is quote unquote new.
27:29
Speaker 2: But because what was new here is going to sort
27:35
Speaker 2: of muddy up the very important contacts that this report provides.
27:40
Speaker 3: Yeah.
27:40
Speaker 1: I mean, that's, and which is what they do for everything.
27:42
Speaker 1: I mean, there's like, I think there's, Trump is on
27:44
Speaker 1: record saying this, this inspector general is, uh, everyone should
27:48
Speaker 1: respect his work. He does amazing work. Um, well, if
27:50
Speaker 1: he blows a hole in the conspiracy theory, I don't
27:53
Speaker 1: know if he'll be saying that. Although, like you said,
27:55
Speaker 1: he'll cherry pick whatever he wants and just lie about it.
27:56
Speaker 1: Cause that's what they do now.
27:58
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, it's like Kevin McCarthy, uh, who on
28:01
Speaker 2: the day after Sondland testified in front of the nation
28:04
Speaker 2: that there was a quid pro quo, Kevin McCarthy went
28:06
Speaker 2: out and said, I enjoyed the testimony. There was no
28:09
Speaker 2: quid pro quo. It's like if you can, like, I
28:11
Speaker 2: hate the term gaslighting, but that's what's happening here.
28:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, they're not even trying anymore to come
28:18
Speaker 1: up with lies that are believable in any way. That's
28:21
Speaker 1: where we're at.
28:23
Speaker 2: Can I ask you another question here, just as we
28:24
Speaker 2: talk about sort of Nunes and Pompeo? Have you noticed
28:30
Speaker 2: that the people– like there was an element of like
28:34
Speaker 2: being in public life where if someone had allegations about
28:37
Speaker 2: you or your office or your boss, you had to
28:39
Speaker 2: respond to questions about it in some way, shape, or form.
28:43
Speaker 2: And the Republicans now just don't respond. Like there is
28:47
Speaker 2: no– comment from Nunes' staff about this. A reporter would
28:52
Speaker 2: call and say, is this true, yes or no? And
28:54
Speaker 2: you would have to say something, right? And in that answer,
28:59
Speaker 2: the reader and the reporter could sort of divine where
29:02
Speaker 2: it's going, right? Did they confirm or deny it? Did
29:05
Speaker 2: they outright deny it? Did they try to provide some
29:08
Speaker 2: sort of context? But now, and this has been, I think,
29:12
Speaker 2: really something that's changed since Trump's come on the scene
29:14
Speaker 2: is the Republicans just don't respond to the reporters they
29:16
Speaker 2: don't want to respond to.
29:18
Speaker 1: And so they have they have decided to delegitimize the
29:25
Speaker 1: nonpartisan media. And the only legitimate media is Fox and
29:29
Speaker 1: other right wing outlets. And so because they've delegitimized the
29:34
Speaker 1: rest of the media and said that it's biased and
29:36
Speaker 1: fake and out to get them, just like Trump has
29:39
Speaker 1: said for the last couple of years. they don't believe
29:42
Speaker 1: they have any kind of obligation to answer reporters' questions.
29:47
Speaker 1: And in the rare moments that they are on television
29:49
Speaker 1: answering questions from nonpartisan media, like, you know, I don't
29:53
Speaker 1: usually watch the Sunday shows, but I have for the
29:58
Speaker 1: mostly they can just run circles around the hosts, you know,
30:01
Speaker 1: even when the hosts are trying their best. Like on
30:03
Speaker 1: Face the Nation this Sunday, Kellyanne Conway gets on there
30:07
Speaker 1: with Margaret Brennan and just lies for 10 minutes straight.
30:11
Speaker 1: Nothing that she says resembles the truth at all. And
30:14
Speaker 1: because Brennan's trying to get through all of her questions,
30:17
Speaker 1: you know, she doesn't stop and correct everything. And so
30:20
Speaker 1: these people figure, well, I got five minutes on television.
30:23
Speaker 1: They're going to have to cut away after that so
30:24
Speaker 1: I can just keep lying and lying and lying and lying.
30:26
Speaker 1: And then that's it. And then I'm done. And then
30:28
Speaker 1: there's no consequence for that.
30:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right. I mean, obviously some like Jake Tapper
30:32
Speaker 2: do pretty well in those scenarios, but it is also
30:35
Speaker 2: the hosts are in an impossible position because what do
30:38
Speaker 2: you do, right?
30:39
Speaker 1: I mean, you have to be willing to get into
30:43
Speaker 1: a very uncomfortable exchange that Republicans will then use to
30:46
Speaker 1: point out that you're some kind of a partisan hack, right?
30:48
Speaker 1: Like if you Or you have to decide, I'm going
30:50
Speaker 1: to ask this person about one thing. And when they lie,
30:53
Speaker 1: I'm going to just keep going and going and going
30:55
Speaker 1: on that one topic and that one lie and try
30:57
Speaker 1: to call them out for that and get rid of
31:00
Speaker 1: the rest of the questions that I was going to ask.
31:02
Speaker 1: I mean, so you have to make that decision. And
31:04
Speaker 1: I almost think that would be more useful. But I
31:05
Speaker 1: think maybe the most useful thing would be to not
31:07
Speaker 1: book congenital liars on your shows anymore.
31:11
Speaker 2: I just think the opting out of mainstream media as
31:15
Speaker 2: a political strategy is not something that's being talked about enough.
31:20
Speaker 2: And I know it doesn't feel like I mean, maybe
31:22
Speaker 2: these are conversations are happening among reporters, but it's not
31:24
Speaker 2: showing up like it's just treated as if they weren't
31:28
Speaker 2: there to take the call as opposed to a deliberate
31:30
Speaker 2: strategy not to answer any of the questions over a
31:32
Speaker 2: three year period.
31:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's it's pretty bad. Well, they know. Look,
31:37
Speaker 1: they know that the public believes that the media is
31:40
Speaker 1: incredibly biased, that distrust of the media is at an
31:43
Speaker 1: all time high. So they don't think that there is
31:47
Speaker 1: any any downside to doing this. It's just like the
31:50
Speaker 1: White House deciding to cancel the briefing. We have a
31:54
Speaker 1: press secretary who's never done a White House briefing right
31:58
Speaker 1: now because there's no punishment for it. It's bad. It's
32:03
Speaker 1: not great, Dan.
32:04
Speaker 2: I know. It's not.
32:14
Speaker 1: The second part of the Republican counterattack on impeachment is,
32:17
Speaker 1: is being led by Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham, who announced
32:21
Speaker 1: on Thursday that he'd be launching an investigation of his
32:24
Speaker 1: own into the Biden family. And to give you more
32:27
Speaker 1: context around Lindsey Graham's history with Joe Biden, here's a
32:31
Speaker 1: clip from an interview he did with Scott Conroy during
32:33
Speaker 1: his presidential campaign in 2016.
32:35
Speaker 8: If you can't admire Joe Biden as a person, then
32:39
Speaker 8: it's probably you got a problem. You need to do
32:42
Speaker 8: some self-evaluation because what's not to like? I called him
32:47
Speaker 8: after Beau died. And he basically said, well, Beau was
32:52
Speaker 8: my soul. We were tall for a long time. He
32:57
Speaker 8: came to my ceremony and said some of the most
33:02
Speaker 8: incredibly heartfelt.
33:03
Speaker 1: Things that anybody could ever say to me.
33:06
Speaker 8: And he's the nicest person I think I've ever met
33:10
Speaker 8: in politics. He is as good a man as God
33:14
Speaker 8: ever created.
33:14
Speaker 1: I mean... What does this say about Lindsey Graham?
33:22
Speaker 2: I mean, that he's just a horrendous human being?
33:27
Speaker 1: Yeah.
33:28
Speaker 2: It's like, how can one person be part, say those
33:31
Speaker 2: things with what was seemingly true emotion a few years
33:35
Speaker 2: ago and be acting this way in this moment?
33:40
Speaker 1: I just want everyone to understand, it is not as
33:43
Speaker 1: if Lindsey Graham had this relationship with Joe Biden... and
33:49
Speaker 1: suddenly Joe Biden, there's a possibility that he was engaged
33:54
Speaker 1: in some kind of wrongdoing and his family as well.
33:57
Speaker 1: And you think, well, I have a good personal relationship
33:59
Speaker 1: with him, but this thing came up and I have
34:02
Speaker 1: to do my job as a public official and this sucks,
34:04
Speaker 1: but that's the way it is. That's not what we're
34:07
Speaker 1: dealing with here. What Joe Biden is being accused of,
34:11
Speaker 1: which is pressuring for the firing of a corrupt Ukrainian prosecutor,
34:17
Speaker 1: And this is part of the problem with how the
34:18
Speaker 1: press has handled this, because they keep saying there's no
34:20
Speaker 1: evidence for this. There's no evidence. It's not that there's
34:22
Speaker 1: no evidence for this. It's that like from Barack Obama
34:26
Speaker 1: down through his entire administration, through the global community, everyone's
34:31
Speaker 1: through every Trump administration official who has testified before Congress
34:36
Speaker 1: to a person, every single one of them has said
34:38
Speaker 1: that not only did Joe Biden do nothing wrong, Joe
34:41
Speaker 1: Biden did the right thing, the right thing by pressuring
34:45
Speaker 1: for the firing of a corrupt Ukrainian prosecutor. He was correct.
34:49
Speaker 1: The guy was corrupt. That's why the Obama administration wanted
34:52
Speaker 1: him fired. That's why three Republican senators in 2016 signed
34:56
Speaker 1: a letter in favor of what Joe Biden was doing
35:00
Speaker 1: in Ukraine, Republicans. And when he did it, it was public.
35:04
Speaker 1: Everyone knew at the time, every Republican in Congress knew
35:08
Speaker 1: that Joe Biden had put pressure to fire that prosecutor, Shokin.
35:12
Speaker 1: Everyone knew it was happening, and at the time, everyone
35:15
Speaker 1: knew that Hunter Biden was on the board of Burisma.
35:17
Speaker 1: It was public information, and no one said a fucking
35:20
Speaker 1: word until Rudy and Trump tried to go dig up
35:23
Speaker 1: this dirt in Ukraine and force an investigation into Biden.
35:26
Speaker 1: Everyone knew he did the right thing, and Lindsey Graham
35:28
Speaker 1: knew it too. And with that knowledge, that this is
35:31
Speaker 1: all bullshit, Lindsey Graham is now opening investigation into the
35:34
Speaker 1: Biden family, his good family friends, to tarnish him. That's
35:38
Speaker 1: what's happening.
35:39
Speaker 4: I mean.
35:41
Speaker 2: The entire Biden conspiracy theory reminds me a lot of
35:45
Speaker 2: the Obama-Birther conspiracy because it is something that starts on
35:49
Speaker 2: the far ridges of the internet, gets picked up by
35:51
Speaker 2: Trump and the Republican Party, and sort of the strictures
35:58
Speaker 2: of journalism may allow it to fester a bit because
36:02
Speaker 2: you're right. It is good for the reporters to for
36:07
Speaker 2: saying there is no evidence to support it every time
36:09
Speaker 2: it comes up. And the nonpartisan media has done a
36:12
Speaker 2: very good job of that. But you're right. It is
36:14
Speaker 2: not only is there no evidence to support it, all
36:16
Speaker 2: of the evidence proves it false. It's sort of the
36:19
Speaker 2: same thing with Donald Trump or Trump. Rush Limbaugh or
36:23
Speaker 2: Jerome Corsi or some other yahoo says Barack Obama was
36:26
Speaker 2: born in Kenya, and you say, well, there's no evidence
36:27
Speaker 2: to support that. Well, no, actually, there's a giant piece
36:30
Speaker 2: of evidence, including his fucking birth certificate, that says he
36:32
Speaker 2: was born in Hawaii. And so you actually, like, they
36:36
Speaker 2: do think it's important to go one step further, because
36:39
Speaker 2: no evidence suggests, well, they haven't proven it yet, right?
36:44
Speaker 2: As opposed to the fact that all of the evidence
36:46
Speaker 2: to be accumulated, which is quite substantial, proves the opposite.
36:50
Speaker 1: Well, and part of this is conflated with a bunch
36:53
Speaker 1: of people in the media and on the left saying, well,
36:55
Speaker 1: you know, it certainly was shady for Hunter Biden to
36:57
Speaker 1: get this position on a board for doing nothing and
37:00
Speaker 1: getting paid all this money. And it's like that fine,
37:03
Speaker 1: that has absolutely nothing to do with the allegations here,
37:07
Speaker 1: which is that yes, Hunter Biden was on the board,
37:09
Speaker 1: but then Joe Biden took an action that somehow decreased
37:14
Speaker 1: the chances that the company that his son sat on
37:17
Speaker 1: would be investigated. When in fact, All of the evidence
37:21
Speaker 1: suggests that when that prosecutor was fired, it increased the
37:24
Speaker 1: chances that Burisma would be investigated, increased the chances. And
37:30
Speaker 1: I don't know if everyone has made this point enough.
37:34
Speaker 1: I don't know if the Biden campaign has made it enough,
37:36
Speaker 1: though I see they're on Twitter all the time talking
37:37
Speaker 1: about it. I've seen Joe Biden say we did nothing wrong.
37:41
Speaker 1: I don't think it's possible for it to be made
37:43
Speaker 1: too many times because it continues to get lost in
37:46
Speaker 1: all of this.
37:47
Speaker 7: Yeah.
37:47
Speaker 2: We have to disentangle two things, whether it's a.
37:50
Speaker 2: Hunter Biden was qualified to be on that board in
37:54
Speaker 2: the intentions of Burisma and putting him on that board
37:56
Speaker 2: and separate that from whether the access that he was
38:01
Speaker 2: theoretically being paid for gave him anything. And the evidence
38:04
Speaker 2: is very strongly it did not, since his father made
38:09
Speaker 2: a very public push that put the company on whose
38:12
Speaker 2: board his son sat in greater legal jeopardy.
38:16
Speaker 1: And in case... you didn't get that this was all
38:19
Speaker 1: a big game that Lindsey Graham is playing. Here's his
38:22
Speaker 1: response today when he was confronted with, well, you've said
38:25
Speaker 1: all these wonderful things about Joe Biden in the past.
38:28
Speaker 1: What are you doing? And he said, quote, I like
38:30
Speaker 1: Joe Biden. All I can say is that Joe didn't
38:33
Speaker 1: pull any punches when he ran against McCain. That's the
38:36
Speaker 1: way the system works. We're not going to live in
38:38
Speaker 1: a country where just one party gets investigated. I just
38:42
Speaker 1: thought it was a stunning statement that has not gotten
38:44
Speaker 1: enough attention today that Lindsey Graham basically just admitted, oh yeah,
38:49
Speaker 1: this is politics. We're just doing this to try to
38:52
Speaker 1: smear Joe Biden as he tries to run for president
38:55
Speaker 1: because look, it was a tough campaign in 08 too
38:58
Speaker 1: against John McCain. And so, you know, if you use
39:01
Speaker 1: the power of the federal government to smear a political opponent,
39:05
Speaker 1: that's just the way things work. That's basically what Lindsey
39:09
Speaker 1: Graham has admitted.
39:11
Speaker 2: And yes, there were arguments, disputes, negative ads everywhere. on
39:16
Speaker 2: both sides in the Obama, Biden, McCain, Palin campaign.
39:20
Speaker 1: Yes.
39:21
Speaker 2: There was no criminal conspiracy. There was no use of
39:24
Speaker 2: taxpayer dollars to smear anyone. In fact, when a question
39:28
Speaker 2: was raised by some about whether John McCain was eligible
39:31
Speaker 2: for the presidency because he was born in Panama, not
39:35
Speaker 2: on the actual U.S. soil, the President Obama and Joe
39:40
Speaker 2: Biden supported the notion that he was eligible for the
39:42
Speaker 2: presidency and helped pass a bill to ensure that to
39:44
Speaker 2: be the case.
39:46
Speaker 6: Yeah.
39:47
Speaker 5: Right.
39:47
Speaker 2: So let's not pretend. Let's not have. It wasn't all
39:51
Speaker 2: hope and change in 2008. There were fights, but let's
39:54
Speaker 2: not pretend these are two of the same things because
39:56
Speaker 2: they are fucking not.
39:58
Speaker 1: Well, again, and this is what the Republicans are counting on, right?
40:01
Speaker 1: Is that voters believe and people believe that politics is
40:04
Speaker 1: rough and tumble. And unfortunately, a lot of people believe
40:07
Speaker 1: politics is corrupt anyway, and they think it's all a
40:09
Speaker 1: game where everyone tries to smear each other. And they're
40:12
Speaker 1: hoping that they can inflate traditional rules of engagement where
40:17
Speaker 1: you run negative ads and say all kinds of bad things,
40:20
Speaker 1: which happens in campaigns all the time, and people can
40:22
Speaker 1: complain about whether it's bad or not. They're trying to
40:24
Speaker 1: conflate that with using the power of the federal government,
40:29
Speaker 1: using the powers of your official office to get personal
40:32
Speaker 1: favors and to do political bidding as opposed to the
40:36
Speaker 1: public interest, which is what's at core of this entire
40:40
Speaker 1: impeachment inquiry right now. And what's scary about what Lindsey
40:44
Speaker 1: Graham is doing is it's not just Donald Trump anymore.
40:48
Speaker 1: It's not just Donald Trump anymore. Now it's Lindsey Graham.
40:51
Speaker 1: It's Devin Nunes. I mean, we are having this whole
40:54
Speaker 1: fucking discussion in the media about, well, can Democrats convince
40:58
Speaker 1: any Republicans to vote with them on impeaching Donald Trump?
41:02
Speaker 1: How do we convince the Republicans? We can't convince the
41:04
Speaker 1: fucking Republicans because some of them are in on the conspiracy.
41:08
Speaker 1: What are you talking about? Oh, we're going to, yeah,
41:10
Speaker 1: we're going to convince them to vote. They're fucking accomplices
41:14
Speaker 1: right now. They're co-conspirators. We're not going to convince them
41:17
Speaker 1: of anything.
41:19
Speaker 2: Well, it's very important. We did convince one of them
41:23
Speaker 2: and they kicked him out of the party. It's an
41:25
Speaker 2: unanswerable question of anytime anyone agrees with the Democrats on impeachment,
41:28
Speaker 2: they have to leave the Republican party. Impeachment is bipartisan.
41:33
Speaker 2: There is bipartisan support for impeachment. There is bipartisanship in
41:36
Speaker 2: Congress because of Justin Amash. There is bipartisanship in the
41:40
Speaker 2: country between a whole host of former Republican elected officials
41:44
Speaker 2: and never-Trumper types. There is bipartisan support for impeachment in
41:48
Speaker 2: Kellyanne Conway's own household.
41:54
Speaker 1: I was just reading a great piece in The New
41:55
Speaker 1: Yorker right before we started recording this. Bill Weld, former
42:00
Speaker 1: Republican governor of Massachusetts... also former Watergate lawyer running against
42:05
Speaker 1: Trump now for the Republican nomination. And he's like, I
42:08
Speaker 1: literally couldn't conceive of a case that is more impeachable
42:12
Speaker 1: than this one. Having gone through Watergate and having been
42:15
Speaker 1: a Republican most of his life, he thinks I cannot
42:19
Speaker 1: conceive of one. There are plenty of conservatives, plenty of
42:22
Speaker 1: Republicans who believe that what Donald Trump did is impeachable.
42:26
Speaker 1: You don't have that on the other side.
42:28
Speaker 2: Just to be very clear, in the 2020 Republican presidential primary,
42:32
Speaker 2: Half the candidates believe Trump should be impeached. The other
42:34
Speaker 2: half is Trump.
42:39
Speaker 1: I mean, now we should ask, you know, is there
42:42
Speaker 1: risk for Biden in all of this? Because now we're
42:44
Speaker 1: talking not just about what Graham's going to do in
42:46
Speaker 1: the Senate, but what's going to happen in the Senate
42:49
Speaker 1: during a potential impeachment trial itself. And you can tell
42:54
Speaker 1: that one of the strategies that Trump and his Republican
42:56
Speaker 1: defenders are going to use is we're going to put
42:58
Speaker 1: Joe Biden and Hunter Biden on trial as opposed to
43:01
Speaker 1: Donald Trump. So, you know, is there a risk and
43:04
Speaker 1: what can Biden do about it? I, you know, when.
43:08
Speaker 2: This whole process started, I thought I was pretty worried.
43:12
Speaker 2: If I had been on the Biden campaign, I would
43:13
Speaker 2: have been quite worried about how this, you know, whether
43:16
Speaker 2: this would damage Biden's candidacy, whether it would affect, you know,
43:21
Speaker 2: the perception of electability, of Biden's electability among Democratic primary voters.
43:27
Speaker 2: We've been talking about this nonstop for two months now,
43:29
Speaker 2: and there's no suggestion that that has had any impact
43:32
Speaker 2: on the Democratic primary. So as the nominee, like worry
43:37
Speaker 2: about everything, there is risk when you get out of
43:39
Speaker 2: bed in the morning, but it seems like Democratic primary
43:43
Speaker 2: voters at least, they may choose not to vote for
43:45
Speaker 2: Biden for other reasons, but there's nothing that I've seen
43:48
Speaker 2: yet that suggests that Biden's being dragged into this impeachment
43:52
Speaker 2: issue has affected him or will affect him going forward
43:56
Speaker 2: in the primary. There was an open question about what
44:01
Speaker 2: impact it'll have among some number of general election voters, independents,
44:07
Speaker 2: Republicans who could potentially vote for a Democratic nominee, what
44:12
Speaker 2: impact it'll have with them. And I think time will
44:16
Speaker 2: tell on that, but I think there should be real
44:17
Speaker 2: concern there because this is basically rerunning the 2016 play
44:22
Speaker 2: of trying to make everyone seem at least almost as
44:26
Speaker 2: bad as Trump.
44:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, I worry about it a lot for that reason.
44:30
Speaker 1: I mean, and the other reason I worry about it
44:32
Speaker 1: is I think that these things end up being cumulative
44:34
Speaker 1: over time and you might not know right away. But,
44:37
Speaker 1: you know, over time, you start seeing your favorability ratings
44:41
Speaker 1: decline gradually and suddenly, you know. Now, look, Hillary Clinton
44:46
Speaker 1: at this stage in the race was more unpopular and
44:50
Speaker 1: had lower favorability ratings than any of our any of
44:53
Speaker 1: the Democratic candidates do right now. Um, so they had
44:56
Speaker 1: already done a number on her at this point, but
44:58
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean that the more, I mean, anyone who
45:01
Speaker 1: watches Fox news, anyone who gets their information from the
45:03
Speaker 1: conservative ecosystem is going to hear that Biden is not
45:07
Speaker 1: just a bad democratic candidate, but this, you know, corrupt
45:10
Speaker 1: politician who probably did some crimes, right? Like that, they're
45:13
Speaker 1: going to hear that over and over and over again.
45:15
Speaker 1: And that, so that's the whole Republican base. Not like
45:17
Speaker 1: Biden was going to get a bunch of Republican votes anyway, but, um,
45:21
Speaker 1: you know, in a close election, everything matters. And I
45:24
Speaker 1: think if I was the Biden campaign, I would sort
45:26
Speaker 1: of mount an aggressive paid media campaign at some point
45:31
Speaker 1: that at least defends him against some of this stuff.
45:34
Speaker 1: But I don't know. They also don't have that much
45:36
Speaker 1: money and they're running in a primary, so it's kind
45:37
Speaker 1: of hard to do now.
45:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's definitely going to need to be some paid
45:43
Speaker 2: media pushback on this. And also, there is both risk
45:46
Speaker 2: and opportunity here for his candidacy because he has bet
45:52
Speaker 2: on electability. And one of the great pieces of evidence
45:57
Speaker 2: that he could theoretically be the most elected was the
46:00
Speaker 2: fact that the entire Trump administration was so scared of
46:03
Speaker 2: running against him that they engaged in a worldwide criminal
46:07
Speaker 2: conspiracy to stop him from being the nominee.
46:09
Speaker 8: Yeah.
46:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's rare. So this brings us to what the
46:14
Speaker 1: Democrats in Congress should do next. While Schiff has not
46:17
Speaker 1: ruled out the possibility of more hearings... His Intelligence Committee
46:20
Speaker 1: is currently writing up a report that it will send
46:23
Speaker 1: to the House Judiciary Committee, which will then decide whether
46:25
Speaker 1: or not to draft articles of impeachment against the president.
46:28
Speaker 1: So that's what's happening right now. How concerned are you
46:32
Speaker 1: about the fact that we still have not gotten testimony
46:35
Speaker 1: from Bolton, Mulvaney, maybe even Parnas, if federal prosecutors are
46:39
Speaker 1: holding on to some of his evidence for trial? Obviously,
46:42
Speaker 1: the House Committee has some video, photographic, audio evidence, whatever
46:47
Speaker 1: it may be. But even with Parnas, there might be
46:49
Speaker 1: a little delay here. What do you think about all this?
46:53
Speaker 2: I have been an advocate for a while now of
46:58
Speaker 2: the most fulsome impeachment hearings possible with as many witnesses
47:02
Speaker 2: as possible, touching on as many different elements of Trump's
47:06
Speaker 2: corruption and criminality as possible. But I'm starting to change
47:09
Speaker 2: my opinion on that given how open and shut this
47:13
Speaker 2: case is and how everything has gone the right way
47:17
Speaker 2: for Democrats. Every witness was– even the ones the Republicans
47:21
Speaker 2: called were devastating to Trump's case. Like the crime is
47:26
Speaker 2: proven a hundred ways from Sunday. Yeah. And I just
47:33
Speaker 2: start to wonder– whether there are diminishing returns. If you
47:37
Speaker 2: told me you could get Mulvaney and Bolton in here
47:41
Speaker 2: the weekend after Thanksgiving, yes, definitely do that. If you
47:45
Speaker 2: could get Giuliani in here the weekend after Thanksgiving, even
47:48
Speaker 2: for a deposition, if not actual testimony in public, definitely
47:54
Speaker 2: do that. If you're going to be involved in a
47:57
Speaker 2: Supreme Court case for six months to get you an
48:00
Speaker 2: answer to that question, I just don't know that you'll
48:02
Speaker 2: be able to hold the nation's attention long enough to
48:05
Speaker 2: receive the sort of political communications payoff of the actual
48:12
Speaker 2: impeachment vote itself.
48:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree with that. You know, and we've all
48:17
Speaker 1: had this debate with Brian Boitler, who believes something different,
48:21
Speaker 1: believes that they should. And look, what Brian would say is,
48:25
Speaker 1: I don't think you should wait six months for a
48:27
Speaker 1: court case, but I think you should at least try
48:29
Speaker 1: and set a deadline for yourself that if the courts
48:30
Speaker 1: don't decide by a certain date, then you just say, okay,
48:33
Speaker 1: we're going to go with what we have. And I
48:35
Speaker 1: get that. And I don't think there's harm in, you know,
48:38
Speaker 1: trying to subpoena Bolton. They already have a subpoena out
48:41
Speaker 1: to Mulvaney who just, you know, basically has defied it.
48:43
Speaker 1: I don't think there's harm, but I also think if
48:47
Speaker 1: the Democrats set up the idea that they need these
48:50
Speaker 1: witnesses to complete their case, then if they don't get them,
48:54
Speaker 1: which is very possible, suddenly it seems like, oh, well,
48:59
Speaker 1: Democrats don't have it. And like you said, This is
49:02
Speaker 1: an open and shut case. We have it. We have
49:04
Speaker 1: the evidence. And I don't know. Now, I do think
49:08
Speaker 1: it's important because a lot of Republicans are saying, you know,
49:11
Speaker 1: it's like the Will Hurd defense. Well, he did something
49:14
Speaker 1: I disagree with on foreign policy, but it's certainly not impeachable.
49:18
Speaker 1: And the way you counter that part one way you
49:19
Speaker 1: counter that. is say, well, this is part of a pattern.
49:23
Speaker 1: And look at all the other things he's done, right?
49:25
Speaker 1: I mean, this and this goes to a question of
49:26
Speaker 1: not just more witnesses, but do you bring in other
49:28
Speaker 1: impeachable offenses? It's part of a pattern. The guy consistently
49:32
Speaker 1: is corrupt. He consistently tries to get personal favors and
49:37
Speaker 1: Using the powers of the presidency instead of using them
49:40
Speaker 1: for the public good over and over and over again
49:42
Speaker 1: And you can list a whole bunch of episodes of
49:43
Speaker 1: this so I do think the pattern of behavior is
49:46
Speaker 1: important But this also assumes that we're trying to prove
49:49
Speaker 1: this like you'd prove it in court to a jury
49:53
Speaker 1: of Donald Trump's peers and instead you have a fucking
49:55
Speaker 1: jury of loyalists Trump loyalists So like if if Republicans
50:02
Speaker 1: aren't going to believe the evidence that, you know, Democrats
50:06
Speaker 1: have already laid out, if they're not going to believe
50:08
Speaker 1: the testimony of Trump administration officials themselves, they're not going
50:12
Speaker 1: to believe anything. They're not going to believe a audio
50:15
Speaker 1: recording where Donald Trump says, hey, I'm going to go
50:18
Speaker 1: bribe the Ukrainians to make sure we smear Joe Biden.
50:21
Speaker 1: They'd make up excuses for that. So what are we doing?
50:25
Speaker 2: What would a jury of Donald Trump's peers be like?
50:28
Speaker 2: Who would those people be? Hulk Hogan? I just don't know.
50:34
Speaker 1: It's like his fucking cabinet, I guess. And look, we
50:38
Speaker 1: are in the situation where he is abusing his power
50:42
Speaker 1: more and more all the time. We haven't even talked about,
50:45
Speaker 1: and I know Tommy's going to talk about it more
50:47
Speaker 1: on Pod C of the World this week, the fact
50:49
Speaker 1: that Trump has basically ordered the defense secretary to to
50:54
Speaker 1: allow a Navy SEAL who was accused and then convicted
50:59
Speaker 1: of at least one war crime to keep his status,
51:02
Speaker 1: interfered in military justice. And basically the Secretary of the
51:08
Speaker 1: Navy has been fired now because he wanted to run
51:13
Speaker 1: his own military justice to instill discipline in the ranks
51:17
Speaker 1: and make sure that someone who was guilty of taking
51:21
Speaker 1: a photo posing next to a dead body, a seal,
51:27
Speaker 1: wanted to make sure that this guy faced zero punishment whatsoever,
51:31
Speaker 1: even though his fellow seals turned him in. His fellow
51:34
Speaker 1: seals turned him in. And now we have the president deciding,
51:37
Speaker 1: you know what? If you are in the military and
51:40
Speaker 1: you commit a war crime, you can get off scot-free
51:43
Speaker 1: as long as you're loyal to me, as long as
51:45
Speaker 1: you go on right-wing radio and start saying that Donald
51:48
Speaker 1: Trump is great and the Democrats are criminals and all
51:51
Speaker 1: this kind of stuff. If you're a Trump guy, if
51:53
Speaker 1: you're loyal to me, you in the military can do
51:55
Speaker 1: anything and get away with it. That's where we are
51:58
Speaker 1: right now.
51:58
Speaker 2: It's actually even worse than that because this isn't some,
52:02
Speaker 2: it's not even like a perverted principle of Trump's. He
52:07
Speaker 2: is responding to the pleas and requests of Pete Hegseth,
52:14
Speaker 2: who is a Fox personality who is essentially Steve Doocy's understudy.
52:20
Speaker 2: This is his cause celeb. Trump is doing a favor
52:24
Speaker 2: for the host of Fox and Friends Weekend.
52:30
Speaker 1: It is horrible. It is horrible. Last question on all this.
52:35
Speaker 1: So we are heading towards the Judiciary Committee will receive
52:41
Speaker 1: a report from Schiff. They'll drop articles of impeachment. This
52:45
Speaker 1: vote will go to the whole House. The House will
52:47
Speaker 1: vote on impeachment if the House, in fact— impeaches Donald Trump.
52:52
Speaker 1: It will go to the Senate. There will be a trial.
52:54
Speaker 1: John Roberts will preside over the trial. Various House members,
53:00
Speaker 1: Democratic House members will present the case. They will be
53:03
Speaker 1: the prosecutors. And then Trump will have his defense. How
53:07
Speaker 1: are you feeling about the prospective trial? Like, what should
53:11
Speaker 1: Democrats be doing differently, if anything differently? What kind of
53:15
Speaker 1: how should their messaging evolve in this? You know, I
53:18
Speaker 1: have this sense that Just sort of reading the coverage
53:20
Speaker 1: this weekend and seeing where the Republicans are going, that
53:23
Speaker 1: they're headed towards. Look, not only is Donald Trump innocent,
53:28
Speaker 1: but look at all these polls. You know, Democrats, public
53:32
Speaker 1: opinion really hasn't moved that much. No one really cares.
53:35
Speaker 1: The Democrats have failed. No Republicans have decided in Congress
53:40
Speaker 1: to join them. And so what are we really doing?
53:42
Speaker 1: This is actually going to be a big victory for
53:44
Speaker 1: Donald Trump because the Democrats have failed at moving public opinion.
53:48
Speaker 1: How should Democrats handle this?
53:50
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, that's been the concern from the beginning.
53:52
Speaker 2: It's one of the things that gave, I think, both
53:54
Speaker 2: of us pause about pursuing impeachment in the immediate aftermath
53:59
Speaker 2: of the Mueller report is that the overwhelmingly most likely
54:03
Speaker 2: scenario is that the Senate on a party line basis
54:07
Speaker 2: will acquit Trump and there's an open question about how
54:11
Speaker 2: the media will handle that. How will that be? You know,
54:13
Speaker 2: is that a victory for Trump? I mean, yes, in
54:16
Speaker 2: the sense that he's not being dragged out of office,
54:19
Speaker 2: it's a victory, but is it really? And so like
54:22
Speaker 2: there is real concern there. I think the thing for
54:24
Speaker 2: Democrats is to continue to frame throughout the whole process,
54:29
Speaker 2: the larger, more important question. Is it okay for a president,
54:38
Speaker 2: to use the power of their office and taxpayer-funded security
54:41
Speaker 2: assistance to try to rig an American election. If you
54:45
Speaker 2: think that is okay, vote to acquit. If you do not,
54:48
Speaker 2: then Donald Trump should be removed from office. You have
54:51
Speaker 2: to frame the question. And much like Schiff, and all
54:54
Speaker 2: the Democrats in the House did a great job, is
54:56
Speaker 2: don't get pulled down into the bullshit. The Republican senators
55:01
Speaker 2: are not going to be as absurd as on a
55:04
Speaker 2: whole is Jim Jordan and Nunes and a bunch of
55:07
Speaker 2: these other yahoos who are on the intelligence committee. But
55:10
Speaker 2: there are going to be people who are going to
55:12
Speaker 2: be performative assholes like Tom Cotton or Josh Hawley or
55:15
Speaker 2: a whole bunch of other people are looking to shine
55:18
Speaker 2: their star in Trump's Republican Party. And you can't get
55:20
Speaker 2: dragged into that. The second thing is use this as
55:23
Speaker 2: an opportunity to put tremendous pressure on Cory Gardner, Susan Collins,
55:28
Speaker 2: Tom Tillis, Joni Ernst, Martha McSally, and the rest of
55:32
Speaker 2: the Republicans who are running in blue and purple states
55:37
Speaker 2: in 2020. If they are going to end up doing
55:40
Speaker 2: what is best– if they're going to put their party
55:42
Speaker 2: over the country, make them pay a political price for
55:45
Speaker 2: it in the moment and every day between now until
55:46
Speaker 2: the election.
55:48
Speaker 1: Yeah, look, I– Public opinion polls already show that about
55:53
Speaker 1: half the country believes the president should be impeached and
55:55
Speaker 1: removed from office. That is extraordinarily significant on its own.
56:00
Speaker 1: That is a higher public approval for impeachment than in
56:03
Speaker 1: any president in the past, except Nixon right before he resigned.
56:07
Speaker 1: That's where we are already. And now we are in
56:10
Speaker 1: an extremely polarized environment where I would be shocked if
56:13
Speaker 1: any Republican who gets their information from the conservative ecosystem,
56:17
Speaker 1: media ecosystem, or believes that Donald Trump should be impeached.
56:20
Speaker 1: I would be shocked by that because that's not the
56:23
Speaker 1: information they're getting all the time. So I don't think
56:25
Speaker 1: we should expect public opinion to move all that much.
56:29
Speaker 1: It's the most polarized in history. But I do think
56:32
Speaker 1: this has always been about some of these Republican senators
56:36
Speaker 1: who are vulnerable in some of these swing states. And
56:40
Speaker 1: we need to make very clear that a vote to
56:42
Speaker 1: acquit Donald Trump is a vote to greenlight foreign interference
56:46
Speaker 1: in the 2020 election and is a vote to greenlight
56:49
Speaker 1: the idea that the president can use the power of
56:52
Speaker 1: his office to destroy anyone who challenges his power. That's
56:56
Speaker 1: what this is about. And I do think that the
56:58
Speaker 1: Democrats should make those points over and over again. It's
57:01
Speaker 1: about rigging an election, and it's about the president using
57:05
Speaker 1: the power of his office to destroy anyone who challenges him.
57:08
Speaker 1: That's what he's doing right now. And if he gets
57:10
Speaker 1: away with this, if they think that's okay, then what
57:13
Speaker 1: we're saying in this country is, When you get into
57:15
Speaker 1: office and you have some power and you have some
57:18
Speaker 1: control and influence over federal dollars, federal agencies, people who
57:23
Speaker 1: are working for the government, law enforcement, the CIA, anything,
57:27
Speaker 1: you can use that to destroy the career of anyone
57:31
Speaker 1: who challenges you, even if it's a conspiracy. And we're
57:33
Speaker 1: saying that's okay in America now. And you know what?
57:36
Speaker 1: If the Republicans say that's okay, then I'm not gonna
57:39
Speaker 1: regret conducting this impeachment trial for a second. I will
57:44
Speaker 1: not regret it for a second. I don't even care
57:46
Speaker 1: if it's that unpopular right now. This is about the
57:48
Speaker 1: sanctity of our elections and our democracy. And there's nothing
57:51
Speaker 1: more important than that.
57:54
Speaker 2: That was great. You should be a Senator.
57:56
Speaker 1: It's just, you know, over the weekend, I was just
57:58
Speaker 1: like reading all this stuff and it's like, it is,
58:01
Speaker 1: it is pretty depressing and a little bit scary that
58:05
Speaker 1: we are sort of careening towards this because I do think, look, if,
58:10
Speaker 1: you know, if he is acquitted, which of course he
58:13
Speaker 1: probably will be when you see all these Republicans talking,
58:16
Speaker 1: and as we've talked about, if he is, it's going
58:18
Speaker 1: to be bad, but we still have a chance to
58:21
Speaker 1: get rid of him in 2020. But it sort of
58:23
Speaker 1: makes the 2020 election, as if it wasn't already the
58:26
Speaker 1: most important election ever, even more critical, because if this
58:31
Speaker 1: man who we know committed these crimes is exonerated and
58:36
Speaker 1: then wins, and David Plouffe has been saying this, imagine
58:40
Speaker 1: Imagine what he will do when he never has to
58:43
Speaker 1: face voters again in a second term. He has four
58:46
Speaker 1: years never having to face accountability or voters again. It's
58:50
Speaker 1: pretty scary, and it should scare everyone into, you know,
58:54
Speaker 1: getting off their asses and working their hearts out for
58:57
Speaker 1: whoever we nominate as the Democratic nominee. All right, let's
59:03
Speaker 1: talk about 2020. Speaking of that, over the weekend, New
59:06
Speaker 1: York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg officially announced his candidacy for
59:09
Speaker 1: president with a video and a very expensive ad campaign.
59:12
Speaker 1: Just this week, he's spending over $ 30 million in 100
59:16
Speaker 1: media markets across two dozen mostly Super Tuesday states. To
59:20
Speaker 1: put this in context, the current biggest spender in the
59:23
Speaker 1: Democratic primary billionaire Tom Steyer is spending $ 1. 2 million on
59:27
Speaker 1: television ads And every other candidate is spending half a
59:30
Speaker 1: million or less. That's half a million versus 30 million
59:34
Speaker 1: in a week. In his announcement, Bloomberg argues he's the
59:37
Speaker 1: right person to take on Trump. And I believe we
59:39
Speaker 1: have a quick clip from his announcement ad.
59:42
Speaker 5: There's an America waiting to be rebuilt where everyone without
59:46
Speaker 5: health insurance is guaranteed to get it. And everyone who
59:48
Speaker 5: likes theirs can go ahead and keep it. Where the
59:51
Speaker 5: wealthy will pay more in taxes and the struggling middle
59:55
Speaker 5: class will get their fair share. And jobs that just
59:58
Speaker 5: allow you to get by will become jobs that let
1:00:01
Speaker 5: you get ahead. Mike Bloomberg for president, jobs creator, leader,
1:00:07
Speaker 5: problem solver. It's going to take all three to build
1:00:10
Speaker 5: back a country.
1:00:13
Speaker 1: Dan, what did you think about the video?
1:00:14
Speaker 2: I thought the video was good in the sense that
1:00:16
Speaker 2: it takes his biography and distills it in a pretty
1:00:20
Speaker 2: authentic way to a set of issues that would be
1:00:23
Speaker 2: of most interest to a Democratic primary electorate, which is
1:00:27
Speaker 2: not an easy feat considering he was a Republican like
1:00:33
Speaker 2: three years ago.
1:00:34
Speaker 1: He was the Republican.
1:00:35
Speaker 2: I guess it was actually longer than that. I think
1:00:37
Speaker 2: he switched in his last term from Republican to independent
1:00:41
Speaker 2: at some point. But he was the Republican mayor of
1:00:43
Speaker 2: New York City, billionaire owner of a media company, and
1:00:49
Speaker 2: is now running the Democratic primary. And so that's a
1:00:52
Speaker 2: marketing challenge, to say the least.
1:00:55
Speaker 1: Yeah. And look, you can tell who their audience is
1:00:58
Speaker 1: for this ad. It is not Democratic primary activists. It
1:01:02
Speaker 1: is not progressives. It is people who are moderate and
1:01:06
Speaker 1: progressive leaning who think, yeah, I've heard of Bloomberg. I
1:01:10
Speaker 1: think he was I already was a successful mayor. Rich
1:01:12
Speaker 1: guy owns a business. And oh, look, I guess he
1:01:14
Speaker 1: did stuff on climate, which he did on gun control,
1:01:18
Speaker 1: which he did. uh... and i like that and you
1:01:21
Speaker 1: know he's rich but he says in this ad uh...
1:01:23
Speaker 1: he's gonna raise taxes and uh... you know he's going
1:01:26
Speaker 1: to give an option he you know to go in
1:01:28
Speaker 1: indirect swipe at medicare for all but said you know
1:01:30
Speaker 1: he's for uh... public option in the video and so
1:01:34
Speaker 1: that's the kind of body and these people are probably
1:01:36
Speaker 1: less engaged in politics uh... the question is how many
1:01:41
Speaker 1: of them are there right like and and the other
1:01:44
Speaker 1: big bet he's making here as part of a strategy
1:01:47
Speaker 1: is again These ads are running in Super Tuesday states.
1:01:50
Speaker 1: He's skipping the first four primary states. He's skipping the
1:01:53
Speaker 1: debates because he's not taking contributions. And to get into
1:01:56
Speaker 1: the debates, you have to have a certain number of donors.
1:01:58
Speaker 1: So because he's not doing that, he's going to skip
1:02:00
Speaker 1: the debates. And he's betting, will these very sleek, well-produced
1:02:05
Speaker 1: ads be enough for all these people in Super Tuesday
1:02:08
Speaker 1: states to suddenly say, yeah, I like this guy and
1:02:10
Speaker 1: I'm going to take a chance on them, even if
1:02:12
Speaker 1: I don't really know him that much and I haven't
1:02:13
Speaker 1: seen him in the debates?
1:02:16
Speaker 7: I think.
1:02:17
Speaker 2: It is a long shot for Bloomberg for the reasons
1:02:22
Speaker 2: we suggested. He's getting in it late. Um, he is
1:02:26
Speaker 2: a former Republican who has some real challenges with the
1:02:30
Speaker 2: African American community based on the law enforcement policies that
1:02:34
Speaker 2: were in place when he was the mayor of New York,
1:02:36
Speaker 2: like real challenges. But if there were a path, this
1:02:40
Speaker 2: is the path it is. Don't get sucked in in
1:02:44
Speaker 2: the early States. wait, wait it out, let it sort
1:02:48
Speaker 2: itself out. And if for some reason Biden were to
1:02:52
Speaker 2: falter in those early States and maybe only Sanders and
1:02:56
Speaker 2: Warren make it out and you've set yourself up for
1:03:00
Speaker 2: the potential to be the moderate alternative, I don't want to,
1:03:04
Speaker 2: not electable, the moderate alternative to this other group and
1:03:07
Speaker 2: to sort of bring in what remained of the Biden
1:03:11
Speaker 2: coalition or what remained of the Buttigieg coalition. And the,
1:03:14
Speaker 2: and it, The thing is, this is a path only
1:03:17
Speaker 2: available to a billionaire. I guess his advertising campaign is what,
1:03:23
Speaker 2: like $ 34 million, which I think is like, I saw
1:03:26
Speaker 2: something that was like the equivalent of writing a $ 300
1:03:28
Speaker 2: check for the average American. And to give you a
1:03:32
Speaker 2: sense of, this is a sense of scale. This is
1:03:33
Speaker 2: from Shane Goldmacher, a New York Times reporter, that if
1:03:36
Speaker 2: you watched the 5 p.m. newscast all week on NBC
1:03:41
Speaker 2: in your hometown of Los Angeles, you would see 20
1:03:44
Speaker 2: 60-second Bloomberg ad. That is an ungodly sum of money.
1:03:49
Speaker 2: He is running more ads in each of these markets
1:03:53
Speaker 2: all around the country than I think almost any Democrat
1:03:56
Speaker 2: is running in the Des Moines market in the most
1:03:58
Speaker 2: important state, or at least the first state in the
1:04:01
Speaker 2: Democratic primary process. It is an ungodly sum of money.
1:04:04
Speaker 2: Will it work? Open question. I mean, it's a long road.
1:04:07
Speaker 1: That's the big question is, does this work? I mean,
1:04:10
Speaker 1: we have seen that Tom Steyer's significant ad spend did
1:04:14
Speaker 1: get him onto the debate stage. It did get him
1:04:16
Speaker 1: past the threshold in polling. And suddenly you saw him
1:04:20
Speaker 1: pop up in a couple of polls in the early
1:04:21
Speaker 1: states at like three, four, five, 6% higher when he
1:04:24
Speaker 1: started than he is now. And the thing that Michael
1:04:27
Speaker 1: Bloomberg has going for him over Tom Steyer is he's
1:04:30
Speaker 1: much richer. He's a much richer billionaire than Tom Steyer.
1:04:34
Speaker 1: And he's got higher name ID than Tom Steyer.
1:04:36
Speaker 2: But the thing I'd say about all of this though
1:04:38
Speaker 2: is Bloomberg does not He is surrounded by some really smart,
1:04:45
Speaker 2: very data-oriented political operatives. They definitely see a path. I
1:04:52
Speaker 2: think they are probably clear-eyed about the narrowness of that path,
1:04:55
Speaker 2: but they see one, and they wouldn't have done this
1:04:59
Speaker 2: without believing that there was an investment, that investment here
1:05:04
Speaker 2: could pay off. This is not a... I'm not saying
1:05:09
Speaker 2: Bloomberg does not have a large ego, everyone in politics,
1:05:12
Speaker 2: particularly billionaires in politics have a large ego, but he,
1:05:16
Speaker 2: he has walked away from the possibility of running many
1:05:19
Speaker 2: times before because he didn't think he could win. And
1:05:21
Speaker 2: he made a different decision this time. And that suggests
1:05:23
Speaker 2: that something in their data shows a path. And as
1:05:27
Speaker 2: we should at least think about that, I, I think
1:05:30
Speaker 2: the New York based media complex tends to overrate his chances,
1:05:36
Speaker 2: but we shouldn't underrate them either.
1:05:40
Speaker 7: Yeah.
1:05:40
Speaker 1: And look, you can you can buy ads, but you
1:05:42
Speaker 1: can't buy enthusiasm. And that's basically their bet right now
1:05:46
Speaker 1: that that you don't really need a lot of enthusiasm
1:05:51
Speaker 1: or grassroots support to win the nomination in the presidency
1:05:55
Speaker 1: and that you can just sort of message to the
1:06:00
Speaker 1: moderate part of the electorate and then maybe the more
1:06:02
Speaker 1: disengaged part of the electorate. And that's going to be enough. And,
1:06:05
Speaker 1: you know, I don't it's quite a bet to make
1:06:07
Speaker 1: because I don't think clearly enthusiasm alone. is not enough
1:06:11
Speaker 1: to make you president of the United States. But if
1:06:13
Speaker 1: you look at the people who have won the nomination
1:06:16
Speaker 1: in the presidency, all of them have some sort of
1:06:18
Speaker 1: fan base. And we have yet to see the Bloomberg
1:06:21
Speaker 1: fan base materialize. But perhaps we will. How do you
1:06:25
Speaker 1: think his candidacy could change the race for any other candidate?
1:06:29
Speaker 2: I mean, I think that's really... I've been trying to
1:06:32
Speaker 2: think about this in the context of just all the
1:06:36
Speaker 2: candidates fighting for you know, some lane to get to
1:06:39
Speaker 2: 15% enough for delegates or whatever. And I think the
1:06:43
Speaker 2: real thing is, is we do not know the answer
1:06:45
Speaker 2: to that until after probably South Carolina. It's just, it's
1:06:52
Speaker 2: a wholly different thing based on which candidates are out there.
1:06:55
Speaker 2: I think the most likely scenario is it affects no one, right?
1:06:59
Speaker 2: He spends all this money, stays in the low single digits.
1:07:03
Speaker 2: That support is dispersed among two or three candidates, um, But,
1:07:07
Speaker 2: you know, if it's, let's say it's a two-person race
1:07:11
Speaker 2: coming out of the early states between Biden and Warren
1:07:15
Speaker 2: or Biden and Sanders, whatever else, and then Bloomberg's getting 4%,
1:07:18
Speaker 2: that 4% could be decisive because that's probably mostly coming
1:07:21
Speaker 2: from Biden. If it's three candidates less so, it's really,
1:07:26
Speaker 2: we really need to know who makes it out of
1:07:28
Speaker 2: the early states with any chance of accumulating delegates going
1:07:31
Speaker 2: forward to know whether Bloomberg gets there. But it's like
1:07:34
Speaker 2: the path you have to see to really be specific
1:07:36
Speaker 2: on this Bloomberg's got to go from where he is
1:07:38
Speaker 2: now to above 15% almost everywhere. And that's hard. That's
1:07:45
Speaker 2: a hard thing to do even with all those millions
1:07:47
Speaker 2: and billions.
1:07:49
Speaker 1: I think right now he's serving as a arguably effective
1:07:53
Speaker 1: punching bag for Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren because he's
1:07:56
Speaker 1: making their case for them that billionaires shouldn't buy democracy.
1:07:59
Speaker 1: And so they're out there whacking him. And I'm sure
1:08:02
Speaker 1: that's helping them. I'm sure he may be making a
1:08:06
Speaker 1: mayor Pete and a Joe Biden, a little bit nervous
1:08:08
Speaker 1: since he's, you know, trying to get into their lane
1:08:10
Speaker 1: or an Amy Klobuchar. Um, but like you said, I think,
1:08:13
Speaker 1: I think you're right. Like let's, let's give the ad
1:08:15
Speaker 1: campaign a couple of weeks and let's see what happens
1:08:17
Speaker 1: in these early primaries. Cause it's really just hard to
1:08:19
Speaker 1: predict this stuff now, which is why we don't do it. Um, okay.
1:08:23
Speaker 1: When we come back, we will have Dan's interview with acronyms,
1:08:26
Speaker 1: Tara McGowan.
1:08:27
Speaker 6: Okay.
1:08:35
Speaker 2: I'm now joined by the founder and CEO of Acronym,
1:08:37
Speaker 2: a leading progressive digital strategy nonprofit, Tara McGowan. Tara, welcome
1:08:41
Speaker 2: back to Pod Save America.
1:08:42
Speaker 3: Hi, Dan. Thanks for having me back.
1:08:45
Speaker 2: Of course. Since you were last on the show in
1:08:49
Speaker 2: the spring, Acronym has announced a $ 75 million digital campaign
1:08:53
Speaker 2: on behalf of the Democrats. What can you tell us
1:08:55
Speaker 2: about why you launched that and give us an update
1:08:58
Speaker 2: on your progress?
1:08:59
Speaker 7: Yeah.
1:09:00
Speaker 3: Absolutely. So the program that we launched out of ACRONYM
1:09:04
Speaker 3: and our affiliated PAC called PACRONYM is called Four is Enough.
1:09:09
Speaker 3: And David Plouffe, who I know you know very, very well,
1:09:13
Speaker 3: joined me in rolling this campaign out and then co-chairing
1:09:18
Speaker 3: it with me. So you and everybody else at Pod
1:09:22
Speaker 3: Save America have been sounding this alarm, as have we
1:09:26
Speaker 3: at Acronym for a while, about really the unprecedented spending
1:09:31
Speaker 3: the Trump campaign has been doing online. As of right now,
1:09:36
Speaker 3: the Trump campaign has spent over $ 28 million on Facebook
1:09:39
Speaker 3: and Google alone. And they really are running a general
1:09:42
Speaker 3: election campaign. And we've never seen spending like this this
1:09:45
Speaker 3: early or in the ways that they're doing it. after
1:09:48
Speaker 3: sounding the alarm for a really long time, we really
1:09:51
Speaker 3: felt that it wasn't enough to just kind of be
1:09:55
Speaker 3: raising the alarm bells and talking about Trump spending, but
1:09:58
Speaker 3: to really make sure that we also on the left
1:10:02
Speaker 3: were driving information, facts, and narratives to voters in the
1:10:07
Speaker 3: battleground states every single day where they're getting their information online.
1:10:10
Speaker 3: So You know, one thing that I think can get
1:10:13
Speaker 3: easily misconstrued is that I really don't think that it's
1:10:15
Speaker 3: about matching Trump dollar for dollar the way that traditional
1:10:18
Speaker 3: political consultants think about kind of television spending or points
1:10:23
Speaker 3: in a competitive way. We really believe that even if
1:10:26
Speaker 3: Trump wasn't spending any money online because of the way
1:10:29
Speaker 3: the information ecosystem exists today. and where people get their
1:10:33
Speaker 3: information online, we should be doing this anyway. We should
1:10:36
Speaker 3: be reminding voters of the stakes of the election and
1:10:39
Speaker 3: getting them the information about the corruption in this administration
1:10:42
Speaker 3: every single day. And so our alarm is heightened by
1:10:47
Speaker 3: what Trump's campaign is doing and able to do while
1:10:50
Speaker 3: we're in a competitive primary. But honestly, this is something
1:10:53
Speaker 3: we should be doing anyway.
1:10:55
Speaker 2: Can you expand on that a little more when you
1:10:57
Speaker 2: talk about the way the information ecosystem is today? What
1:11:00
Speaker 2: do you mean?
1:11:01
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely. So for decades and decades, there were very
1:11:06
Speaker 3: few trusted channels where people went to get their news
1:11:10
Speaker 3: and information, mainly television, radio, and newspapers. And now we
1:11:15
Speaker 3: live in a digital age where media and news and
1:11:19
Speaker 3: information is distributed across so many more channels and increasingly, um,
1:11:25
Speaker 3: people of all ages and, and, and backgrounds are getting
1:11:29
Speaker 3: their information online and on their mobile phones and on
1:11:32
Speaker 3: social media. And it's become a lot more of a passive, um,
1:11:37
Speaker 3: experience where you're, you know, you're scrolling through your news
1:11:40
Speaker 3: feeds or your Instagram feeds or Twitter. Um, and, and,
1:11:44
Speaker 3: and you're really taking in what's given to you, um,
1:11:47
Speaker 3: on these platforms from your friends and, and people you
1:11:50
Speaker 3: trust or influencers. And you're not kind of going to
1:11:54
Speaker 3: specific websites or newspapers to get that information. And so
1:11:59
Speaker 3: the way that platforms like Google and Facebook have changed
1:12:02
Speaker 3: the media environment in a lot of really disruptive ways, right?
1:12:07
Speaker 3: We're seeing a lot of traditional media companies and publications
1:12:11
Speaker 3: not be able to keep up or make the revenue
1:12:13
Speaker 3: they need to stay in business. These platforms have monetized
1:12:18
Speaker 3: our attention, right? We're spending so much time on them
1:12:20
Speaker 3: that you actually really have to spend money to get
1:12:25
Speaker 3: your message across, even to people who like your Facebook
1:12:28
Speaker 3: page or follow you on Twitter. And so Trump and
1:12:33
Speaker 3: his campaign really understand that. And so they not only
1:12:36
Speaker 3: have the bully pulpit and drive a narrative that gets
1:12:39
Speaker 3: picked up by the press, but they also pour gas
1:12:43
Speaker 3: on the flames of their lies and misinformation by putting
1:12:46
Speaker 3: money behind those ads and behind that content on social
1:12:49
Speaker 3: media platforms. And for a really long time, we haven't
1:12:53
Speaker 3: been doing the same thing on our side. We've kind
1:12:56
Speaker 3: of continued to rely on the traditional media and earned
1:12:59
Speaker 3: media to drive information and make sure that folks are
1:13:04
Speaker 3: getting reached with that information. And that's just not the case.
1:13:07
Speaker 3: We have to be a lot more deliberate because of
1:13:09
Speaker 3: the way social media has changed the way we consume information.
1:13:13
Speaker 2: Let's say hypothetically, the Trump campaign was spending no money.
1:13:17
Speaker 2: And you guys or other Democratic or progressive entities were
1:13:20
Speaker 2: not spending money on the sort of digital campaign you're
1:13:22
Speaker 2: talking about. Would the information ecosystem as it exists benefit
1:13:26
Speaker 2: one side or the other?
1:13:28
Speaker 3: Absolutely. So if we weren't spending any money at all,
1:13:34
Speaker 3: if neither side were spending any money, frankly, at all
1:13:36
Speaker 3: on social media platforms, people would still be getting their
1:13:39
Speaker 3: news and information there. And so the information that they
1:13:43
Speaker 3: would be getting would would be coming from publishers and
1:13:49
Speaker 3: incumbent politicians and candidates who have large bases of support
1:13:55
Speaker 3: or followers on those platforms. So Trump has obviously invested
1:14:00
Speaker 3: heavily in Facebook since 2015, his campaign. And of course,
1:14:05
Speaker 3: being in the White House and having the bully pulpit,
1:14:07
Speaker 3: he has an enormous audience and reach, as do publishers
1:14:11
Speaker 3: like Fox News and Breitbart that amplify his message. So
1:14:15
Speaker 3: even if we weren't spending any money at all and
1:14:18
Speaker 3: they weren't spending any money at all, they would still
1:14:20
Speaker 3: be able to reach a lot of people. And, you know,
1:14:24
Speaker 3: they wouldn't be able to target people who don't like
1:14:26
Speaker 3: their pages. But because they have these built up audiences,
1:14:31
Speaker 3: when they post something and their audience sees it and
1:14:33
Speaker 3: engages with it or shares it, then it expands that reach.
1:14:37
Speaker 3: And so. putting money behind content on social media platforms
1:14:41
Speaker 3: allows you to target it and ensures you break through
1:14:43
Speaker 3: because that's how the platforms work right now. But if
1:14:46
Speaker 3: you didn't do that, you have to rely on your
1:14:48
Speaker 3: existing audience. And Trump just has a huge competitive advantage
1:14:52
Speaker 3: over the left because we don't have a candidate right now.
1:14:55
Speaker 3: I mean, we don't have a nominee. And so we
1:14:58
Speaker 3: don't have a center of gravity or leadership that's able
1:15:01
Speaker 3: to kind of drive a consistent narrative to a large
1:15:04
Speaker 3: audience the way that Trump does.
1:15:06
Speaker 2: Over the weekend, the Wall Street Journal reported that your
1:15:10
Speaker 2: effort with Acronym and Packronym is being helped by James Barnes,
1:15:15
Speaker 2: who was the Facebook employee who was embedded in the
1:15:18
Speaker 2: Trump campaign and someone the Trump campaign referred to as
1:15:20
Speaker 2: their quote-unquote MVP. Can you tell us about the decision
1:15:24
Speaker 2: to bring James on board and what, if anything, you
1:15:26
Speaker 2: could share with us that you've learned from him and
1:15:28
Speaker 2: his experience?
1:15:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, of course. So James was not an obvious candidate
1:15:34
Speaker 3: to work at Acronym, obviously. So he was a Republican.
1:15:42
Speaker 3: He is now a registered Democrat. He also was the
1:15:44
Speaker 3: Facebook employee that was embedded in the Trump campaign, as
1:15:47
Speaker 3: you mentioned, which was not his choice, per se, even
1:15:51
Speaker 3: at the time he was doing his job. There were
1:15:54
Speaker 3: he had Democratic counterparts, one of which is also full
1:15:58
Speaker 3: time at acronym and has been for a while to
1:16:00
Speaker 3: tend to Musa Patika. And she worked on the Democratic
1:16:03
Speaker 3: side and work closely with me when I was running
1:16:06
Speaker 3: digital priorities in 2016. So the way that it sort
1:16:09
Speaker 3: of came about is that James had, you know, a
1:16:12
Speaker 3: real personal motivation and reason after the election results to
1:16:19
Speaker 3: to want to think about how he could do whatever
1:16:23
Speaker 3: he could in his power and in his control and
1:16:26
Speaker 3: with the expertise he has about Facebook and political messaging
1:16:30
Speaker 3: and advertising online to get Trump out of office. And
1:16:35
Speaker 3: I think, you know, people's motivations are something I think
1:16:38
Speaker 3: about a lot, whether people are motivated by money or
1:16:40
Speaker 3: power or different things. And James really spent a lot
1:16:44
Speaker 3: of time thinking about the implications of the work he
1:16:47
Speaker 3: did and not that it was the reason that Trump won.
1:16:51
Speaker 3: I think there's so many factors involved with that win,
1:16:53
Speaker 3: but he felt a responsibility. He personally voted for Hillary Clinton.
1:16:58
Speaker 3: He was personally really, really shocked, as many of us
1:17:01
Speaker 3: were after the election, but of course had this more
1:17:04
Speaker 3: personal experience being a part of the other side. And
1:17:09
Speaker 3: while that that meant that when I first heard about James,
1:17:12
Speaker 3: I had no interest in meeting him for my own
1:17:15
Speaker 3: personal reasons of how hard I and so many of
1:17:17
Speaker 3: my colleagues and friends poured our time and our hearts
1:17:20
Speaker 3: and our lives into making sure Hillary Clinton would be
1:17:22
Speaker 3: the president. It took some time, but I was really
1:17:27
Speaker 3: interested and intrigued in in. in his background and in,
1:17:31
Speaker 3: in knowing if he was, if he was being honest, honestly,
1:17:34
Speaker 3: I was curious. And so I, you know, I decided
1:17:40
Speaker 3: that it was worth a conversation. And James and I
1:17:42
Speaker 3: had many, many, many conversations before I brought him on
1:17:44
Speaker 3: board and built a lot of trust with him and
1:17:47
Speaker 3: realized that his motivations were pure. He, he very much
1:17:50
Speaker 3: wants to do whatever he can in his control to
1:17:52
Speaker 3: get Trump out. And that is how I feel. And
1:17:55
Speaker 3: that is how everyone at acronym feels. And he brings
1:17:57
Speaker 3: a lot of really interesting experience and knowledge and expertise
1:18:03
Speaker 3: to our team. And we feel really grateful to have
1:18:05
Speaker 3: him on board.
1:18:07
Speaker 2: How would you describe to a lay person the difference
1:18:09
Speaker 2: between how Trump used Facebook in 2016 and how Democrats did?
1:18:15
Speaker 3: Well, so I would say that it comes down to
1:18:19
Speaker 3: kind of the culture of the campaigns. And something I
1:18:24
Speaker 3: talk about a lot is the similarities between President Obama,
1:18:31
Speaker 3: President Trump, and even Bernie Sanders. Each of their first
1:18:35
Speaker 3: campaigns for president, there's a common approach that they all
1:18:40
Speaker 3: took that I think is really interesting. And None of
1:18:43
Speaker 3: them were the obvious candidates. None of them had an
1:18:48
Speaker 3: obvious path. They all were disruptive to the status quo
1:18:53
Speaker 3: in a number of different ways. And they all really
1:18:56
Speaker 3: empowered risk taking and I think investment and innovation in
1:19:02
Speaker 3: digital outreach and organizing and communication to build movements, frankly.
1:19:08
Speaker 3: And I think that when you are the underdog and
1:19:11
Speaker 3: you do not have a clear path, especially as a
1:19:13
Speaker 3: candidate running for national political office, you've got to try everything.
1:19:20
Speaker 3: You've got to throw everything at the wall. And that
1:19:24
Speaker 3: is where innovation is usually born. And so I think
1:19:28
Speaker 3: that what happened on the Trump campaign is that they
1:19:31
Speaker 3: did not have a clear path. And they used every
1:19:33
Speaker 3: tool and channel available to them. And and learned very
1:19:37
Speaker 3: quickly that they could raise a lot of money and
1:19:41
Speaker 3: identify supporters when they had no idea where to start
1:19:45
Speaker 3: on Facebook. And so that meant that they invested even
1:19:48
Speaker 3: more in Facebook. And I think because so many of
1:19:53
Speaker 3: us in the Democratic Party, including myself, who worked on
1:19:55
Speaker 3: President Obama's reelection campaign on the digital team in 2012,
1:20:00
Speaker 3: because we were really known as the ones who drove
1:20:03
Speaker 3: a lot of innovation in the digital space when it
1:20:06
Speaker 3: came to campaigning, I think that we rested a little
1:20:09
Speaker 3: bit on our laurels. I think that we, you know,
1:20:13
Speaker 3: took for granted that these platforms were changing so quickly
1:20:16
Speaker 3: and that the other side, especially Trump's campaign, was, you know,
1:20:21
Speaker 3: experimenting more and taking more risks and, frankly, just pouring
1:20:24
Speaker 3: more money into these platforms. And so in large part,
1:20:29
Speaker 3: I don't think that we evolved our playbook as much
1:20:31
Speaker 3: as we could or should have. And I say that
1:20:33
Speaker 3: feeling a great deal of responsibility for my own role
1:20:35
Speaker 3: in my own position in 2016. And so I do
1:20:39
Speaker 3: think that, you know, when you suffer a great loss
1:20:42
Speaker 3: or you're an underdog, you are you're compelled out of
1:20:45
Speaker 3: necessity to try things differently. And so I don't think
1:20:49
Speaker 3: that they had any dark magic or some rocket science strategy.
1:20:55
Speaker 3: I just think that they needed to take risks, and
1:20:58
Speaker 3: then they put money behind the things that they found
1:21:00
Speaker 3: that were working. And that ended up giving them somewhat
1:21:04
Speaker 3: of a competitive advantage.
1:21:06
Speaker 2: Over the last few months, I guess, there's been this
1:21:09
Speaker 2: larger conversation among Democrats and progressives about Facebook advertising sort
1:21:15
Speaker 2: of sparked by Facebook's decision to not fact check the
1:21:19
Speaker 2: ads from politicians. So you believe that Trump is more
1:21:23
Speaker 2: likely to lie and Facebook's going to let him do it.
1:21:25
Speaker 2: And then you and I sit here and talk about A,
1:21:28
Speaker 2: Trump's spending advantage on Facebook and B, the innovations that
1:21:31
Speaker 2: they made in 2016. It sounds appealing to some that
1:21:37
Speaker 2: Facebook would follow Twitter's lead and ban political advertising. You
1:21:41
Speaker 2: have been a very outspoken uh, opponent of that idea.
1:21:45
Speaker 2: Can you explain to why Facebook, uh, banning political ads
1:21:49
Speaker 2: would be bad, would help Trump and hurt Democrats?
1:21:52
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely. And I want to, I want to start
1:21:55
Speaker 3: and be really, really clear that, um, I think one
1:21:57
Speaker 3: of the biggest dangers and threats to our democracy and
1:22:00
Speaker 3: certainly to, um, Democrats prospect of taking back power and
1:22:05
Speaker 3: getting Trump out of office next November is, is the
1:22:08
Speaker 3: spread of misinformation and lies and, and the, um, The
1:22:14
Speaker 3: way that misinformation is spreading is incredibly complicated. It is
1:22:18
Speaker 3: a complicated problem. And so it's going to require complicated,
1:22:22
Speaker 3: nuanced solutions. And so I think while everybody is quick
1:22:25
Speaker 3: to find a silver bullet to make sure that we
1:22:29
Speaker 3: are regulating and eliminating the spread of misinformation online, it's
1:22:34
Speaker 3: unfortunately not going to be as simple as any one
1:22:37
Speaker 3: policy change, mostly because a lot of misinformation spreads organically.
1:22:42
Speaker 3: in ways that I just described with channels and brands
1:22:46
Speaker 3: and candidates who have really large followings on these social
1:22:49
Speaker 3: media platforms. They don't even need to put money behind
1:22:53
Speaker 3: lies to really get those to spread because oftentimes it
1:22:56
Speaker 3: starts with a meme or it starts being seeded out
1:22:59
Speaker 3: by a network of organizers online and then it spreads
1:23:03
Speaker 3: like wildfire because it drives so much engagement. So One
1:23:07
Speaker 3: thing that's really important to note is that even if
1:23:10
Speaker 3: all of the social media platforms and technology platforms like
1:23:13
Speaker 3: Google and Facebook banned political advertising on their platforms, it
1:23:18
Speaker 3: would not stop the spread of misinformation on their platforms.
1:23:22
Speaker 3: I think that's really important to note. So when Twitter
1:23:25
Speaker 3: came out in a very, you know. Righteous public way
1:23:28
Speaker 3: about banning political ads. Number one, most political advertisers and
1:23:32
Speaker 3: campaigns do not spend money or significant sums of money
1:23:35
Speaker 3: on Twitter because it's really an influencer space. You can
1:23:38
Speaker 3: influence a narrative. You can you can drive a narrative there,
1:23:41
Speaker 3: but you're not really reaching most of the American people.
1:23:44
Speaker 3: That's not where they're spending their time. And so it
1:23:46
Speaker 3: didn't hit their bottom line. And yet it made them,
1:23:49
Speaker 3: you know, it was pretty much, I think, a very
1:23:52
Speaker 3: positive move from them from a PR perspective. But it
1:23:55
Speaker 3: applied pressure on platforms that are much more powerful than
1:23:59
Speaker 3: Twitter at reaching voters and reaching people across this country. So,
1:24:05
Speaker 3: you know, what Google has done now in... in essentially
1:24:09
Speaker 3: limiting targeting capabilities in different tools for political advertisers. One, it, again,
1:24:16
Speaker 3: won't eliminate misinformation or the spread of misinformation across Google
1:24:20
Speaker 3: channels and properties and ad networks. And two, it will
1:24:27
Speaker 3: also have a really negative and potentially dangerous impact on
1:24:32
Speaker 3: the ability for grassroots organizations and campaigns to communicate build
1:24:37
Speaker 3: and communicate with their supporters to raise money online. Every
1:24:44
Speaker 3: ad on Facebook that is an online fundraising appeal from
1:24:49
Speaker 3: a small or insurgent candidate or campaign, those are tagged
1:24:55
Speaker 3: as political ads. So it's really important that people understand
1:25:00
Speaker 3: that You know, the broad still still shape shifting definition
1:25:06
Speaker 3: of political ads as defined by these platforms that are
1:25:08
Speaker 3: not regulated. And also, you know, how how political ads
1:25:12
Speaker 3: are being used to really drive grassroots support and fundraising,
1:25:17
Speaker 3: which essentially is democratizing our campaigns more than we'd seen
1:25:21
Speaker 3: before before those existed. So it just I think that
1:25:26
Speaker 3: it is a complicated problem that requires complicated solutions. And
1:25:28
Speaker 3: I think people it makes sense that people are very,
1:25:31
Speaker 3: very quick to try to, you know, lobby or demand
1:25:34
Speaker 3: what sounds like a silver bullet solution, but it's just not.
1:25:38
Speaker 3: And so more than anything else, what we wanted to
1:25:39
Speaker 3: do was try to provide some context and nuance to
1:25:42
Speaker 3: that conversation that. Yes, we need to get rid of
1:25:45
Speaker 3: misinformation online. That's going to take a lot of work
1:25:49
Speaker 3: and a lot of time and a lot of thoughtful discussion.
1:25:53
Speaker 3: One thing that Facebook could do immediately is close their
1:25:56
Speaker 3: loophole that allows politicians to lie in advertisements. So no
1:26:02
Speaker 3: other political advertiser, including Acronym and Pacronym, our organizations, are
1:26:06
Speaker 3: able to lie. We are beholden to being fact-checked for
1:26:09
Speaker 3: every advertisement we place on those platforms. We believe that
1:26:13
Speaker 3: candidates and political elected officials should be held to that
1:26:16
Speaker 3: very same standard. And that is a very simple loophole
1:26:19
Speaker 3: that Facebook could close that they're unwilling to do. And
1:26:22
Speaker 3: I think that's also adding to this debate.
1:26:25
Speaker 2: The way I've tried to explain this to people in
1:26:28
Speaker 2: a way that I think is less eloquent than yours was,
1:26:30
Speaker 2: but is that Facebook or Google or whoever else banning
1:26:35
Speaker 2: political ads would limit the ability of the Democratic nominee
1:26:38
Speaker 2: to respond to the information that's already spreading like wildfire
1:26:42
Speaker 2: on these platforms. Yeah.
1:26:44
Speaker 3: And it would limit their ability to raise grassroots dollars
1:26:47
Speaker 3: to be able to compete with Trump's war chest and infrastructure.
1:26:53
Speaker 3: That's really equally important to me as getting information and
1:26:57
Speaker 3: facts to voters at the same clip as they are
1:26:59
Speaker 3: spreading lies and misinformation is the fact that We are
1:27:05
Speaker 3: the party of an incredibly diverse and extraordinary electorate. We
1:27:12
Speaker 3: have power in numbers on our side if we can
1:27:15
Speaker 3: communicate to them and turn them out in the election
1:27:18
Speaker 3: next year. And that also means getting our candidate the
1:27:22
Speaker 3: resources that they need to compete. And so I think
1:27:24
Speaker 3: that's just an important piece of the conversation that's been
1:27:26
Speaker 3: missing as well.
1:27:28
Speaker 2: I'm going to tee you up to pitch our listeners
1:27:33
Speaker 2: to support your efforts. But in doing so, can you
1:27:36
Speaker 2: tell us the scariest thing that you've seen the Trump
1:27:39
Speaker 2: campaign doing on digital advertising?
1:27:42
Speaker 8: Sure.
1:27:43
Speaker 3: So our team spends way too much time focused on
1:27:48
Speaker 3: what Trump's campaign is doing online and who they're reaching
1:27:52
Speaker 3: and how. And two things give me... give me a
1:27:57
Speaker 3: great deal of anxiety. The first is for how long
1:28:01
Speaker 3: the Trump campaign has been at this work, spending money
1:28:06
Speaker 3: and collecting data about their supporters and finding other likely
1:28:10
Speaker 3: supporters in the battleground states. It's not just for fundraising
1:28:14
Speaker 3: and having a big email list to fundraise off of.
1:28:18
Speaker 3: The Trump campaign has really essentially mined an enormous amount
1:28:22
Speaker 3: of data already that is going to make them more
1:28:25
Speaker 3: effective at targeting both their supporters and turning them out,
1:28:29
Speaker 3: but also potentially spreading lies and misinformation to our potential
1:28:33
Speaker 3: supporters online. That's really hard to measure.
1:28:36
Speaker 2: And finding new supporters, right?
1:28:37
Speaker 7: Yeah.
1:28:38
Speaker 3: And finding new supporters. Absolutely. We believe, you know, I
1:28:42
Speaker 3: don't have proof to back this up, although Brad Parscale
1:28:45
Speaker 3: has been pretty transparent about it in his Fox News interviews. But,
1:28:50
Speaker 3: you know, we believe that they are actually identifying likely
1:28:52
Speaker 3: supporters and registering them. Brand new people who've never voted before,
1:28:58
Speaker 3: have never been part of the process, who are there
1:29:00
Speaker 3: registering to vote and will turn out as Trump supporters
1:29:03
Speaker 3: in states like Wisconsin and and Minnesota and Michigan that
1:29:06
Speaker 3: we know could really come down to a very small
1:29:09
Speaker 3: number of votes in the election. So that's really scary
1:29:12
Speaker 3: to me. The other thing that we're seeing that I
1:29:14
Speaker 3: think is only going to get worse over the next
1:29:18
Speaker 3: coming months is that they are targeting smaller audiences of
1:29:24
Speaker 3: voters with persuasive messages in the battleground states to build
1:29:32
Speaker 3: support for Trump among these audiences. So the examples that
1:29:35
Speaker 3: I've been giving is reaching Venezuela and expats in Florida
1:29:41
Speaker 3: with Spanish language ads about their bold position on what's
1:29:45
Speaker 3: happening in Venezuela right now, the administration's position, targeting different
1:29:50
Speaker 3: voters with messages about bills they've passed and how, you know,
1:29:54
Speaker 3: this is what it takes, like no more Mr. Nice Guy, right?
1:29:57
Speaker 3: This is how we change Washington.
1:29:59
Speaker 6: Because I think one of Trump's strongest strongest messages is
1:30:03
Speaker 6: actually the most disingenuous one he has, which is that
1:30:06
Speaker 6: he's there to drain the swamp and he is not
1:30:09
Speaker 6: emblematic of the corruption that he talks about being seen
1:30:13
Speaker 6: on both sides in D.C.
1:30:15
Speaker 3: When he is literally the most corrupt president we've ever
1:30:18
Speaker 3: had in this country. But that is a message that
1:30:21
Speaker 3: resonates with people. And it is something that they drive
1:30:23
Speaker 3: a consistent narrative around and then really kind of get
1:30:26
Speaker 3: surgical with how they communicate that to people who they
1:30:29
Speaker 3: know it will resonate with.
1:30:31
Speaker 2: Tara, thank you so much. How can our listeners support
1:30:34
Speaker 2: your efforts?
1:30:35
Speaker 3: In so many ways. So one, when we launched Four
1:30:39
Speaker 3: is Enough, we launched it through our pack. It's really
1:30:44
Speaker 3: important to us that while, of course, I fundraise to
1:30:47
Speaker 3: make sure we have the resources we need, that this
1:30:51
Speaker 3: is a space where people can get involved and contribute
1:30:54
Speaker 3: their time, their small dollar donations, and their voices. While
1:30:58
Speaker 3: we while we are in the midst of a primary.
1:31:01
Speaker 3: So for everybody who has anxiety over what Trump is
1:31:04
Speaker 3: able to do and build and the voters he's able
1:31:08
Speaker 3: to talk to right now while we're still focused on
1:31:10
Speaker 3: a primary. This is a space where you can lend
1:31:12
Speaker 3: your support. You can lend your small dollar donations. You
1:31:15
Speaker 3: can buy merchandise that we have. but also just using
1:31:19
Speaker 3: your voice and making sure that we are all in
1:31:24
Speaker 3: unison communicating as loudly and every single day we can
1:31:28
Speaker 3: about the stakes of this election and how corrupt this
1:31:32
Speaker 3: administration is and how he has broken promises to people
1:31:35
Speaker 3: that took a chance on him. And so For Is
1:31:38
Speaker 3: Enough has a simple site at pacronym.org and you can
1:31:43
Speaker 3: go there to find out more and you can buy
1:31:46
Speaker 3: information swag. We have impeachment pins and T-shirts, and we're
1:31:53
Speaker 3: going to be rolling more content out. But also, to
1:31:56
Speaker 3: your listeners in particular, because these folks are paying attention
1:32:01
Speaker 3: and they care deeply about the stakes of this election,
1:32:04
Speaker 3: is to not think that because maybe you don't live
1:32:07
Speaker 3: in a battleground state or you don't have the ability
1:32:09
Speaker 3: to write really big checks to organizations doing this work,
1:32:13
Speaker 3: is that just being out there on your own social
1:32:16
Speaker 3: media channels every day is really important. And I think
1:32:20
Speaker 3: that we have to remind people that the other side,
1:32:24
Speaker 3: they are a smaller group of voters than our base,
1:32:29
Speaker 3: but they can be louder. And that can influence the
1:32:31
Speaker 3: narrative and that can really influence the election. And so
1:32:34
Speaker 3: we've got to get really loud and we've got to
1:32:37
Speaker 3: be consistent and we've got to focus on on the
1:32:42
Speaker 3: shared mission that we all have, which is getting Donald
1:32:44
Speaker 3: Trump out of office. So would love to encourage folks
1:32:46
Speaker 3: to help donate, be a part of our campaign, but
1:32:49
Speaker 3: also just, and you can use the hashtag four is enough,
1:32:52
Speaker 3: make sure that you're talking about the stakes of this
1:32:54
Speaker 3: election every day in your own voice, because that really
1:32:57
Speaker 3: will matter.
1:32:58
Speaker 2: Tara, thank you so much. And I'm sure we'll be
1:33:01
Speaker 2: talking to you again soon as this campaign plays out.
1:33:03
Speaker 3: Thank you, Dan. And thank you so much for everything
1:33:06
Speaker 3: you guys do to keep folks informed. I really appreciate it.
1:33:13
Speaker 1: Thanks to Tara for joining us today. And happy Thanksgiving, Dan.
1:33:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, you have a great Thanksgiving, too. And happy Thanksgiving, everyone.
1:33:21
Speaker 1: All right, guys. We'll see you after the break.
1:33:23
Speaker 8: Bye, everyone.
1:33:29
Speaker 1: Pod Save America is a product of Crooked Media. The
1:33:31
Speaker 1: senior producer is Michael Martinez. Our assistant producer is Jordan Waller.
1:33:35
Speaker 1: It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin is
1:33:37
Speaker 1: our sound engineer. Thanks to Carolyn Reston, Tanya Sominator, and
1:33:41
Speaker 1: Katie Long for production support, and to our digital team,
1:33:44
Speaker 1: Elijah Cohn, Narmel Cohnian, Yale Freed, and Milo Kim, who
1:33:47
Speaker 1: film and upload these episodes as a video every week.