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"A Very Special Episode of Insurrection." · 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: On today's show, a very special episode of Insurrection gives
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: us what might have been the most shocking congressional hearing
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: in American history. That's right. Hot Takes Amy Westervelt joins
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: to talk about the Supreme Court's fuck you to the planet.
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: And Chief Take Officer Elijah Cohn has prepared a special
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: take appreciator of Republican reactions to Tuesday's hearing. But first,
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: Crooked Media has a brand new podcast out. called Imani
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: State of Mind. This is a show where psychiatrist and
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: TV personality Dr. Imani Walker and co-host comedian Meg Scoop
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Thomas normalize the conversation about mental health through insightful and
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: witty discussions about what's happening in news, pop culture, and
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: our daily lives. Get real on your relationship with yourself,
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: your parents, your friends, and so much more. Listen and
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: follow Imani State of Mind wherever you get your podcasts. Exciting. Also,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: check out this week's Offline, where we answer the question,
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: has Google created a soul? Natasha Tiku of the Washington
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: Post joins to discuss her blockbuster story of a Google
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: engineer who claims the company's artificial intelligence chatbot, Lambda, is sentient.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: This is a great conversation, Dan. If you haven't listened already,
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: you'll want to hear this one. I had not followed
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: the whole AI debate for a while.
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: Because you were Offline?
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: Because I was offline, right? And then I finally read
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: this story and then read the chats, and I went
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: down a rabbit hole. And then I did this interview. Also,
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: check out this coming Sunday's episode where I talk to
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: college student Emma Lemke about the log-off movement that she
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: started to help young people struggling with the mental health
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: effects of social media. Listen to new episodes of Offline
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: every Sunday, wherever you get your podcasts. All right. Let's
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: get to the news. On Tuesday... The January 6th committee
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: shocked the world with a surprise hearing that revealed Donald
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: Trump wanted to personally join the violent mob that stormed
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: the Capitol after being told that they were armed and dangerous.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: The star witness was Cassidy Hutchinson, the most Republican name possible.
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: Cassidy Hutchinson. She was a top aide to former White
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. And Cassidy... as promised
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: by Congressman Jamie Raskin not long ago, blew the roof
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: off the House with the most damning and potentially incriminating
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: testimony ever delivered about the current Republican frontrunner for the presidency.
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: All right, so we are going to go through the
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: five most batshit crazy moments from the hearings in a bit.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: But before we do, Dan, maybe we should explain to
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: people why Hutchinson's White House job would have allowed this
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: 25-year-old special assistant to the president to see and hear
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: so much?
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: So a couple of things here. One, the real centers
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: of power in the West Wing are the assistants. They
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: know everything. They are involved in everything. At least in
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: our White House, each and every one of them had
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: the highest security clearance available. They basically help run the place.
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: And if you want to know what's happening, you have
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: to talk to the assistants. It's also, I think, just
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: so people understand it, special assistant to the president is
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: the third highest rank that the president can give someone.
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: There are people who are assistants in the sense that
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: they assist bosses, which could be clerical work, scheduling, et cetera.
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: But special assistant to the president is an official designation.
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: It goes assistant to the president. There are like 25
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: or so of those. Deputy assistant to the president and
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: special assistant. And so that is a rank of significance.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: And I think More important than any other assistance are
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: the people who work for the chief of staff, because
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: every single decision that is made, political, legislative, scheduling, administrative,
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: national security, involves the chief of staff's office. So it
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: is not shocking to anyone, I think, who's ever worked
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: in the West Wing that this individual would be so
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: plugged in. And I think it's particularly true because In
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: this testimony, Mark Meadows seems like a largely absent doofus.
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: So if you needed to get something done in that office,
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: people were clearly going to Cassie Hutchinson. So she seemed
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: to know even more than the average assistant to the
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: chief of staff would know. So it's not surprising, I think,
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: to anyone who's worked in that building.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: And I think that I read this a couple of places.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: She was more basically the chief of staff to the
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: chief of staff. The coast to the coast? Yeah, the
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: coast to the coast. Because I think the chief of
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: staff does have some assistants that work for them but
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: they also have a chief of staff that sort of
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: runs everything. And according to people who worked in the
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: Trump White House, other Republicans, she was in every single
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: meeting that Mark Meadows was in and many meetings that
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: he wasn't in. So she was at the Oval. I mean,
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: her office was steps from the Oval. I think that's
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: why they decided to show a map of the West
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: Wing at the beginning of the hearing, just so that
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: you could see where Cassidy sat was like, next to,
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: right down the hall from the Oval, from the Chief
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: of Staff, from the Deputy Chiefs of Staff, all the
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: most senior people in the White House were right there. Okay,
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: moment number one. Hutchinson testifies about Meadows' reaction when she
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: tells him that Rudy Giuliani talked about a plan to
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: go to the Capitol on January 6th.
• 5:52
  Speaker 3: I remember leaning against the doorway and saying, I had
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: an interesting conversation with Rudy, Mark. Sounds like we're going
• 5:58
  Speaker 3: to go to the Capitol. He didn't look up from
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: his phone and said something to the effect of, there's
• 6:05
  Speaker 3: a lot going on, Cass, but I don't know. Things
• 6:08
  Speaker 3: might get real, real bad on January 6th.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: Real, real bad. In other words, not great. Not great, Dan.
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: First of all, I like that at least 15 different
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: times in her testimony, she talked about how Mark Meadows
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: refused to look up from his phone. So first of all,
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: great offline guest. I should get him. thinking about like
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: what was he just do you think he was on
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: his phone the whole time because ginny thomas wouldn't stop
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: texting him about the coup.
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah i mean maybe he's addicted to twitter maybe he's
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: setting his lineup for his fantasy basketball team i don't
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: know but he also as we know picking the right
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: instagram filter that's right we also maybe he's big into
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: tiktok but we also know that he seemed to have
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: spent 90 of his time texting the worst people in
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: the world very busy The staff of Fox, Ginny Thomas,
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: et cetera. And so, yeah, maybe that's what he was doing.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: So we now know that both Meadows and Trump had
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: advanced knowledge from multiple sources that January 6th might turn
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: violent in advance of January 6th. This includes the Capitol Police,
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: the Secret Service, various national security officials. Why is that significant?
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: Because it indicates that they knew that something bad could happen.
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: Not only did they do nothing to prevent it, They
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: actively poured gas on the fire to make it worse.
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: And that matters legally, which we'll talk about. It certainly
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: matters politically. It is just the absolutely most damning statement
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: on the kind of people they are.
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, around 9-11, everyone always talks about the
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: warning that Bush got from the intelligence agencies, like bin
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: Laden determined to strike within the U.S. This was like
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: days and days of like, hey, There's going to be violence.
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: There's going to be organized violence. There's going to be
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: people who are armed coming to Washington. You have to
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: watch out. And then Trump and Meadows just decided they
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: didn't care. They didn't care. In fact, as we'll find out,
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: we're encouraging it. OK, so moment number two, Hutchinson testifies
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: that various White House staff, but especially White House lawyers,
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: were urging speechwriters not to include language in Trump's Stop
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: the Steal rally speech that he had demanded, such as, quote,
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: We're going to march to the Capitol. and quote, I'll
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: be there with you. Here's what Hutchinson said that White
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: House counsel Pat Cipollone told her earlier.
• 8:31
  Speaker 4: Mr.
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  Speaker 3: Cipollone said something to the effect of, please make sure
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: we don't go up to the Capitol, Cassidy. Keep in
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: touch with me. We're going to get charged with every
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: crime imaginable if we make that movement happen.
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  Speaker 4: And do you remember which crimes Mr. Cipollone was concerned with?
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: In the days leading up to the 6th, we had
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: conversations about potentially obstructing justice or defrauding the electoral count.
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: Do you remember when I would get testy because the
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: White House Counsel's Office would try to make my speeches
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: less crimey?
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: I really feel like I should clear out and just
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: let you address this because you are one of the
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: most even-tempered people I know, except when speech edits come in.
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: So I'll let you address this.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: You know, here's the thing with the speech edits. You know,
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: when they come from people like you know, that you
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: know in the White House office, you know, Axelrod, you,
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: any number of people we worked with, that's one thing. Also,
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: when they come in a timely manner in the early drafts, right?
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: That's what we appreciate in the speech writing process, not
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: last minute fucking edits right before the speech. But when
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: you get all the branches of government getting involved and
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: giving you edits and they all come in late, it's
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: really annoying. But I will say that if... As annoyed
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: as I used to get about last minute speech edits
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: right before a speech after Barack Obama had already signed
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: off on what he wanted to say. if someone from
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: the when the White House Counsel's Office reached out which
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: they I cannot even remember many times when they did
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: but whenever I got an email from Greg Craig or
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: Kathy Rumler or anyone who worked in the White House
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: Counsel's Office my ears would perk up and I would
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: say okay well if the lawyers don't like this We
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: will make something work. We will make something work.
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: I mean, it is important to recognize that those were
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: always like very narrow language changes involving like the Hatch Act.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: I was just going to say they were all Hatch
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: Act stuff. So basically be like if we were writing
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: a speech for, and this is, it goes back to
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: why some people probably get annoyed that Joe Biden doesn't
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: go further on things. If you are president, there is
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: this law called the Hatch Act where you have to
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: be careful what you advocate for politically and and in
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: a partisan way in your capacity as president of the
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: United States. So if you're at a campaign rally, that's fine.
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: If you're giving an official speech, you can say like,
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: I wish Congress would send me legislation, but you can't
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: necessarily say, I wish you would all vote out the
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: Republican members of Congress because that could possibly be a
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: hatch act violation. So those were usually the lines that
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: we had to make sure not to cross and what
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: the White House counsels were.
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: Those are minor things like avoiding, basically speeding tickets, right?
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: What we're talking about here is, in the words of
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: Pat Cipollone, every crime imaginable, right? Like an active, specific
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: announcement of a crime in commission at the moment is
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: what they were referring to. And they did it anyway, right?
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: They did it anyway. They did it anyway. Or at
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: least in the case of Donald Trump, he certainly tried to,
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: which we'll get to in a second. So Cipollone was
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: just subpoenaed on Wednesday. What do you think the committee
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: is looking for from him?
• 11:44
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: Literally everything. He obviously could testify with a first-person account
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: to verify the things that Cassidy said at this hearing,
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: but also he clearly, and this is true, we've seen
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: this in other reporting, a lot of reporting Maggie Haberman
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: has done in some of these books, that Cipollone was
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: often the person trying to stop Trump and his allies
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: from committing a lot of crimes. Stopping and failing in
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: many cases, but he was constantly raising concerns The red flag.
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: So he like this is he is the John Dean,
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: to use the Watergate parallel here, who could come and
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: speak to it. And now some people will say, well,
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: he's the president's lawyer. What about attorney client privilege? But
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: he's not the president's lawyer.
• 12:26
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: He is the government's lawyer. And there have been it
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: is not a fully established principle, but it's mostly White
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: Houses operate under the idea that the White House counsel
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: and the president states do not share attorney client privilege
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: when they communicate. And that you could be compelled to
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: testify about that stuff. So he is an absolutely essential witness.
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: It is ridiculous that he, it is an act actually
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: of just pure cowardice that he has not cooperated and
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: he is not going to step up because he clearly
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: knows what the president did was wrong, was a deeply
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: dangerous person. That deeply dangerous person is planning on running
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: for president again, and he's refusing to speak out because
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: it may be He's afraid that he'll upset his MAGA
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: friends or to get fewer clients, whatever it is. But
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: it's very, very frustrating.
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there are ways to abide by the spirit of
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: the privilege law while still constructing testimony that would be
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: helpful and necessary to the committee here. The New York
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: Times reported that Cipollone and people close to him were
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: surprised that he received the subpoena because apparently he'd been
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: having informal conversations with the committee. But now they want
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: him to testify, you know, partly because of Hutchinson's testimony,
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: partly because in all of these hearings, every moment from
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: the planning of the coup, the overturning of the election,
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: wanting Pence to overturn the election, DOJ and Jeff Clark trying,
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: you know, Trump pressuring them to say that the election
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: was corrupt. Pat Cipollone was in every single one of
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: those meetings. And according to testimony from other witnesses, Cassidy
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: Hutchinson and others, in every single instance, Pat Cipollone was like, hey,
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: this is against the law, within earshot of the president
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: of the United States, who then decided to do it anyway,
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: which would then prove that the president did this knowing
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: full well that what he was doing was against the law,
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: which is what we're trying to prove here if we're
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: in a legal situation.
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: One thing that is mildly frustrating here is in the
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: world in which we imagined we existed, when someone is
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: has a subpoena delivered to them, that means that they
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: then will testify. And now we know after multiple impeachments,
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: multiple oversight investigations, these hearings, that subpoena is just basically
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: like Latin for pretty please. Like it's not clear that
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: more of a suggestion.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: Yes. Hey, please show up to Congress if you have time.
• 14:51
  Speaker 6: All right.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: Moment number three. Here's here's where shit gets really nuts.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: Hutchinson testifies that she heard Trump say the following. when
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: he was told that the rioters who showed up for
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: the Stop the Steal rally at the Ellipse were armed
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: and dangerous and were being stopped at the metal detectors
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: at the event, known as MAGs.
• 15:09
  Speaker 7: He was told again in that conversation, or was he
• 15:13
  Speaker 7: told again in that conversation, that people couldn't come through
• 15:16
  Speaker 7: the MAGs because they had weapons.
• 15:18
  Speaker 4: Correct.
• 15:19
  Speaker 7: And that people, and his response was to say they
• 15:24
  Speaker 7: can march to the Capitol from, Is it from the Ellipse?
• 15:28
  Speaker 5: Something to the effect of take the effing mags away.
• 15:31
  Speaker 5: They're not here to hurt me.
• 15:33
  Speaker 4: Let them in.
• 15:33
  Speaker 8: Let my people in.
• 15:35
  Speaker 5: They can march to the Capitol after the rally's over.
• 15:37
  Speaker 5: They can march from, they can march from the Ellipse.
• 15:39
  Speaker 5: Take the effing mags away. Then they can march to
• 15:42
  Speaker 5: the Capitol.
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: Take the fucking mags away. They're not here to hurt me.
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: And then they can march to the Capitol. Dan, I
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: am no lawyer, but, um, Do you think you're allowed
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: to send a mob of armed insurrectionists to disrupt the
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: peaceful transfer of power so long as it was to
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: make sure you had a decent-sized crowd shot on television?
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: Well, John, I'm not a lawyer either. But ultimately, it's
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: not up to you or me, people listening. There's just
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: one ponderous former judge sitting in the Department of Justice
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: who will determine whether that is a crime.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: I mean... That's just that that truly is. I know
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: we're going to focus on the steering wheel anecdote here,
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: but I think that to me, I mean, look, there's
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: plenty of evidence that we've heard already that that Trump
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: was deeply involved in the overturning the election part of
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: the coup, the fake electors getting Pence to do it,
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: the pressure on DOJ, et cetera, on the inciting violence
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: and inciting the insurrection part of the coup. I think
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: this is maybe the strongest evidence yet that Trump not
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: only knew there was an armed and dangerous crowd, but
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: thought it was fine, welcomed them to the event that
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: he spoke at, and then hoped and urged them, in fact,
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: to then march to the Capitol.
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: The phrase, they are not here to hurt me, is
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: just the absolute crystallization of Trumpism. Right, is we don't
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: give two shits about what happens to anyone else. It
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: is fine because they will not hurt me.
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: Not even my staff or my voters or my people
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: or my movement.
• 17:34
  Speaker 8: Me.
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: It's just me. It's all he has ever been about.
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: He's not fucking the leader of a movement. He's a
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: fucking selfish, egotistical asshole who only cares about himself. That
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: is it.
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: Now, look, to be fair to.
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: Merrick Garland. Obviously, we have not seen all the evidence.
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: We have not seen these witnesses under cross-examination. They have
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: to make a decision, not just do they have sufficient
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: evidence to charge Trump, but do they have sufficient evidence
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: to convict Trump? And that's always a hard thing to do.
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: But I have to say, if somehow the former president
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: of the United States can dispatch a mob he knows
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: to be violent and armed to march on the Capitol...
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: for the purpose of blocking the certification of legitimate election.
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: And then when things get violent, he pours gas on
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: the fire by tweeting about it. If that is something
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: that is not treated as a crime, that there is
• 18:33
  Speaker 2: no legal accountability for, that is just opening the door
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: to so much stuff in this country. It is just
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: giving a permission slip to the right for a violent
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: takeover of the elections again in 2025. And that is,
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: has to weigh on the decision makers at the department
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: of justice. Like even like put the optics aside, but
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: you know, whatever shit they're going to get from the
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: optics police about, you know, Joe Biden's attorney general is
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: prosecuting Joe Biden's, you know, future opponent. Fuck that. Like
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: this is a much, much more important thing and principle.
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: And it's essential that something happens here.
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: Now they will, I'm sure. Trump and the, and the,
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: and I've seen this already in the MAGA assholes will
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: say that their defense will be well in the speech.
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: He also used the word peaceful somewhere in the speech, right?
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: That's what they'll say in the rally speech. But like now,
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: you know, that was one thing. It was never believable.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: It was one thing right after it happened. Now that
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: we know all this, that he was there, That he
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: wanted them to come through the, they wanted to take
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: the mags away, that he didn't think they were going
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: to hurt him, that he still wanted an armed and
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: dangerous crowd to go to the Capitol, that he wanted
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: to join them. Now that fucking steamrolls the whole, oh,
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: I included the word peaceful once in the speech. Bullshit.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, peaceful is a poorly constructed alibi. It's
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: not evidence of innocence.
• 19:57
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: All right. Moment number four, which will surely live in infamy.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: Hutchinson testified that White House Deputy Chief of Staff Tony
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: Ornato told her the following story about what happened. when
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: Trump's driver, Secret Service agent Robert Engel, told the president
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: that he couldn't go to the Capitol.
• 20:16
  Speaker 3: The president said something to the effect of, I'm the
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: effing president, take me up to the Capitol now. To
• 20:23
  Speaker 3: which Bobby responded, sir, we have to go back to
• 20:26
  Speaker 3: the West Wing. The president reached up towards the front
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: of the vehicle to grab at the steering wheel.
• 20:35
  Speaker 4: Mr.
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: Engel grabbed his arm. said, sir, you need to take
• 20:39
  Speaker 3: your hand off the steering wheel. We're going back to
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: the West Wing. We're not going to the Capitol.
• 20:47
  Speaker 4: Mr.
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: Trump then used his free hand to lunge towards Bobby Engel.
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: And when Mr. Renato had recounted this story to me,
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: he had motioned towards his clavicles.
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: So anonymous Secret Service sources have been telling reporters that
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: this incident did not happen, exactly as Hutchinson testified. And
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: that Ornato and Engel are prepared to testify to that effect.
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: What do you think is going on here?
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: Well, three points. The first is Hutchinson didn't testify that
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: she saw this. She testified that someone told her this. Second,
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: Tony Ornato, who was a Secret Service agent who left
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: the Secret Service to accept a political job working for
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump, who has now since returned to the Secret Service.
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: According to Alyssa Farah, Trump's communications director turned, I don't know,
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: view host aspirant? I don't know. But she's been out
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: there a lot sort of explaining Cassie Hutchinson's role. But
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: she tells a story about how, she said on CNN,
• 21:49
  Speaker 2: I believe to Jake Tapper, that she knows that Tony
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: Arnotto has previously lied in order to defend Trump over
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: the– to push back against Alyssa Farah's– recounting of how
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: the Lafayette Square photo op during the 2020 protests happened.
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: And so that is a reason to question whether he
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: is doing that once again. Third, and I think most importantly,
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: who cares? This is by far the least important thing
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: that she revealed in her testimony. It does not matter.
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: It would not be part of the criminal case. Whether
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: Trump lunged for the steering wheel, whether he grabbed someone's clavicle,
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: he stumbled towards someone's clavicle, whether he simply yelled is irrelevant.
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: It is more an example of just how potentially unhinged
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: and dangerous he is and why he should not be,
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: one of the many reasons why he should not be president.
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: But the fact that cable news, Twitter, everyone is obsessing
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: about this is we are missing the forest for the
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: trees here. And I think that is a The obsession
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: with this is just an indictment of so much of
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: political media, political Twitter, what we focus on. Because it's
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: exciting and we can imagine the scene where it happens.
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: It doesn't matter. We have to focus on the criminal
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: intent of what happened and what that means for a
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: legal case and what it means politically. This thing is dumb.
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: I haven't been... I haven't... Sort of, I guess, a
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: New Year's resolution. I haven't yelled about... like really dumb
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: media coverage in a few pods, I guess. But like,
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: you know, NBC News of all places had some line
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: that was like, this chipped away at the credibility of
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: her testimony. Fuck you. No, it did not. Like you said,
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: she is recounting a story that Tony Ornato told her.
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: If he exaggerated the story or if he lied about
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: the story, that's not fucking Cassidy Hutchinson's problem. That's Tony
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: Ornato's problem. Also, like you said, it matters so little.
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: Here's what we know for sure. What the Secret Service
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: has confirmed, what Trump has said in an interview, is
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: that he wanted to go to the Capitol. We know
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: that he wanted to go to the Capitol. That is
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: not in dispute. We also know that he was angry
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: because he wasn't allowed to go to the Capitol. That
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: is not in dispute by the Secret Service, by Trump.
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: So whether he was just flailing around in the... in
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: the limo, whether he lunged, whether he made it all
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: the way to the steering wheel, which, look, is he
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: the most agile guy? I don't think so. Is he
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: known to move quickly? Not so much, but surely he
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: was screaming and yelling. I'm sure that was the case.
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: So whether he reached the clavicle or not, whether he
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: reached the steering wheel or not, does not matter a
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: fucking whit. It just doesn't matter. I mean, later, many
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: people were, you know, Cassidy Hutchinson testified, and I'm sure
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: others can account for this too, that he got mad
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: when he read the AP story about Bill Barr saying
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: there was no fraud in the election and he threw
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: his fucking burger at the wall in the White House
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: and there was ketchup all over the wall. I'm sure
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: that happened.
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: And if it didn't, who cares?
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: Again, but like how many stories do we have to
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: hear about Trump fucking losing his shit and throwing this
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: around before we realize they're probably true stories or some
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: version of it, you know? It's ridiculous. It's really, really ridiculous.
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: And like you said, I think it's another important point too.
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: Like Tony Ornato does not seem like that guy is
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: fucking on the level. Like you're in the Secret Service,
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: you leave for a political job, And Carol Lenning of
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: the Washington Post, who wrote a book both on the
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: Secret Service and helped Phil Rucker write a book on Trump,
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: has noted that Ornato and Engel were both known as
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: Trump yes-men. They were very close to Trump. They were
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: like his pals. Mike Pence's aide didn't want to send
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: Mike Pence in the motorcade leaving the Capitol during the
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: vote count because he was worried that That Tony Ornato
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: and his goons would like take Mike Pence away somewhere
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: and actually like put him at risk. So like that's
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: how little people trust Tony Ornato within the Trump.
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: I mean, that is a wild, wild anecdote.
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: I mean. And look, and the Secret Service initially responded
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: to that anecdote. Oh, that's that's that's not a story
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: we had heard before. So, like, I don't know that
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: we I don't know right now how much we can
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: trust trust with the Secret Service.
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: I mean, I think we I mean, you and I
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: should probably at least just take one second to note
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: that we obviously worked with, you know, and we're around
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: Secret Service agents all the time. And the overwhelmed like
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: these are the exception, not the rule. The overwhelming majority
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: of them are just basically patriots who work for either
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: president without, you know, there was never a term we
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: were worried about them taking us somewhere if we got
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: in the wrong car.
• 26:36
  Speaker 8: Right.
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: They 100 percent. But, you know, Trump corrupts everyone around him.
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: And so do I believe that there's a few Secret
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: Service agents that Trump corrupted? Yeah, of course. Of course.
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: All right. One last moment from the testimony, which again
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: shows the unbreakable bond between Donald Trump and his vice president.
• 26:53
  Speaker 5: I remember Pat saying something to the effect of, Mark,
• 26:56
  Speaker 5: we need to do something more. They're literally calling for
• 27:00
  Speaker 5: the vice president to be effing hung. And Mark had
• 27:04
  Speaker 5: responded something to the effect of, You heard him, Pat.
• 27:07
  Speaker 5: He thinks Mike deserves it. He doesn't think they're.
• 27:09
  Speaker 4: Doing anything wrong.
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: Seems like a cool boss, huh? I noticed that Tony
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: Ornato and all his sources didn't push back on that one.
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'm really struggling with the fact that we've
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: been talking about the hang Mike Pence thing for a
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: year and a half now. And every time it's funny.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: I know it should not. I know it should not
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: be funny. It should not be funny, but it is.
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: But for some reason, I don't know what it is
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: about Mike Pence. That is the only, he is the
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: only person whose murder is socially acceptable to laugh at.
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: It's just everyone laughs. Democrats, Republicans, some of the media
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: people can't keep a straight face when they think about it.
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: And it's just, I don't know what to say, but it's.
• 27:52
  Speaker 7: You know, it's.
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: Look, it's a horrifying thing that the president of the
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: United States said. It's horrifying. No one says it's okay.
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: It's horrifying that there was a fucking violent mob that
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: was calling for the hanging of the vice president of
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: the United States. That's horrifying. But, you know, Trump and
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: Mike Pence, no love lost. No love lost there.
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: In the world in which Trump is the 2024 Republican nominee,
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: just imagine the thought process for potential vice presidents.
• 28:20
  Speaker 8: Yeah.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: Like, I'd like to fly on Air Force Two, and
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: I'm willing to risk murder for it.
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Like on one hand, I might get to be
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: vice president. On the other hand, if things go south,
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: he might toss me to a violent mob. So, you know,
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: so they've got some pros and cons.
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: A few more questions before we move on. How much
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: do you think Hutchinson's testimony affects the legal, the potential
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: legal case against Trump?
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: Once again, you and I are not.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: We got we got potential seditious conspiracy, incitement to violence,
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: obstruction of a congressional proceeding and conspiring to defraud the U.S.
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: That's what we got. That's the constellation of potential charges.
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: I mean, you and I, as you pointed out, not lawyers.
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: All of the lawyers on Twitter seem to think that
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: it is quite damning for Trump. And if this evidence
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: were to hold up under cross-examination and is confirmed by
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: other testimony, the pressure on Merrick Garland to do something
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: is incredibly high. All of the defenses that Trump's aides
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: and allies have previously offered are eviscerated by Hutchinson's testimony.
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: Here's a quote. The department is clearly looking into this,
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: and this hearing definitely gave investigators a lot to chew on.
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: From former Attorney General Bill Barr to the New York Times.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: That's when you know you're in the shit right there.
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: You got Billy Barr out there telling you that there
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: was a lot to chew on. I mean, yeah, look, I,
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: like I said, I think that on the, you know,
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: there's two parts of the two parts of the coup,
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: there's the overturn in the election part and there's the, uh,
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: sicking the violent mob on the, on Congress part. And
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: I think so far, a lot of these hearings have been, uh, lending, uh,
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: a lot of evidence on the first and not the,
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: and not the second. And I think the surprise that
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: Cassidy Hutchinson's testimony certainly, um, gives investigators to a lot
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: to chew on in the words of Bill Barr on, um,
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: whether Trump's words and actions, uh, incited violence, uh, which
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: of course would be a crime. So whether there'll be
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: able to, like you said, there's difference between indictments and convictions.
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: And if you're going after a potential, a former and
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: potential future president, you gotta, you gotta feel pretty strongly
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: that you can get a conviction, but, um, but yeah,
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: I mean, I do want to talk about the political
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: case against Trump, if there is any justice in this world,
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: because like we said last time, there's not just, uh,
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: you know, lawyers and juries that we have to think about,
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: but there's a larger jury, which is, uh, the American electorate, uh, which, uh,
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: is going to have a chance to, uh, render their
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: verdict on Donald Trump potentially in 2024, starting with Republican voters. Um,
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: Do you think there's enough new and explosive information here
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: to strengthen the political case against Trump? Certainly not among us.
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: I think we are decided. You and I have rendered
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: our verdict, and probably every single person listening to this
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: podcast has done the same. But for those who are
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: still thinking about voting for Donald Trump again if he runs,
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: what do you think?
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: You mean folks like Rusty Bowers of Arizona?
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. Someone go interview Rusty Bowers. What did Rusty
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: Bowers do? think about Cassidy Hutchinson's testimony. He's still thinking
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: about voting for Donald Trump?
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: On paper, this should be so damning that no one
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: would ever publicly support Trump ever again. That even being
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: associated with him would make you persona non grata in
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: polite society. That's obviously not going to happen. The overwhelming
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: majority of Trump's base is going to stick with him.
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: But I don't think that's how we should judge the
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: success of this. We should judge the success of whether
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: it It does two things. One, helps people understand who
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: Trump is, what he did, and just how dangerous he
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: was and is. And in the polling thus far, there's
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: evidence that it's working. In some of the polling we've seen,
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: the number of people who believe Trump should be charged
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: with a crime has gone up, not down, since this
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: hearing started. Support for these hearings and this investigation has
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: gone up, not down, since they started. And in the
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: number of people who support Trump, it's not a huge number,
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: but it includes two in 10 Republicans think Trump should
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: be charged with a crime. And that is a big deal.
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: In order to win, Trump has to hold his base.
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: And so I do think it could change the calculus
• 32:35
  Speaker 2: about whether Trump runs, the appetite for him to run
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: within the Republican Party, were he not to be charged
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: with a crime. And- That matters. But I think we,
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: the point of these hearings and the point of what
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: Merrick Garland does is about Trump, what he did. The
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: rest of us have to make a case. It's not
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: just about Trump in the past. It's about Trump, the
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: Republicans in the future. Because if we just simply swap
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: one insurrectionist for another within the Republican Party and in
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: the White House, then we're in huge trouble. And so
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: that is the one thing that I think really comes
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: out of it. Because as you say, the The broader
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: jury will weigh in 2024, but also there's another trial
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: in 2022. And every Republican, not named Cheney, Kinzinger, and Romney,
• 33:22
  Speaker 2: continues to stand with Trump. And not just tolerate him,
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: to enthusiastically seek his support, to brand themselves as Trump Republicans,
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: to beg him to campaign for them. And if there
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: is no political price for that in this election, it
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: will embolden him, it will embolden the Republicans in 2024.
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: I was talking to a democratic strategist who was, um,
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: made the point that, you know, obviously Terry McAuliffe failed
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: to tie Glenn Youngkin to Donald Trump famously in that
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: Virginia gubernatorial race. But he also pointed out, he's like,
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: that wasn't during the January 6th hearings. He's like, imagine
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: if the election in Virginia was in a couple of
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: weeks and Glenn Youngkin was being asked every single day,
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: what do you think about Donald Trump? Are you still support,
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: you know, are you supportive of Donald Trump? Are you still,
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: and And I think it would, who knows what would
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: have happened, but it would have been much more difficult.
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: And I do think like every single candidate up in
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: a competitive district or state in 22 is going to
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: have to answer for the fact that they are still
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: embracing this guy who his former employees are now testifying,
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: wanted to join the violent mob that attacked the Capitol,
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: knowing that they were armed and dangerous. That is who
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: you're embracing. If you're a Republican candidate in 2020, I.
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: Think this is one very important political element to Cassidy
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: Hutchinson's testimony, which is it ties Trump very specifically to
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: the violence that happened on January 6th and the fact
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: that he wanted to join. He wanted to lead that mob.
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: He wanted them to follow him. I imagine quite slowly
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: on the walk to the Capitol. And like we know
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: in polling that even though 70 percent of Republicans think
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: the election was stolen in some way, shape or form.
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: We know that majorities of Republicans oppose these hearings. We
• 35:09
  Speaker 2: do know that eight in 10 Republicans oppose what happened
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: on January 6th. And so the fact that Trump was
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: involved in that is very, very damning.
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: Last question before we move on, just sort of a
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: curiosity that we've all had since these hearings, like why,
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: obviously this was like, you know, bombshell explosive testimony, but
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: why did they hold the surprise hearing when they had
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: just announced that they were done until after the July
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: 4th holiday. What do you think the reason for the
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: urgency of the hearing was?
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: Well, I think we know a little bit about this
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: from some of the reporting and some of Cassie Hutchinson's
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: colleagues talking to the press, but it seems to be
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: a couple of things has happened. She has been cooperating
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: clearly very fully with the committee for a long period
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: of time. She recently switched attorneys and the attorney she
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: had previously was, I think more sort of like mobbed
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: up in Trump world. And the new one is I've,
• 36:04
  Speaker 2: A conservative Republican, I think he worked for Jeff Sessions previously,
• 36:07
  Speaker 2: but I think his take is representing his client very
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: specifically and not the former president. And I think there
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: was maybe some reaction to some of the criticism she
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: got from the right after her videotape testimony played such
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: a prominent role in the previous hearing and wanted to
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: get out there and tell her story. And I think
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: two points of urgency to move forward. One is perhaps
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: she did not want to spend three or four weeks
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: waiting for congressional recess to end to actually tell that story,
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: to sort of just sit out there unable to defend herself.
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: And the second one from the committee, I think, was
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: previewed at the end when Liz Cheney brought up the
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: fact that some of their witnesses have received pressure from
• 36:52
  Speaker 2: Trump associates saying things Like he's paying attention. He reads
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: the transcripts before they testify. And Punchbowl today reported that
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: one of the text messages that Liz Cheney showed on
• 37:04
  Speaker 2: the screen was to Hutchinson. Now, any threat that includes
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump reading transcripts is probably an idle threat. But
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: even still, that is witness tampering, plain and simple.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: Just fucking mobbed up assholes right to the end.
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: Just the dumbest mobsters, right? It's like.
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: Dumbest mobsters.
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: It's like Sopranos cosplay, but just with the worst possible writing.
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: When we come back, Dan talks to Amy Westervelt of
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: the Crooked Pod Hot Take about the next steps on
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: climate after the Supreme Court's EPA decision.
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: This morning, the Supreme Court issued its last major ruling
• 37:51
  Speaker 2: of this session, and it was yet another shitburger. In
• 37:54
  Speaker 2: a 6-3 ruling, the conservative majority wrote that President Biden
• 37:57
  Speaker 2: does not have the power to enforce emission standards through
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: the EPA. Joining us to discuss the future of climate
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: change policy in this country is the host of Crooked's
• 38:04
  Speaker 2: fantastic climate podcast, Hot Take, Amy Westervelt. Amy, welcome to
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: the pod.
• 38:09
  Speaker 7: Thanks.
• 38:09
  Speaker 4: Thanks. Thanks for having me on this great day.
• 38:13
  Speaker 2: Of course. We're just running every day. Every pod is
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: like another guest asked to explain something terrible to people.
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: But that's why you're here. So we've known this really
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: was coming for a while. Can you just help walk
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: through what the court did and where this case came
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: from for our listeners who may have been preoccupied with
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: the other horrendous decisions of this Supreme Court over the
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: last seven days?
• 38:37
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 38:37
  Speaker 6: So first of all, I have to say that actually,
• 38:41
  Speaker 6: I was relieved when I saw this decision because it
• 38:44
  Speaker 6: could have been so much worse.
• 38:47
  Speaker 4: It's actually quite narrow.
• 38:48
  Speaker 6: It focuses specifically on this section of the Clean Air
• 38:52
  Speaker 6: Act that has to do with whether or not the
• 38:54
  Speaker 6: EPA can regulate emissions beyond the fence line of power plants.
• 38:59
  Speaker 6: So whether it has authority beyond just kind of saying
• 39:04
  Speaker 6: one power plant at a time.
• 39:06
  Speaker 4: What the emissions can be from each place.
• 39:09
  Speaker 6: So he, you know, they definitely got into basically saying,
• 39:13
  Speaker 6: don't you dare implement that clean power plan. But it
• 39:17
  Speaker 6: still leaves quite a bit of authority for both the
• 39:20
  Speaker 6: EPA and other governmental agencies to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
• 39:26
  Speaker 6: That is preserved, Whether or not it happens is another question. Frankly,
• 39:32
  Speaker 6: the Supreme Court should have never taken this case. It
• 39:35
  Speaker 6: is a case about the Clean Power Plan, which was
• 39:37
  Speaker 6: never implemented. The entire major questions doctrine that got the
• 39:42
  Speaker 6: court to take this up, which is this idea that
• 39:45
  Speaker 6: When there's something passed by an agency that has a
• 39:48
  Speaker 6: big impact politically or economically, the court can weigh in.
• 39:52
  Speaker 6: That was introduced into this whole story by Scott Pruitt
• 39:57
  Speaker 6: under Trump.
• 39:59
  Speaker 4: Scott Pruitt, before.
• 40:00
  Speaker 6: He was EPA director under Trump, was the head of
• 40:04
  Speaker 6: the Republican Attorneys General Association and as such.
• 40:08
  Speaker 4: Mounted this case.
• 40:10
  Speaker 6: So, like, this is, you know, the coal industry's last
• 40:14
  Speaker 6: ditch effort to try to stave off specifically CO2 emissions regulations.
• 40:22
  Speaker 4: And, you know, like I said, I was relieved by
• 40:24
  Speaker 4: the ruling.
• 40:25
  Speaker 6: However, I think that, like, had it not been the
• 40:27
  Speaker 6: weirdest case for them ever to even take up, it
• 40:31
  Speaker 6: would have been worse. And I think we can expect
• 40:33
  Speaker 6: that in some case in the near future.
• 40:35
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: So I'm relieved to hear you say it could have
• 40:38
  Speaker 2: been worse because recently these days it's just been worse.
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: So that's good. And the Scott Pruitt thing is notable
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: because conflict of interest are very in vogue at the
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: Supreme Court these days. But what is the specific impact
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: of this decision on what the Biden administration can do
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: and how does it affect, if at all, any of
• 40:59
  Speaker 2: the legislative proposals that are sort of circling around Joe
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: Manchin's houseboat right now?
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 41:05
  Speaker 6: So, I mean, what it says is that you have
• 41:08
  Speaker 6: to pass legislative proposals if you want to do this.
• 41:12
  Speaker 6: It doesn't necessarily preclude the EPA from using other sections
• 41:17
  Speaker 6: of even the Clean Air Act to get at this. So,
• 41:19
  Speaker 6: for example, Section 115 says that if there is an
• 41:24
  Speaker 6: international agreement around pollutants, there is, that, you know, that
• 41:32
  Speaker 6: the EPA... has the authority to regulate U.S. sources of
• 41:36
  Speaker 6: those emissions. So that is something that has not yet
• 41:39
  Speaker 6: been invoked.
• 41:40
  Speaker 4: It could be.
• 41:42
  Speaker 6: The EPA could also use the Toxic Substances Control Act
• 41:46
  Speaker 6: to get at greenhouse gas emissions. There's a petition for
• 41:49
  Speaker 6: them to do that right now. The EPA is already
• 41:52
  Speaker 6: authorized to regulate particulate matter, which, guess what, is created
• 41:56
  Speaker 6: by the same thing that generates greenhouse gases.
• 41:59
  Speaker 4: The combustion of fossil fuels.
• 42:01
  Speaker 6: So I really like want to discourage people from feeling like, oh,
• 42:05
  Speaker 6: now we can't do anything about climate change.
• 42:06
  Speaker 4: That is not true. That is not what this ruling says.
• 42:10
  Speaker 4: There is still plenty.
• 42:11
  Speaker 6: Of authority, both at the executive branch within Congress and
• 42:16
  Speaker 6: within the regulatory agencies to do a multitude of things
• 42:19
  Speaker 6: about this.
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: And is this and so the efforts that a lot
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: of states, you know, specifically California, Washington and Oregon have
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: undertaken or should also be able to continue to proceed
• 42:30
  Speaker 2: under this?
• 42:31
  Speaker 4: Absolutely.
• 42:31
  Speaker 6: Yes.
• 42:32
  Speaker 4: The states are fine.
• 42:33
  Speaker 6: California just passed a $ 50 billion climate package and that
• 42:37
  Speaker 6: is moving forward. And, you know, I mean, there's been
• 42:42
  Speaker 6: some various analyses that have shown that the market on
• 42:45
  Speaker 6: its own has already driven like the, the emissions reductions
• 42:49
  Speaker 6: that we would have seen from the clean power plan.
• 42:52
  Speaker 6: So it's hilarious to me that the people that are
• 42:55
  Speaker 6: always squawking about the free market are the ones that are,
• 42:58
  Speaker 6: that are fighting the, regulations that would actually be consistent
• 43:01
  Speaker 6: with where the market is going on this.
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: You mean the free market people who also adamantly oppose
• 43:07
  Speaker 2: ending the tax subsidies for highly profitable oil companies, those people?
• 43:10
  Speaker 4: Yes. Yes. Correct. Those same people. Yeah.
• 43:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 43:14
  Speaker 6: So, I mean, again, like, obviously it's not great, but it, um,
• 43:18
  Speaker 6: you know, I saw people being like, they're going to
• 43:20
  Speaker 6: make it illegal to regulate CO2.
• 43:22
  Speaker 4: No, that has not happened.
• 43:24
  Speaker 6: So, you know, um, We live to breathe another day.
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: We live to.
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: Breathe polluted air another day on a rapidly dying planet.
• 43:33
  Speaker 7: Yes.
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: This is an unusual experience for us in recent weeks
• 43:39
  Speaker 2: to talk about Supreme Court decisions that are not as
• 43:41
  Speaker 2: bad as they could have possibly been. So I'm struggling
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: with this element of optimism, personally, which is sort of
• 43:49
  Speaker 2: my nature anyway.
• 43:50
  Speaker 4: Optimism is not my usual mode. So I, too, feel.
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: Out of place. That says a lot right there. But
• 43:57
  Speaker 2: you indicated earlier that they could strike down other authorities.
• 44:04
  Speaker 2: Are there any sort of breadcrumbs or canaries in the
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: coal mine in any of the opinions here that suggest
• 44:10
  Speaker 2: that that could be in the offing?
• 44:13
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 44:14
  Speaker 6: I think that EPA is going to struggle with particularly
• 44:20
  Speaker 6: anything that has to do with generation of power.
• 44:22
  Speaker 4: So they seem to be.
• 44:24
  Speaker 6: Drawing this line between you know, putting a cap on
• 44:28
  Speaker 6: emissions and dictating to the power sector what type of
• 44:33
  Speaker 6: power they can generate. So I think that no matter,
• 44:38
  Speaker 6: I honestly think that they should probably just give up
• 44:40
  Speaker 6: trying to use the Clean Air Act. The Clean Air
• 44:42
  Speaker 6: Act is extremely vague. Like everyone has known that forever, right?
• 44:46
  Speaker 4: It's very, very vague.
• 44:47
  Speaker 6: If we could possibly, you know, reauthorize the Clean Air
• 44:51
  Speaker 6: Act with some specifics around.
• 44:53
  Speaker 4: This, that would be amazing, but Joe Manchin.
• 44:56
  Speaker 6: So, you know, I think that the possibility of doing
• 45:01
  Speaker 6: that is probably pretty slim.
• 45:03
  Speaker 4: I actually think.
• 45:05
  Speaker 6: That the Toxic Substances Control Act has much more explicit
• 45:09
  Speaker 6: language that would allow them to get out of this.
• 45:14
  Speaker 6: I think, you know, yeah, I honestly, I think that
• 45:19
  Speaker 6: anything they try to do around specifically discouraging coal is
• 45:26
  Speaker 6: going to be.
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: Tough to get past these guys.
• 45:30
  Speaker 6: I also think there was this weird section of the
• 45:32
  Speaker 6: ruling where Roberts basically acted like the EPA was overstepping
• 45:37
  Speaker 6: its bounds because they're not tasked with being in charge
• 45:41
  Speaker 6: of the energy system in the US. So to me,
• 45:44
  Speaker 6: I was like, oh, should DOE be getting more involved
• 45:47
  Speaker 6: than Roberts?
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: Because.
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: It.
• 45:50
  Speaker 4: Seemed to be like.
• 45:53
  Speaker 6: A bone of contention for them that like, oh, well,
• 45:56
  Speaker 6: if you're talking about trying to transition the power system,
• 46:00
  Speaker 6: that belongs to the DOE and or to Congress to
• 46:04
  Speaker 6: authorize some sort of other legislation.
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: Can you say a little more about what using the
• 46:10
  Speaker 2: Toxic Substances Act would mean? Would that require someone in
• 46:13
  Speaker 2: the government declaring CO2 to be a toxic substance?
• 46:18
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 46:18
  Speaker 6: So there's a petition at the EPA right now, it
• 46:20
  Speaker 6: was filed a couple of weeks ago, asking them to
• 46:24
  Speaker 6: make a determination on whether greenhouse gases pose a risk
• 46:28
  Speaker 6: to human health or the environment. I think it's very
• 46:31
  Speaker 6: unlikely that a Biden EPA will come out and say,
• 46:35
  Speaker 6: greenhouse gases pose no threat to human health or the environment.
• 46:41
  Speaker 6: So I assume there's going to be some kind of
• 46:44
  Speaker 6: determination made there. They have 60 days to reply. And
• 46:48
  Speaker 6: the Toxic Substances Control Act was just strengthened with bipartisan
• 46:52
  Speaker 6: support in 2016 to explicitly say that they must make
• 46:57
  Speaker 6: decisions about how to reduce the risk of a toxic.
• 47:01
  Speaker 4: Substance to human health and the environment.
• 47:04
  Speaker 6: Absent political concerns or financial concerns. That's huge because that
• 47:10
  Speaker 6: is the thing that they referenced over and over again
• 47:12
  Speaker 6: in this ruling is that This would have major economic implications.
• 47:17
  Speaker 6: This would increase the cost of energy for Americans across
• 47:21
  Speaker 6: the board. There are a lot of political considerations to
• 47:25
  Speaker 6: take into account here. So this would, you know, using
• 47:28
  Speaker 6: Tosca would remove like half of Roberts, you know, justification
• 47:33
  Speaker 6: in this ruling.
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: That's fascinating. Last question for you. We're getting to the
• 47:39
  Speaker 2: end of this legislative session. This, you know, Democratic majorities
• 47:42
  Speaker 2: are at risk Do you have any insight or hope
• 47:46
  Speaker 2: or optimism that I'm really riding this optimism thing, any
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: hope or optimism that Democrats can get something done on
• 47:53
  Speaker 2: climate legislatively before the end of the year?
• 47:57
  Speaker 4: Oh, at the federal level, maybe. I mean, it'd be great.
• 48:02
  Speaker 6: We could we could definitely get this determination from Tosca
• 48:05
  Speaker 6: by the end of the year.
• 48:06
  Speaker 4: They have to reply.
• 48:07
  Speaker 6: You know, that could trigger rulemaking.
• 48:11
  Speaker 4: Which would be good.
• 48:12
  Speaker 6: I also think they also, they already agreed to tighten
• 48:18
  Speaker 6: the regulations on particulate matter. So this is something that
• 48:20
  Speaker 6: Scott Pruitt stopped under Trump. The Clean Air Advisory Board
• 48:26
  Speaker 6: published their study anyway to say like, we really need
• 48:29
  Speaker 6: to restrict this more. And now the Biden EPA has said, yeah,
• 48:33
  Speaker 6: actually we do. We're going to tighten regulations on particulate matter.
• 48:36
  Speaker 6: So that's actually, you know, I know it's not, we
• 48:39
  Speaker 6: don't call it climate, but very much it would have
• 48:42
  Speaker 6: that impact.
• 48:44
  Speaker 4: And that is moving forward. That should be done by
• 48:46
  Speaker 4: the end of the year. So those are a few things.
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: That's good.
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: This is a shockingly optimistic, optimism-fueled interview. Okay. Actual last
• 48:55
  Speaker 2: final question now. If there are people who do not
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: share your optimism and now my optimism about this, but
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: are just generally angry at the court, and want to
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: do something to help with climate? Do you have any
• 49:06
  Speaker 2: place you would direct them to go to give their
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: time or money or energy to?
• 49:11
  Speaker 6: I would say, well, there's this group called, let's see,
• 49:18
  Speaker 6: it's the Climate Protection and Restoration Initiative. They're the ones
• 49:21
  Speaker 6: behind this EPA petition on TSCA. I think that what
• 49:25
  Speaker 6: they're doing is really interesting. And they have the support
• 49:27
  Speaker 6: of James Hansen, who's the climate scientist who kind of
• 49:31
  Speaker 6: first brought this problem to the masses to begin with.
• 49:34
  Speaker 6: And also Richard Headey, who's the guy that did the
• 49:37
  Speaker 6: carbon majors report, which is that report that's like 70
• 49:39
  Speaker 6: companies are responsible for, you know, 80% of emissions or
• 49:43
  Speaker 6: whatever it is. I have those numbers wrong. Don't quote me,
• 49:45
  Speaker 6: but it's that report. So those folks are doing some really,
• 49:48
  Speaker 6: really interesting stuff. I also think like getting involved at
• 49:54
  Speaker 6: the state and local level is huge right now.
• 49:57
  Speaker 4: Really, really huge.
• 49:58
  Speaker 6: Because, you know, I think, the one thing that the
• 50:05
  Speaker 6: Supreme Court seems to not want to touch is the
• 50:08
  Speaker 6: state's rights issue, right? So I think getting involved at
• 50:13
  Speaker 6: the state level too. And the other thing is, I
• 50:15
  Speaker 6: had someone suggest to me the other day that climate
• 50:17
  Speaker 6: people look at pressuring the Fed more because A, SCOTUS
• 50:23
  Speaker 6: will never fuck with the Fed. B, there's actually a
• 50:27
  Speaker 6: lot that they can do. They're authorized to do a
• 50:29
  Speaker 6: lot of things that would... make it harder for fossil
• 50:33
  Speaker 6: fuel projects to get built and easier for renewables to
• 50:35
  Speaker 6: get built. So I actually think that that's an area
• 50:38
  Speaker 6: that would be good to see some more pressure applied.
• 50:41
  Speaker 2: Fascinating interview. Thanks for breaking this down for us, Amy.
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: Always great to talk to you and we'll see you
• 50:45
  Speaker 2: again soon.
• 50:46
  Speaker 4: Thank you.
• 50:47
  Speaker 5: Okay.
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: We couldn't end a week like this without one more round.
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: of Take Appreciator. Chief Take Officer Elijah Cohn is with us.
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: There was no shortage of Republican reactions from Tuesday's congressional hearing,
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: and Elijah's going to hit us with some of the favorites.
• 51:11
  Speaker 8: Yes, guys, welcome back to the Take Appreciator's simp edition.
• 51:19
  Speaker 8: Today's takes are all defending Donald Trump after Cassidy Hutchinson's
• 51:23
  Speaker 8: testimony in front of the January 6th committee on Tuesday,
• 51:26
  Speaker 8: so it's safe to say that they're all terrible. Instead,
• 51:31
  Speaker 8: We'll be grading our contestants on how big of simps
• 51:33
  Speaker 8: for Trump they are on a scale of one to
• 51:35
  Speaker 8: four simps. Instead of earning a full playbook, we'll be
• 51:38
  Speaker 8: awarding the biggest simps the full Rudy. John and Dan,
• 51:42
  Speaker 8: what is a simp?
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: You tell me, CTO.
• 51:49
  Speaker 8: The G-rated version is it's a person who is desperate
• 51:53
  Speaker 8: for affection from someone who is not going to give
• 51:55
  Speaker 8: it to them.
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: This isn't a G-rated show. What's the other version?
• 52:00
  Speaker 8: It's extremely misogynistic, so we'll punt on that one.
• 52:06
  Speaker 7: Cool.
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: Let's punt on that. Let's punt on that. I'm 41,
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: so I don't know all these things.
• 52:10
  Speaker 6: Yeah, listen to Offline.
• 52:14
  Speaker 8: As always, John and Dan have not heard these takes,
• 52:16
  Speaker 8: so let's go ahead and dive in with a clip
• 52:18
  Speaker 8: from a real grade-A asshole, Kyle, whenever you're ready.
• 52:21
  Speaker 2: She's an extremely junior low-level aide.
• 52:24
  Speaker 9: I don't think I ever had a conversation with her
• 52:26
  Speaker 9: that I can at least recall of any substance or death.
• 52:29
  Speaker 9: But to Molly's point, this is a Rorschach test for
• 52:32
  Speaker 9: your sanity. If you heard this story and you thought, man,
• 52:35
  Speaker 9: I believe every word of this, I'm going to go
• 52:37
  Speaker 9: online and say something about it energetically, something is wrong
• 52:41
  Speaker 9: with you.
• 52:42
  Speaker 8: Guys, any guesses?
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: What an annoying voice, and I can't place it.
• 52:46
  Speaker 6: Sigh.
• 52:49
  Speaker 2: Who could that be?
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: It sounds a little like Matt Gaetz, but not really.
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: I don't think it's Matt Gaetz.
• 52:53
  Speaker 8: Want a hint?
• 52:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, a hint would be great.
• 52:56
  Speaker 8: Former Trump admin official.
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: Admin official?
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: Or staffer. I get my terms mixed up, but he.
• 53:02
  Speaker 8: Was in the Trump admin.
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: He's a real creep.
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: I mean, Stephen Miller?
• 53:07
  Speaker 8: Yes, it's Stephen Miller.
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: Wow. The speechwriter in question that we had been talking
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: about earlier that was trying to fight off the edits
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: from the White House counsel's office was trying to decrime
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: the speech.
• 53:19
  Speaker 2: I mean, it's very hard for Stephen Miller to balance
• 53:22
  Speaker 2: in a limited word speech all the crimes and all
• 53:26
  Speaker 2: the racism. So I imagine that was quite challenging for him.
• 53:28
  Speaker 8: Yeah.
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: I mean, I guess he wasn't having a lot of
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: conversations with her from his mom's basement.
• 53:35
  Speaker 8: How would you guys like to grade him on the
• 53:37
  Speaker 8: simp meter here?
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: I mean, he is a legendary, I mean, I think
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: his life is definitely a full Rudy, but that quote specifically,
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: I would say is a, but, but a two and
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: a half, a three.
• 53:49
  Speaker 2: I'm going to go one and a half. That's he barely,
• 53:53
  Speaker 2: he was mailing it in there.
• 53:55
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 53:55
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: He could have done worse.
• 53:56
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 53:57
  Speaker 8: The old didn't really know her defense.
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: Did it know the chief of staff's assistant is not
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: a credible argument.
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: For the chief speechwriter of the white house. Yeah, no,
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: that doesn't work.
• 54:09
  Speaker 6: Okay.
• 54:10
  Speaker 8: Well, this next one is a tweet. I think it's
• 54:12
  Speaker 8: indicative of a lot of responses, kind of like the
• 54:14
  Speaker 8: party line response. Much of it is in all caps.
• 54:17
  Speaker 8: I'll try to shout those parts.
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: Thank you.
• 54:21
  Speaker 8: The witch hunt committee is a joke. The liberal media
• 54:26
  Speaker 8: will do anything to push this never Trump snooze fest,
• 54:30
  Speaker 8: but nobody in real America cares. Where are the hearings
• 54:34
  Speaker 8: on inflation, open borders and baby formula? This whole thing
• 54:38
  Speaker 8: is meant to distract from Biden's failures.
• 54:42
  Speaker 4: Who said it?
• 54:43
  Speaker 2: Kirsten cinema. No, that's not right.
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: I mean, it sounds like it's like too many coherent
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: words for Chuck Grassley tweet, but it's that kind of vibe. Um,
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: it seems maybe it's an idiot from the house, like
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: a Jim Jordan. Is that a Jim Jordan tweet?
• 55:04
  Speaker 8: It is not. It's in that vein though. And you
• 55:07
  Speaker 8: guys had a previous relationship with this person.
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: Oh, it's a, of course. Ronnie Jackson. Speaking of people
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: with formerly sterling reputations.
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: It would have been really funny.
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: Like the Secret Service.
• 55:21
  Speaker 2: It would have been really funny if when Elijah said,
• 55:25
  Speaker 2: you have a previous relationship with her, John just piped
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: up and said Marjorie Taylor Greene. We were like, what?
• 55:34
  Speaker 8: Oh, Ronnie.
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: Anywho.
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: Good job, Ronnie. I mean, honestly, not very creative from
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: Ronnie either, though I have come to not expect a
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: lot of interesting creative responses from Ronnie. He's sort of
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: like a Magabot. You could not tell the difference between
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: an AI Magabot and Ronnie's comments. And I don't even
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: know if he writes them.
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm going to give it a two.
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: Two. Two for me.
• 55:58
  Speaker 8: What do you guys think of that Republican line generally
• 56:00
  Speaker 8: of like, this is a distraction from the real issues,
• 56:03
  Speaker 8: that kind of thing?
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: That's their best argument.
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it gets harder to make when you're talking about
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: their frontrunner for 2024 saying that he wanted to go
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: join a violent mob to attack the Capitol. That's a
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: harder thing to, it's like, what do we care about more?
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: The fact that the guy who wants to be president
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: in a couple of years led a violent assault on
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: the Capitol or inflation?
• 56:31
  Speaker 2: I don't think we want to get into that.
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: Dan doesn't want the answer.
• 56:35
  Speaker 4: All right.
• 56:37
  Speaker 8: Well, moving on. This one's a little long. It's a
• 56:39
  Speaker 8: clip again. We can maybe cut it down and post
• 56:41
  Speaker 8: if we want. But I think it's an important part
• 56:43
  Speaker 8: of the response to Cassidy Hutchinson. So, Kyle, whenever you're ready.
• 56:47
  Speaker 8: And if you put up this Secret Service agent who says,
• 56:49
  Speaker 8: this girl's lying.
• 56:50
  Speaker 2: I never said that. She's got 20 years in the
• 56:52
  Speaker 2: Secret Service. Guy's got a ton of integrity. She's fresh
• 56:55
  Speaker 2: out of college.
• 56:56
  Speaker 4: Who do you believe?
• 56:57
  Speaker 2: He has a lot to lose by lying.
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: She has.
• 57:01
  Speaker 2: everything to gain by lying. Look at her. She's the
• 57:05
  Speaker 2: new it girl, right? She's going to get a job
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: offer at CNN.
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: She's going to be a contributor.
• 57:09
  Speaker 2: She'll probably get a book deal. And she'll waltz around
• 57:12
  Speaker 2: at every party in Washington, go to Cafe Milano, never
• 57:15
  Speaker 2: have to pay for another drink. So I'm suspicious of her.
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: Look, I will tell you that the Cafe Milano crack
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: really got me. We do have a bipartisan hatred for
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: Cafe Milano here with Jesse Waters and the crew on Fox.
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: That's who it was, right?
• 57:33
  Speaker 2: That's correct.
• 57:34
  Speaker 8: Yes, Jesse Waters.
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: Unfortunately, you can't disguise that voice. You can't disguise that. Yeah, no,
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: she has a lot to gain. Death threats, intimidation, harassment.
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: never getting a job in Republican politics again. She did
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: plenty of gain. Also, she testified under oath. And so far,
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: Tony Arnotto has testified via anonymous sources to reporters. So
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: that's what we got going on.
• 57:57
  Speaker 2: I mean, also just the premise that you gain integrity
• 58:00
  Speaker 2: as you age is just really stupid. He's like, obviously
• 58:04
  Speaker 2: he's more honest. He's older. Yeah, right.
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah. No. I mean, look, I think it's, I'd bump
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: it up to a three. He gave it a little
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: more of a college try than the last two.
• 58:15
  Speaker 2: I think I'm going to give it a three and
• 58:16
  Speaker 2: a half just for that special Fox News dose of
• 58:19
  Speaker 2: misogyny in the end there.
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And also, again, making fun of Cafe Milano.
• 58:25
  Speaker 2: That's why it's not a four.
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: I do have to align myself with that.
• 58:31
  Speaker 2: Great.
• 58:32
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 58:33
  Speaker 8: Jesse Waters, man. Tough to hear.
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: What a douche.
• 58:37
  Speaker 2: The amount of people who are listening to this who
• 58:39
  Speaker 2: were just like, Why do these guys hate a random
• 58:42
  Speaker 2: Italian restaurant so much? It's just going to be.
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: It's the epitome of everything that's wrong with Washington, D.C.
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: is Cafe Milano.
• 58:50
  Speaker 2: You're going to get an email about this. I know it.
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: I don't know who it's from, but you're going to
• 58:52
  Speaker 2: get one.
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: Who? Yeah. The defenders of Cafe Milano.
• 58:56
  Speaker 8: Oh, no.
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to be able to go there when
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: I visit D.C. What's going to happen? I'm going to
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: have to fucking eat some fucking spaghetti somewhere else. It's not,
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: the food's not that good.
• 59:05
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 59:05
  Speaker 8: Someone, someone made the meme of like one really strong arm,
• 59:09
  Speaker 8: giving the handshake to the other really strong arm. And it's,
• 59:11
  Speaker 8: you know, John and Dan on one, Jesse waters on
• 59:13
  Speaker 8: the other and hating cafe Milano. All right, let's move
• 59:22
  Speaker 8: on to the next one, which I think is just
• 59:24
  Speaker 8: really like definitional scent behavior. So as we discussed, Part
• 59:29
  Speaker 8: of Cassidy Hutchinson's testimony was that at one point during
• 59:34
  Speaker 8: the insurrection, Trump got so upset that he threw his
• 59:36
  Speaker 8: lunch across the room, leaving ketchup smeared on the White
• 59:39
  Speaker 8: House cafeteria wall. That led to one potential simp here
• 59:43
  Speaker 8: saying the following, quote, he threw a plate in the lunchroom.
• 59:47
  Speaker 8: I don't know how much that matters. He was very
• 59:50
  Speaker 8: upset about the election.
• 59:52
  Speaker 2: Guys, I don't want to.
• 59:54
  Speaker 8: Guess who that was.
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: I don't know. I can't even.
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, just tell us.
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: You got anything?
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 8: It's Brian Kilmeade.
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: I mean, and you know what? Brian Kilmeade, that gets
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: a fucking one. You're trying to focus on the plate?
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: You think that the plate against the wall is how
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: you're going to try to distract from the rest of
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: the bullshit? Come on.
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, the way to do it is to
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 2: focus on the steering wheel, right? That's the way to
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 2: do it.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: Exactly.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: You can't even pick the right marginalia.
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: That's at least more effective simp behavior. Don't go with
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: the ketchup on the wall. No one thought that was important.
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 2: It was funny.
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 8: He was mad. He was mad so much.
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 7: He was mad.
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, you'd throw fucking ketchup at the wall too.
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 8: The other reason we put that in there is because
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 8: Tommy Vitor, you guys know him. We all know him.
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 8: He asked me specifically to read this quote from Fox
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 8: News from the Obama years. Quote, plain old ketchup didn't
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 8: cut it for the president. He ordered Dijon mustard. I
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 8: hope you enjoyed your fancy burger, Mr. President.
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: Tommy holds the most specific grudges, and I really appreciate that.
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: I mean, Mustard Gate was a great, great moment in
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: American history that sort of foretold everything that was to come.
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: It's very true. It's very true. When was that? Was
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: that 09? Yeah, we were in the White.
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: House, I think. Was it 09? I'm not sure what year,
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 2: but do.
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 8: You want to guess what pundit?
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 1: Oh, that started the.
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: Peter Baker?
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 6: Oh.
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 8: He's still on the network.
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 9: Oh, oh, oh.
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 6: Is it.
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: Which network? Which network?
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 8: Fox News. He's in primetime.
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: Oh, is it Tucker?
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 5: No.
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: Sean Hannity. Sean Hannity.
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: Sorry. I should have gone with that. I mean, this was.
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: It wasn't just it was mustard. It was like Grey Poupon,
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 2: which was the... Why people were so upset about it.
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 2: It is some beautiful.
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 8: poetry there of going from ketchup to ketchup condiment to condiment.
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: Here you know it is that's very nice you know
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: thank you for that grudge tell me who's also very
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: excited that we attacked cafe milano because um he he
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: brought up that steve bannon had also recently so there's
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: the there's the meme right there there's the tommy vitor
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: steve bannon anti-cafe milano we'll.
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 8: Get on it all right last one glad i could
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 8: talk you guys up to five instead of three today
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 8: uh This is a series of posts on social media. Quote,
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 8: Cassidy Hutchinson's body language is that of a total bullshit artist.
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 2: Fantasyland.
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 8: Another post, there's no cross-examination of this so-called witness. This
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 8: is a kangaroo court. Another post simply reads, a total phony.
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 8: Another post reads, I never said Mike Pence deserves it, parentheses,
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 8: to be hung. Another made-up statement by a third-rate social climber.
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 8: Who's simping, guys?
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: The simper in chief. Those sound like red checkmarked truths,
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: if I ever heard them, from Donald J. Trump himself.
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: I can't believe you didn't include the wacky handwriting. He
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: made fun of her wacky handwriting.
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 8: He did make fun. Oh, I did include it. I
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 8: just skipped over that line.
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 7: Yes.
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 2: I mean, obviously Donald Trump is known for his penmanship
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 2: for anyone who remembers who he, when he defaced the
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 2: weather map with the Sharpie.
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: Or has seen, I think he, I think he actually
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: said that it was the handwriting of a wacko. I
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: think it was a little, a little tougher than that.
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 2: But also, as we know, there is a direct relationship
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 2: between trust in penmanship, which is why the most trusted
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 2: profession in America is calligraphers. It's so insane.
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: Honestly, like, Honestly, on the Sims scale, not the greatest
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: effort from Donald Trump.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 2: I mean, he's lost his fastball. He has absolutely lost
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 2: his fastball on this stuff.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: He's just not the same on truth. His truths aren't
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: the same.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 2: I fucking love truth social. I love everything about it.
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 2: I love that.
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: Let's just clip this.
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 2: That they call it a truth, a re-truth. I love
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 2: that he took blue checkmark and made it a red checkmark.
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 2: It is like the most.
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 9: I know.
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 2: McDonald's, McDowell's thing in history. It's so good. It is
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 2: the big mick of social media sites. I love it.
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: No notes. No notes on Truth Social. Just indictment.
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 2: That's right.
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: Apparently with the media company. Chief Take Officer Elijah Cohn,
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: thank you as always. Amy Westervelt from Hot Take, thanks
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: for joining. Everyone go subscribe to Hot Take and listen
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: to some of the best, the best, most expert climate
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: analysis there is. Everyone else have a fantastic weekend. fourth holiday,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: and we will see you all next week.
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 2: Bye, everyone.
• 1:04:51
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• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: producer is Michael Martinez. Our senior producer is Andy Gardner-Bernstein.
• 1:04:58
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• 1:05:01
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• 1:05:05
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• 1:05:15
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• 1:05:19
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