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Will the Supreme Court Grant Trump Immunity? · Pod Save America

• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Tommy Vitor.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: And I'm Alyssa Mastromatico.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Alyssa, it's so great to have you. We have a
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: packed show today, my friend. Donald Trump... He's just starring
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: in all kinds of legal dramas all over the world.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: He is, you know, the Secret Service is contemplating what
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: to do if he spends time behind bars. You have
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: the Biden administration taking big moves to help out consumers
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: and workers. We might be banning TikTok.
• 0:43
  Speaker 3: I don't know.
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: The courts are going to have something to say about that, too.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: And state lawmakers in Arizona finally act to repeal their
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: state's 1864 abortion ban. That feels like a very long
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: time ago, everybody. But first, we're recording this on Thursday afternoon,
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: East Coast time. And it was a day of truly
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: dizzying legal news. In Washington, the Supreme Court heard oral
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: arguments about whether Donald Trump should be immune from criminal
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: prosecution for official acts and what constitutes official acts in
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: the first place. This is very important for the January
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: 6th case. Trump himself was stuck in a court in Manhattan,
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: sitting through more testimony from former National Enquirer publisher David
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: Pecker about the catch and kill scheme. More on that later.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: And for good measure, New York's highest court overturned Harvey
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: Weinstein's conviction. And that was just today. On Wednesday, the
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: Supreme Court heard arguments about the Biden administration's challenge to
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: Idaho's ultra-strict abortion law and how it interacts with federal
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: laws about emergency medical care. And then in Arizona, Trump
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: has been named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the new
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: faked elector's indictment that goes after Rudy Giuliani, Mark Meadows,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: and a lot of other goons. So, man, thank God
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: we have strict scrutiny's Leah Whitman with us today. Truly,
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: thank you for being here, Leah. You are saving the podcast.
• 1:54
  Speaker 3: Thank you for having me. Too bad I can't save
• 1:56
  Speaker 3: the Supreme Court.
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you've been trying. First question, did I get anything wrong?
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: So I might characterize the Idaho case as not necessarily
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: just about federal law and preempting Idaho's law, but instead
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: whether women are people and they get to keep their organs.
• 2:11
  Speaker 4: But, you know, details.
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: It was a yes or no question.
• 2:15
  Speaker 4: Co-sign.
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: Co-sign that, Leah Lindman. I co-sign that.
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: Here's my actual first question. What was your big takeaway
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: from Thursday's oral arguments in Trump's immunity case? And what
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: you heard, did it make you feel like it's more
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: or less likely that a January 6th trial will happen
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: before the election?
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: Way less likely. So the court seems inclined to reject
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: Trump's very broad notion of immunity, which his lawyers said
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: would make a president immune even if they directed the
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: military to conduct a coup. But what they are inclined
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: to do is basically say the court below needs to
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: make some additional determinations before they can conclude that Donald
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: Trump actually isn't immune here. And those additional determinations that
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: a court is going to have to make are likely
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: to prolong the proceedings here until after the election.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: So basically, you would have to throw this case back
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: down to a lower court and they do a bunch
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: of what hearings, make a bunch of decisions, and that
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: could take weeks, months?
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so they would have to do additional briefing where
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: they basically invite the parties to make arguments about whether
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: the allegations in this indictment satisfy whatever legal test the
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: Supreme Court makes up here. And then assuming that the
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: allegations in the indictment, some of them might fall within
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: the outer bounds of official activity, whether some of those
• 3:32
  Speaker 3: allegations could nonetheless be introduced at trial not to form
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: the basis of criminal liability, but instead as evidence of
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: the president's intent here. And all of those questions, they're
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: just going to take up time because there have to
• 3:44
  Speaker 3: be hearings, briefing, determinations, decisions, and we're already really close
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: to the election.
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: So it's Trump in the calendar versus the prosecution. That's great. Alyssa,
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: over to you.
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: What a wreck. Leah, can you give us a quick
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: refresher on Trump's immunity claim and how it relates specifically
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: to the January 6th trial?
• 4:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so his immunity claim is basically if a president
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: does something exercising the powers of the president's office, then
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: the president... cannot be convicted of a crime unless and
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: until the president is first impeached and convicted by the Senate.
• 4:21
  Speaker 3: This is completely nonsensical and would immunize the president from
• 4:27
  Speaker 3: criminal activity, given that the Senate is not in the
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: habit of impeaching and convicting presidents. But that's his argument.
• 4:33
  Speaker 3: And so he says, yeah, sure, I was attempting to
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: overturn the results of an election.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: But guess what?
• 4:38
  Speaker 3: I used the Department of Justice to do so. So
• 4:41
  Speaker 3: nothing to see here.
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: Leah, I've got to tell you, I listen to these
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: arguments driving around in my Subaru because I just find
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: it like I drive around, I listen, I try to
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: take it in. And I sometimes, in this one in particular,
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: I'm like, I think I have a comprehension problem. Like
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: we used to take reading comprehension when you were in
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: elementary school. I'm like, this can't possibly be correct. What
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: is the Nixon tie-in?
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: I'm impressed you did not devolve into road rage. But
• 5:09
  Speaker 3: the Nixon.
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: Backcountry roads, girl. Backcountry roads. I can't be in front of...
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: Only squirrels are at risk here.
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: So there are several Nixon tie-ins here, of course. You know,
• 5:20
  Speaker 3: Nixon famously or infamously said if the president does it,
• 5:23
  Speaker 3: it's not illegal. Donald Trump's argument is like slightly more
• 5:26
  Speaker 3: nuanced in that he's saying if a president does it,
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: it's an official act and therefore immune from criminal prosecution
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: and therefore effectively not illegal. But the Supreme Court heard
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: several cases involving presidential claims of immunity arising out of
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: Nixon's case. So one was a case involving civil immunity,
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: Nixon versus Fitzgerald. And there, the court said presidents can't
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: be sued civilly, that is by private citizens seeking monetary
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: damages for actions that fall within the scope of their
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: official duties. And that's just an absolute immunity bar. But
• 6:00
  Speaker 3: the court also decided Nixon versus United States, in which
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: the court said look, presidents aren't completely immune from criminal
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: process and therefore can be ordered to turn over evidence,
• 6:10
  Speaker 3: you know, as part of the grand jury subpoena. And,
• 6:13
  Speaker 3: you know, in part because of the Nixon events, you know,
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: and particularly Ford's pardon of Nixon, several justices pointed out
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: that that seemed to reflect an understanding that, of course,
• 6:23
  Speaker 3: presidents would and could be subject to criminal process if
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: they needed a fricking pardon for violating criminal law. And
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: yet Donald Trump's lawyer was like, No, no, no. You
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: all have it all completely wrong. Presidents just can't be
• 6:36
  Speaker 3: subject to criminal law.
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: I think you both have Trump derangement syndrome. And it
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: makes perfect sense that if I were president on the
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: last day and I was in office, I was getting
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: a ride home from the Secret Service agents and I
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: get out of the car and then I shoot them
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: all myself and murder them. And then it's the next
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: day and I'm no longer president and I haven't been
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: impeached by the Senate. So I get off scot-free. That
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: makes sense to me.
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: It is so wild. I actually, I love that everyone
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: focuses kind of on that because I enjoy like the
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: insider trading. Like this is what he would be doing.
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: This is, this is like, I'm like, let's get into
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: the financial examples because I think we, we all know
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: that's where he would be. But Leah, so here's another one,
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: a vivid and admittedly somewhat extreme example that's come up
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: in the lower courts consideration of the issue is whether
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: a president could order the military to assassinate a political opponent,
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: for example. Justice Sotomayor asked a version of that question today.
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: Let's listen.
• 7:30
  Speaker 5: If the president decides that his rival is a corrupt
• 7:37
  Speaker 5: person and he orders the military or order someone to
• 7:43
  Speaker 5: assassinate him. Is that within his official acts for which
• 7:48
  Speaker 5: he can get immunity?
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: that could well be an official act.
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: It could, and why?
• 7:54
  Speaker 5: Because he's doing it for personal reasons.
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: Right. So what did you think of Trump's lawyer's answer there, Leah?
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: I mean, in some ways, it was entirely expected. This
• 8:04
  Speaker 3: was a question that he was asked in the Court
• 8:07
  Speaker 3: of Appeals. You know, if the president orders SEAL Team
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: 6 to assassinate a political rival, are you saying the
• 8:12
  Speaker 3: president would be immune? And Trump's lawyer basically says, Yes,
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: unless the Senate impeached and convicted him first.
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: So this is his argument.
• 8:19
  Speaker 3: They did not feel the need to basically trim its
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: sails once they got to the Supreme Court. And I
• 8:24
  Speaker 3: think for good reason. I mean, it seemed to me
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: like there are a majority of justices, the Republican appointees,
• 8:30
  Speaker 3: who are willing to endorse some thinner version of immunity
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: and even go so far as to suggest that there
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: need to be additional proceedings in order to determine whether
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: President Trump's attempt to overturn the results of a valid
• 8:43
  Speaker 3: election and refuse to leave office fell within the scope
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: of official duties that are entitled to immunity. And so
• 8:50
  Speaker 3: there's a reason why Trump's lawyer didn't feel the need
• 8:52
  Speaker 3: to basically moderate his position arguing before this court.
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: Clarence Thomas did not recuse himself, right?
• 8:59
  Speaker 5: Correct.
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: Instead, Clarence Thomas proudly proclaimed that having a bunch of
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: presidents done coups, so what's the big deal here?
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: Got it. Um, Has his wife, Ginny Thomas, stormed the
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: proceedings yet?
• 9:13
  Speaker 3: You know, I was not made aware if that happened,
• 9:16
  Speaker 3: but she doesn't text me like she texts Mark Meadows.
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: So maybe I missed something.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: That's fair. So Justice Barrett went a different route asking
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: about specific things that Jack Smith is alleging that Trump did.
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: in asking whether Trump's lawyers considered those official or private acts.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: Let's listen to a clip.
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: So you concede that private acts don't get immunity.
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: We do.
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 9:37
  Speaker 4: And I want to know if you agree or disagree
• 9:39
  Speaker 4: about the characterization of these acts as private. Petitioner turned
• 9:43
  Speaker 4: to a private attorney, was willing to spread knowingly false
• 9:46
  Speaker 4: claims of election fraud to spearhead his challenges to the
• 9:48
  Speaker 4: election results.
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: Private?
• 9:50
  Speaker 6: As alleged.
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: I mean, we dispute the allegation, but that sounds private
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: to me. Sounds private.
• 9:54
  Speaker 4: The petitioner conspired with another private attorney who caused the
• 9:57
  Speaker 4: filing in court of a verification signed by petitioner that
• 10:00
  Speaker 4: contained false allegations to support a challenge.
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: That also sounds private.
• 10:04
  Speaker 4: Three private actors, two attorneys, including those mentioned above, and
• 10:07
  Speaker 4: a political consultant helped implement a plan to submit fraudulent
• 10:11
  Speaker 4: slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding, and
• 10:15
  Speaker 4: petitioner and a co-conspirator attorney directed that effort.
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: You read it quickly.
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: I believe that's private. I don't want to.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: What did you make of that exchange, ACB asking those
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: questions and the answers?
• 10:26
  Speaker 3: I mean, unlike Justice Alito, she was actually willing to
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: discuss the actual facts of this case and try to
• 10:32
  Speaker 3: determine whether they were within the official activities or official
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: scope of the president's duties. And it was encouraging in
• 10:40
  Speaker 3: some respects that she was able to get a concession
• 10:43
  Speaker 3: from Trump's lawyer that several of the allegations in the
• 10:45
  Speaker 3: indictment conceitedly do not concern official acts. And if that's right,
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: then a trial is not flatly prohibited here. Instead, the
• 10:55
  Speaker 3: trial could proceed based on the allegations that Trump's lawyer
• 10:59
  Speaker 3: is conceding are not entitled to immunity. And the fight
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: is just going to be about how some of the
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: other allegations can be used here.
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: So Leah, last question about the immunity case. So everyone
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: seemed to think that Trump's team's case for absolute immunity
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: was pretty weak, but the government's lawyer didn't exactly have
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: a smooth sailing either when it was his turn. A
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: few of the conservative justices pushed him about the fraud
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: statute that the government is using against Trump. Can you
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: explain what that means, why it was unexpected, and whether
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: you thought it was a big deal?
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so Justice Alito in particular wanted to ask the
• 11:37
  Speaker 3: lawyer for special counsel, Jack Smith, whether the fraud statute,
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: the conspiracy to defraud the United States, which is one
• 11:44
  Speaker 3: of the charges that Jack Smith charged Donald Trump with,
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: whether that statute could itself be unconstitutional because it's simply
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: too vague and people don't know what it means. And
• 11:55
  Speaker 3: so that is, I think, showing his hand that even
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: if a trial is allowed to proceed, you know, without
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: a blanket form of immunity, it's possible if and when
• 12:06
  Speaker 3: the case goes back up to the Supreme Court that
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: there are some justices who would just say these charges
• 12:11
  Speaker 3: are per se invalid and cannot support a conviction.
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: Wonderful. So we heard these arguments in late April. Does
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: that mean we'll hear some sort of judgment in what, June, July?
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: So by tradition and custom, the Supreme Court's term ends
• 12:27
  Speaker 3: at the end of June. That is when they try
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: to release all of the decisions in argued cases. But
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: if they wait that long to release a decision in
• 12:35
  Speaker 3: this case, they are all but guaranteeing there will not
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: be a trial before the election. And so I think
• 12:41
  Speaker 3: we should be watching to see whether they are able
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: to issue a decision before the end of May, because
• 12:46
  Speaker 3: that at least holds out the remote possibility of some
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: pre-election trial.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: Let's hope. Maybe someone will just leak a copy to
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: Politico like with the Dobbs case. OK, let's turn to
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: a different courtroom. So meanwhile, Donald Trump is in Manhattan.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: He's attending his criminal trial for paying to cover up
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: the Stormy Daniels affair story. So the DA's team asked
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: the judge to hold Trump in contempt of court for
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: violating his gag order again. Prosecutors presented what they said
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: were four additional violations. Prosecutors now argue Trump has violated
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: the gag order 14 times, I believe. Is that normal?
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: Would any other defendant be allowed to violate a gag
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: order 14 times?
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: Usually they're allowed 10 free violations of gag orders.
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: No, no. Like a punch card? Exactly.
• 13:35
  Speaker 3: Like one violation of a gag order, that's it. There's
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: no kind of like free passes. It's almost as if
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: this guy believes he is above the law.
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: Did you guys see the story in the New York
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: Times about the Secret Service having like preliminary discussions about
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: how to protect Trump in jail or in prison? Jail, prison?
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: I don't know. If he goes for contempt because- I
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: just want to flag that to get the vibes up, basically.
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: I have to tell you, I would love to be
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: a consultant on this project. Secret Service trying to secure
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: him in prison, I have it all mapped out in
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: my head. He'd have to be in one wing. Secret
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: Service would have to have rooms on either side. He'd
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: have to have 24-7 protection. But I just imagine they
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: do have to be playing this out. It's a possibility.
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: And I would just give anything to be in those meetings.
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: I mean, Alyssa, you were the coordinator in the White
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: House for all things Secret Service. I can't imagine the
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: conference calls and meetings with these guys right now. They
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: must be losing their minds.
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: The funniest thing is I actually– I mean, you remember
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: my stint at Vice. I was there when Barack Obama
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: was the first sitting president to visit a federal prison,
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: and he wasn't going to prison.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: Right, right, yeah.
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: And that was like a huge thing. So I cannot–
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: I would not want to be the Secret Service agents
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: on that rotation.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: No, 24-hour shifts in a jail doesn't sound very fun.
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: At Rikers.
• 14:59
  Speaker 4: I don't know. No, thanks.
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: They probably sent him to the Martha Stewart minimum security place.
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll see. So, Alyssa, Trump said this morning outside
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: the courthouse that he thinks he can win New York
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: State in a general election. He did a meet and
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: greet with some construction workers this morning in Manhattan. He's
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: been holding rallies in the Bronx, Madison Square Garden. He
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: went to a bodega the other day. What do you
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: make of these campaign stops? He's not really playing for... Okay,
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: so a couple things.
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump, not a morning person. So the fact that
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: he got up, I think he hit the, it was
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: like the JP Morgan construction site. I think he hit
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: that between like 6.30 and 7 o'clock this morning. So one,
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: he's scared. Okay, he is not doing these stops because
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: he's not scared. Second, it's always about the fine print
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: with him. When he's talking about MSG, I'm like, maybe
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: the Hulu Theater at MSG. That's a capacity of 5,500.
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: But I mean, in terms of like whether he could
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: ever win New York as a lifelong New Yorker, I
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: think the last time a Republican won this state was
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: Reagan in 84. And right now, Joe Biden is polling
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: on average 10 points ahead of Trump. So I feel
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: like we're good.
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he's just smart enough to know where the media
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: is and he's going to go to them like a
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: moth to a flame.
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: Though, I mean, like those are facts and I feel
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: confident in them, but I also don't want to have
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: hubris because New York State is sort of responsible for
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: like the narrow margin in the House right now.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: So we won't talk about that. Switching gears again. So
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: yesterday in Arizona, a grand jury handed down an indictment
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: related to the state's fake elector scheme. They charged 11
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: fake electors themselves, as well as seven Trump aides whose
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: names were redacted. But it was pretty clear who they
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: were talking about, people like Rudy Giuliani, Mark Meadows, etc. Likewise,
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: it was obvious that the anonymous former president named as
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: an unindicted co-conspirator is Donald Trump, unless Obama has been
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: getting into some shit that we have not heard about. Leah,
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: what does it mean to be an unindicted co-conspirator? And
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: does this mean Trump will remain one or could he
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: be indicted down the road?
• 16:56
  Speaker 3: Unindicted co-conspirator just means kind of for purposes of fleshing
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: out the actual facts and giving the grand jury and
• 17:02
  Speaker 3: the jury an idea about what actually happened. You are
• 17:05
  Speaker 3: including some other person's involvement. But for whatever reason, the
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: grand jury or prosecutor did not decide to indict that person.
• 17:13
  Speaker 3: So he was involved in the scheme but is not
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: currently facing charges. It is possible he could face charges
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: in the future. Whether that's a possibility depends a little
• 17:22
  Speaker 3: bit on when the statute of limitations for the crime
• 17:24
  Speaker 3: would expire.
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: Got it. And then I saw that Boris Epstein, who's
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: a Trump aide, he was indicted in Arizona as part
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: of this fake elector scheme. But he was in the
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: courtroom today in Manhattan. He's been described as the person
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: quarterbacking the legal defense. That seems complicated.
• 17:41
  Speaker 3: No.
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: How does that work?
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: I mean, there's a bunch of lawyers who have been indicted,
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: you know, in the course of Trump's efforts to overturn
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: the election. not just Boris Epstein. I think Christine Bob
• 17:53
  Speaker 3: was also indicted, and she was named kind of the
• 17:56
  Speaker 3: person in charge of election integrity for the RNC. So
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: a whole host of characters, and certainly being a lawyer
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: does not immunize you from legal process or mean you
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: have the good judgment to avoid trying to overturn an election.
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: Well said. Switching gears again back to the Supreme Court.
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: So yesterday, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: big case this time related to Idaho's unbelievably draconian abortion
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: ban and whether it conflicts with federal law. Leah, can
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: you just give us the basics of Idaho's ban and
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: why the government is challenging it?
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: So Idaho's ban says that doctors can only perform abortions
• 18:37
  Speaker 3: that are actually necessary to save the life of the
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: pregnant person. What this means is they cannot perform abortions
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: that might be necessary to save a pregnant person's organs
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: or potentially prevent further deterioration of the emergency medical condition
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: that caused the pregnant person to go to the hospital
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: in the first place and thereby risking them potentially becoming
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: closer to death and risking death. And That is what
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: the federal government says violates hospitals' obligations under a federal law, EMTALA,
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act, that requires
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: hospitals to provide stabilizing care for emergency medical conditions. In
• 19:21
  Speaker 3: order to prevent, you know, further deterioration, in order to
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: prevent serious risks to bodily organs or bodily functions. And
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: Idaho is like, nope, we can take a woman's uterus
• 19:32
  Speaker 3: or kidney, pancreas, right? Maybe some stomach, small intestine, large
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: intestine too. As long as she's not going to die,
• 19:38
  Speaker 3: all good.
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: Jesus Christ. There was a moment yesterday where even Justice
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: Barrett confessed to being shocked by an answer that had
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: been given by Idaho Solicitor General. Can you just help
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: us understand? what that moment was about and what your
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: takeaway was?
• 19:52
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 19:52
  Speaker 3: So Justice Sotomayor had just finished going through a series
• 19:56
  Speaker 3: of examples of actual cases where people had been denied
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: abortions under restrictive abortion laws similar to Idaho's, including cases
• 20:03
  Speaker 3: like Anya Cook in Florida, who ended up, you know,
• 20:06
  Speaker 3: after being denied an abortion, put on life support because
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: she lost so much blood. or people who went into
• 20:10
  Speaker 3: septic shock, or people who had to have hysterectomies because
• 20:13
  Speaker 3: of the amount of bleeding and complications that followed when
• 20:17
  Speaker 3: they were denied abortions. And Justice Sotomayor kept asking the
• 20:19
  Speaker 3: Idaho lawyer, could this person get an abortion under your law?
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: And the Idaho lawyer basically said, maybe not. Maybe a
• 20:25
  Speaker 3: prosecutor would choose to indict the hospital or the doctor
• 20:29
  Speaker 3: who performed them. At which point Justice Barrett said, this
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: is shocking, to which I say, Sweetie, like, have you
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: been paying attention for the last two years? I mean,
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: on some level, like, it's good, right, that she's shocked.
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: On the other hand, it's like face-eating leopards are going
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: to eat your face.
• 20:44
  Speaker 4: Too, Amy.
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there's been a lot of reporting about this kind
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: of these scenarios that you're mentioning. Alyssa, you and Aaron
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: have covered, you know, the fight over abortion bans in
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: many states in amazing detail on hysteria. which everyone should
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: check out and subscribe to.
• 20:58
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: Why is this case, do you think, important beyond Idaho?
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: What does it tell us about the stakes and the
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: momentum for each side?
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: There's so much. Like what Leah was just saying, this
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: is bullshit. Like these laws and people, we're getting incredibly
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: graphic and gruesome examples of how wrong these are. You know,
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: Republicans try to sound very middle of the road by saying,
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: of course, the life of the mother. You know, exceptions
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: for rape and incest, except the caveats around them are bullshit. Doctors,
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: these are the same states where there are huge penalties
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: for a doctor who could potentially perform an abortion that
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: someone could sue later and say, oh, that wasn't actually,
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: they weren't close enough to dying, right? So on the
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: one hand, these cases, I think, are showing the world
• 21:49
  Speaker 2: what is really meant by these bands and how disingenuous
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: a lot of the sort of caveats and the exceptions
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: around some of these things that they say to try
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: to make them sound wholesome. And they're not. They're trash.
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: And also, I think that if you– I mean, and actually, Leah,
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: I have a question for you. I have to throw
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: this back to you. I really feel like the supremacy
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: clause is having a moment because it has always been
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: like the supremacy clause. Like, how is this even an
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: issue with EMTALA? Like, why are they trying to do this?
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: But what's their beef with the supremacy clause now? They're
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: challenging it left and right.
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: So maybe I should just pause to explain what the
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: Supremacy Clause is. So the Supremacy Clause is part of
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: the Constitution, and it declares that federal law is supreme.
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: And in the EMTALA case, the Biden administration marches into
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: federal court and says, there's a federal law, EMTALA, that
• 22:42
  Speaker 3: requires hospitals to provide stabilizing care. And the state says,
• 22:47
  Speaker 3: but we don't want to apply stabilizing care when that
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: stabilizing care is an abortion. And when federal law says
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: one thing that is inconsistent with state law, federal law
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: is supposed to win out. There's a similar dynamic happening
• 22:58
  Speaker 3: in the immigration case where you have Texas passing SB4
• 23:03
  Speaker 3: and then interfering with federal immigration officers' attempts to enforce
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: federal immigration law. And I think the supremacy clause, Alyssa,
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: has moments when Democrats hold office because the Republican Supreme
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: Court doesn't like to recognize that Democrats get to exercise
• 23:19
  Speaker 3: political power and hold political power. And so in those instances,
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: they say, well, of course, Texas gets to determine federal
• 23:24
  Speaker 3: immigration policy rather than the Biden administration. And of course,
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: Idaho gets to determine, you know, whether women can receive
• 23:31
  Speaker 3: abortions that are necessary to save their organs rather than
• 23:33
  Speaker 3: the federal law that Congress passed during the Reagan administration,
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: by the way. And so it is just a further
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: effort to impede, I think, Democratic administration's ability to govern.
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: And that is the threat that this super majority Republican
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: controlled Supreme Court poses.
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: Oof, man. OK, last piece of truly shitty legal news
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: in this cornucopia of truly shitty legal news is that
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: the New York Court of Appeals overturned Harvey Weinstein's 2020
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: rape convictions. Leah, can you help us understand what happened here?
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: What happens to Harvey Weinstein now? Like, does he go
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: to prison in California instead? He's not released, right?
• 24:10
  Speaker 3: No, he's probably not going to be released. The court
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: overturned his New York convictions on the ground that prosecutors
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: had impermissibly been allowed to introduce evidence of prior bad
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: acts for which he was not charged. And those prior
• 24:25
  Speaker 3: bad acts were other sexual assaults. And the court ruled
• 24:30
  Speaker 3: four to three that those previous sexual assaults were not
• 24:34
  Speaker 3: relevant to an issue at the trial, namely Harvey Weinstein's intent.
• 24:43
  Speaker 3: The decision doesn't mean Harvey Weinstein is going to go three. Obviously,
• 24:46
  Speaker 3: he has the California convictions, and it's likely he will
• 24:50
  Speaker 3: still be in jail while New York attempts to retry him.
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: But I think the dissenting opinion or one of the
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: dissenting opinions got it right when they basically raised the
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: alarm that the majority opinion just inhabits this fantasy world
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: that imagines when people make an accusation of sexual assault,
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: a jury and people will necessarily believe them. And therefore
• 25:15
  Speaker 3: there's no need to introduce evidence of someone's prior bad
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: acts in order to establish their criminal intent and willingness to,
• 25:23
  Speaker 3: you know, forcibly assault someone, you know, without their consent.
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: And so it was a disappointing decision, but that was
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: what the court did.
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: So Alyssa, I mean, Everything you read about this guy,
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: he sounds very guilty, seems like an incredibly bad person.
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: What do you think this news means for the broader
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: Me Too movement, efforts to hold people like Harvey Weinstein accountable?
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: And just I don't know what it does to help
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: people feel like the morale of seeing someone like this
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: seem to catch a break from the New York Supreme Court.
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: Look, it's not good. It's not good, Tommy. It's not good.
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: I think that honestly, and like Leah chime in, it's
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: to me, it feels a lot like when Ro fell
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: a little bit. Like, guess what, guys? It's not done.
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: The fight's not over. We have to keep our foot
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: on the gas, you know? Just because we had a
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: couple of, you know, marches and people wore pink hats
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: doesn't mean that everything is all good and we can
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: just move on. And it's why elections matter and we
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: have to keep voting. And, you know, Harvey is just,
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: Harvey is a blip. Harvey is a blip. And we just,
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: we can't let, we can't let this one, well, there
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: are many, but we can't let this derail us. You know,
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: we have to stay motivated.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: All right. Well, Leah, we truly cannot thank you enough
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: for being here. You made this show exponentially smarter. So
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: thank you. And everyone should subscribe to Strict Scrutiny. Truly
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: like one of my favorite shows ever. So thank you again.
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: Thank you so much for having me. All right.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: We're going to take a quick break. When we come back, though,
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: Alyssa and I will talk about what President Biden has
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: been up to, what happens next after Congress actually passed
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: a TikTok ban, and the cloak and dagger madness that
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: goes into the vice presidential selection process. You will not
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: want to miss it. So stick around. All right, Alyssa.
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: So some less headline grabbing, but actually good news while
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: all this legal drama unfolds is that the administration has
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: been busy rolling out regulatory changes that are a big
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: deal for actual people. On Wednesday, the Biden administration issued
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: a final rule requiring airlines to issue cash refunds for
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: canceled and delayed flights and to do it quickly. Anyone
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: who's ever lost an airline voucher for hundreds of dollars
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: knows how big of a deal that is. Then the
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: FTC banned non-compete agreements for most new workers. So right now,
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: one in five workers face a non-compete. And then lastly, today,
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: the EPA issued a new regulation on coal power plants,
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: requiring them to cut their emissions by 90% by 2039
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: and tighten rules on other types of pollution, from these plants.
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: So obviously that's critical for climate change mitigation. The coal
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: industry says they can't get to that emissions target by
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: 2039 and that this whole effort is basically an effort
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: to stamp out coal power in the U.S. altogether, which
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: doesn't make me sad. Yeah, seems fine. All right, Alyssa.
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: So these regulations, they're obviously the right thing to do.
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: They're great for consumers. But the question becomes, how do
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: we make sure voters actually know about them? Any recommendations
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: for the Biden team for actually selling some wins here?
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: Tommy, listen, before we recorded today, I was telling you
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: how I like to print things out and highlight them. Okay.
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: My advice for the Biden administration is borderline that basic.
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: I want to turn on AM FM radio and I
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: want to hear people talking about this. Do you know
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: that 88% of Americans listen to AM FM radio every week?
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: That's 293 million people.
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: People, you know what else they should do? They should
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: take out ads or write articles or op-eds for AARP magazine.
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: You want to know why? You want to know why?
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: 38 million readers. So I think they need to go
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: very guerrilla, very worm's eye view, and do the things
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: that people don't think are cool. Because I actually think
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: that in some ways, that's how people are consuming information.
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: Totally. No, I'm with you. Listen, people hate the airlines.
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: And if you hate airlines, you really hate airline vouchers
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: because you're never allowed to use them. They're always like
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: some reason you can't do it. You can't find them
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: in your stupid app. So I love this rule. This
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: is one of those things Biden did where I was like,
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: why didn't we do that in the Obama days? That's
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: so smart. I'm glad they did it. I agree with you.
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: I do think this is fodder for a funny, tight
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: digital ad too. Like you find someone who got screwed
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: over or missed Christmas or whatever. People who don't care
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: about politics, remember that Trump sent them a check, right? Yes, yes.
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: Tommy, this is exactly what I'm talking about. Like there
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: should be billboards in airports. There should be, you know,
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: when you go into a hotel and they have like
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: the scrolling screen of like what weddings in which ballroom,
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: it should be up there telling people exactly how they
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: can protect their vacations. People save up for a year
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: or years to go on a vacation that can be
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: utterly fucked because of an airline's malfeasance. This is real
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: money for people. And so I think it's a real,
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: if they don't try to get this out in every way,
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: this is the thing that people could potentially remember.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: Totally. This is discreet. It's memorable. People will love it.
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: The non-compete clause stuff is, it's a bigger deal for
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: the labor market generally, but I think there's going to
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: be a long legal fight So people aren't necessarily going
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: to feel this in their lives anytime soon. But again,
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: this is where I would love to just see them
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: lean into the fight. You find some fast food workers
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: who are harmed by a non-compete. You tell their stories
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: in an ad. You lean into the legal case. Make
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: the Chamber of Commerce the enemy here. Find a villain.
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: Demagogue this. People remember stories like that. They resonate.
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: They do. And it's like with everything, even just back
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: to the travel vouchers, everything that's been going on with Boeing,
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: why should a company that's making so much money, why
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: should people who have saved up for an airline ticket
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: to go to Disney World or visit their sick relative...
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: Be the ones who are put out. And so I
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: just to me, this feels like, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: This is a yes.
• 31:42
  Speaker 6: All of it.
• 31:42
  Speaker 3: Yes, yes.
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: So the question, I guess, again, is like by Election Day,
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: I imagine we'll be talking about sort of higher stakes issues,
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: more thematic issues like abortion access, like the future of democracy.
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: What do you think? Do you think Joe Biden should
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: be running a bunch of ads in October about how,
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: you know, Joe Biden stuck it to United on your behalf?
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: Or you think it's going to be, you know, all
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: row by that time?
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: They should be fighting on every front, right? Because, Tommy,
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: people are motivated by all different kinds of things to
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: show up at the polls on Election Day. So, yes,
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: there are people who will be super motivated to save democracy.
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: There are people who understand that every vote is a
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: potential vote to bring back Roe. And so, you know,
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: I think that they can't take anything for granted and
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: they should have a strategy for each of these issues.
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah. So also this week, President Biden signed the bill
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: that would ban TikTok if ByteDance, the parent company to TikTok,
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: doesn't sell it within the next year. Casey Newton, great
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: reporter for Platformer, wrote an interesting piece about just how
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: much legal risk there actually is for the government's case here.
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: The gist is that TikTok is likely to have a
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: strong First Amendment argument against getting banned. The Supreme Court
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: has previously found that Congress can't ban foreign propaganda, including
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: specifically Chinese propaganda. So they'll have a case. Casey also
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: points out that the government's other argument, which will be
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: about Data privacy could also be weak given that the
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: United States doesn't have any kind of national data privacy law.
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: So the suggestion that, you know, banning TikTok will fix
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: that is silly. Like China could just go out and
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: buy some data from data brokers. So let's just big picture.
• 33:14
  Speaker 6: Where do you.
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: Land on this decision, whether it's the right or the
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: wrong thing? Like I get obviously the national security concerns.
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: I also do feel very bad for people who built
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: a business on TikTok, who have big followings. or who
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: just rely on it for a sense of community that
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: they just can't find where they live.
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: Well, Tommy, first and foremost, couldn't we find something else
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: to ban? Like, I don't know, assault weapons?
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: That would be great. I'd rather do that.
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: Let's ban assault weapons.
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: That's a good idea.
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: I mean, honestly, look, I'm a dinosaur, but I love TikTok.
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: Once I discovered TikTok, I was like, this is incredible.
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: All the Gen X videos, the sea shanty singing, like,
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: I love it. And so I feel like there has
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: to be a third way. And there really kind of is, right?
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: Like TikTok has, I think it's like 170 or 150
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: million US users. So someone's going to buy it? I mean,
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: come on. Because right, that is the issue. It will
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: be banned if it is not bought by someone in
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: the US. And so I mean, I don't know. I
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: guess I'm not too worked up about it. This feels
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: like something that's going to get resolved because there are
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: like 170 million people here who love it. And, you know?
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: I'm hopeful, too. I mean, there's a Reuters report out
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: today where they talked to a bunch of sources at
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: TikTok that say that they would rather exit the U.S.
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: market than sell it because ultimately they feel like the
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: algorithm is the secret sauce of TikTok. And their algorithm
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: is actually associated with a bunch of other bite dance
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: companies that we don't use that are used in China.
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: I don't know that I necessarily buy that.
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: I don't buy that.
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: The U.S. market's a lot of cash, man, and I
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: think a lot of people want to be here. But
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: just to take on the congressional and the administration's argument,
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: I mean, I've obviously not seen any of the intelligence
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: that elected officials saw. It sounds like it was pretty compelling.
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: We had Katie Porter in here who saw the intelligence,
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: thought it was compelling, but thought the government hadn't made
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: the case yet. I mean, the government's concerns are twofold.
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: There's The question about data privacy and whether the Chinese
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: Communist Party could go to ByteDance and say, I need
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: this person's, what, keystroke log or something. And then there's
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: the question about whether TikTok could be used as a
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: propaganda tool to shape U.S. public opinion. The public opinion
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: question is interesting to me because there's an organization called
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: Network Contagion Research Institute at Rutgers University. They looked at
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: popular hashtags and search terms. So some of them were
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: like Taylor Swift or Trump. And they found that There
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: were basically two Instagram posts for every one TikTok posts
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: about those topics. But when you got to topics that
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: were banned in China, the ratio changed. So it was
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: eight to one when it came to the Uyghurs. So
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: eight posts on Instagram to one post on TikTok. 30
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: to one for Tibet. 57 to one for Tiananmen Square.
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: 174 to one for the Hong Kong protests. So you're
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: picking up what I'm putting down here.
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: Picking up what you're putting down.
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: Stuff the Chinese Communist Party doesn't like. ain't going viral
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: on TikTok. So look, your broader point is a good one. Like,
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: I hope that Congress doesn't look at this and just
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: decide like, great work, boys and girls. We just, we
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: solve social media, right? Because our issues are not TikTok.
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: It's about data privacy, protecting kids, understanding the mental health
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: impact of social media, especially on young girls. So this
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: is way bigger than TikTok, but this sort of anti-China
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: sentiment allowed them to pass the first major tech regulation in, what,
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: a decade? Yeah.
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: And you know, the other thing, though, Tommy, I was
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: going to say is that, you know, going back to 2020, Microsoft,
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: because this has come up before, right? And so back
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: in 2020, Microsoft was getting together with Walmart and they
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: were like, you know, let's do this. And then that
• 37:05
  Speaker 2: didn't happen. But like, here's the one thing that makes
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: me a little nervous. is it's kind of like careful
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: what you wish for. Because one of the people putting
• 37:12
  Speaker 2: together a bid right now with multiple investors to buy
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: TikTok is Steve Mnuchin.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: Former Treasury Secretary for Donald Trump. Yeah, he's probably going
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: to get some Saudi money in there too. Right.
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: So, you know, it's just, it's kind of like, okay,
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: if the, even though I was a little bit light
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: in saying, you know, I think that someone's obviously going
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: to buy it, there are like real roadblocks to that too,
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: because it couldn't A Meta trying to acquire it would
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: probably not get approval. That would probably be seen as problematic.
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: Same with Amazon. So it will require probably someone like
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: a Steve Mnuchin to put together the money. But then
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: can you say, well, we don't want Steve. It wouldn't
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: be Steve Mnuchin owning it, but it's still not great.
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: No, that's a really good point because you're right. The
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: companies that can afford it would have antitrust issues. So
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: you are probably looking at some hodgepodge of investors with
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: big backing. And someone like Steve Mnookin would, yeah, I
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: don't want him with the keys to the algorithm either.
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: So Donald Trump's trying to use this for political advantage, obviously.
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: On Monday, he truthed, quote, just so everyone knows, especially
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: young people, crooked Joe Biden is responsible for banning TikTok. Accurate,
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: but not subtle. So Trump clearly thinks the ban can
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: give him a political advantage with young people. The argument
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: he's making is obviously complicated by the fact that in 2020,
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: Trump himself issued an executive order trying to ban TikTok.
• 38:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: That EO was later blocked in court by a judge
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: that Trump had appointed. How much political risk do you
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: think this TikTok ban creates for Biden?
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: I don't think it's that much risk because it's weirdly
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: the issue that's like united Democrats and Republicans. So I
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: don't think it's great for Biden, but I do think
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: that that gives him some cover.
• 38:55
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: There was a little bit of polling on this back
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: in the day. So there was 38% support for banning TikTok,
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: 27% opposed in a poll in December of 2023. But
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: the support number had dropped from 50% in March of
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: 2023 to 38%. So it was going down. But to
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: your point about this actually united Republicans and Democrats for once,
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: that's because the only thing that seems to unite these
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: guys is kind of Cold War 2.0 anti-China sentiment, right?
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: And if Biden makes this part of a broader message
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: about getting tough on China and says Trump is weak
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: because he wanted to let, you know, the CCP keep
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: their propaganda tool in the U.S. and keep your kid
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: hooked on it. I mean, that could be a powerful argument, too.
• 39:37
  Speaker 4: Totally.
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: It's also weird that they passed this thing in seven weeks.
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: That is like lightning fast introduction to passage.
• 39:43
  Speaker 2: Like like you can't get like hurricane disaster funding that fast.
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: Last question.
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: Or at all sometimes.
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Or another problem. So last thing, last thing on
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: this list, the Biden campaign says it's going to keep
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: using TikTok even though they're banning it through the election.
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: They're putting in some sort of enhanced security measures. Does
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: that bother you? You think anyone cares?
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: I don't think anyone really cares. I don't really care.
• 40:11
  Speaker 2: But I think the bigger question is like, what are
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: the enhanced security measures and can we get them?
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: Right. And also, I mean, if they think TikTok is
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: juicing the algorithm now, what's going to happen when Joe
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: Biden is trying to post stuff on it later?
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: So I feel it's kind of like, whatever, do what
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: you got to do right now.
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: That's how I feel. Do what you got to do
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: to win. Two quick things before we go to break. One,
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: Patsy of America is hitting the road this summer. The
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: Democracy or Else book tour begins in Brooklyn on June 26th,
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: followed by Boston on June 28th. We're also going to Madison, Wisconsin, Phoenix,
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: Ann Arbor, and Philly. So come see us. You can
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: find all the tour dates and get tickets at crooked.com
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: slash events. Also, if you loved Alyssa Mastromonaco on this episode,
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: and of course you did, Make sure you tune in
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: to Hysteria, where she and Aaron Ryan cover everything from
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: abortion rights to the weird interaction they had with the
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: dude in the parking lot to politics to culture and more. Also,
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: check out Hysteria on YouTube. Their This Fucking Guy series
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: is incredible and blown up on YouTube. New episodes of
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: Hysteria drop every Thursday. Make sure you subscribe wherever you
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: get your podcasts. All right. Last topic here. So we
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: talked on our live show on Sunday about the Trump
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: VP hunt, the selection process. You didn't get to weigh in.
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: So I wanted to pick your brain on this and
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: then just do some Alyssa story time. So who are
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: you putting your money on right now in terms of
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: the potential VP candidates? Who's your favorite?
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: Who did you put your money on? I got to know.
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: I mean, I tried to stir the pot a little bit.
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: So I said Tulsi Gabbard could be interesting in terms
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: of just like generating a story, bringing on someone who
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: was once a Democrat, showing that you're bipartisan. I don't
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: think that's a good idea. I wouldn't do it if
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: I were him, but.
• 42:00
  Speaker 3: No.
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: See, I think that for Trump, like, look, he has
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: so much legal trouble right now. He's going to draw
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: this out as long as humanly possible. He is going
• 42:12
  Speaker 2: to wait until he feels the tidal wave a coming
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: with one of his legal things, and then he's going
• 42:17
  Speaker 2: to throw this into the universe. And I have to say,
• 42:19
  Speaker 2: if I picked someone, because, you know, he loves a
• 42:22
  Speaker 2: beauty pageant. He loves central casting. He loves all of it.
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: I'm going with Kristi Noem.
• 42:26
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: I think Erin was there too.
• 42:29
  Speaker 5: Was she?
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: Okay. She and I actually have not talked about it.
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: Kristi Noem fits the bill. She is attractive, which matters
• 42:35
  Speaker 2: to him. You know, I think South Dakota's had a
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: Republican governor since like 2015 or something like that. So,
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: you know, and Lieutenant Governor anyway. So there's no like risk.
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: It wouldn't be like a Carrie Lake situation. So yeah,
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: I'm going to go with Kristi Noem.
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: That's good. I mean, you know, sticking in the region,
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: Doug Burgum could be your pick and he could write
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: you like an unlimited check. Because I think if you're
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: on the ticket, you can write as much as you
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: want to yourself and he's worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: So there's that. But you're right. I mean, Trump, look,
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: he's a lot of things.
• 43:07
  Speaker 2: She's a little abortion fairy dust too, right? It's like
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: she's a woman.
• 43:11
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 43:12
  Speaker 2: Which to him is like, will sell to people that
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: he maybe isn't as bad as he says he is.
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: But You know, I think there's a little like, look,
• 43:18
  Speaker 2: I can't be that bad. I've got a woman with me.
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that is absolutely the case. And he views it
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: all as sort of optics and, you know, so-and-so's from
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: central casting. You're right that he is, look, the guy's
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: good at manipulating the press. He doesn't care about lying.
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: So he's going to drag this out. He's going to
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: leak a short list. He's going to add people. He's
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: going to remove people. He's going to say, dance for me.
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: He's going to elevate their profiles. Yeah. And like, it
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: makes sense because, you know, if he sends Vivek Ramaswamy
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: to a state to campaign for him, that's one thing.
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: But if Vivek goes out and campaigns for you in
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: a swing state and you leak in advance that he
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: could be the vice presidential nominee that's going to get
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: more attention, he's going to raise more money for you, right?
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: Like there's no downside for Trump.
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: No, none whatsoever. And he can honestly let this go
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: as long as he wants to. It really, he can just,
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: he can do it whenever the spirit moves him.
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: Float away until the convention. OK, so Alyssa, you oversaw
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: the VP selection process in two different campaigns, both for
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: John Kerry and for Barack Obama. Let's start with Kerry.
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: How did he view the process? And like, given that
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: literally every political reporter in the country is desperate to
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: break this news, tell us about some of the cloak
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: and dagger shit you had to do to keep it secret.
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: So it's funny, because of the Kerry days, it's how
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: Jeff Zeleny and I became friends, because he's always been
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: on the VP beat. We were both little babies back then.
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: CNN reporter, then New York Times, I believe.
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: Then New York Times. And so, you know, I worked
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: for John Kerry back when Al Gore was considering him
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: as a running mate in 2000. And Gore did this
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: thing that was like a little uncool, where he wanted
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: Joe Lieberman to be the big surprise. And so there
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: was a lot of leaking that it was going to
• 44:55
  Speaker 2: be John Kerry. And I was like, with John Kerry
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: when it was announced that it was Joe Lieberman. And
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: it was not great. And so when it was, it was,
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: you know, it's like you understood kind of what Gore
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: was doing, but it really informed how John Kerry wanted
• 45:11
  Speaker 2: to run the process. And then when he became the
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: nominee in 2004, and he was like, I never want
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: anyone to feel the way that I felt. And so Alyssa,
• 45:20
  Speaker 2: since you were like there with me, I want you
• 45:22
  Speaker 2: to do this. And I want it to be such
• 45:25
  Speaker 2: a secret. literally, Tommy, we did such cloak and dagger
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: stuff that people, reporters, thought there was a period of
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: time before the convention, I think, John Kerry was getting
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: a little work done on his teeth, and all the
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: reporters were convinced that the meetings were actually happening in
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: the dentist's office until they saw his new teeth. But
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: we were doing, I mean, we had Bob Graham, I
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: ate Chinese food with Bob Graham, you know, Senator of
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: then senator from Florida, he had this diary, remember, that everyone,
• 46:00
  Speaker 2: he would write everything, everything he ate in the diary.
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: So we were waiting for John Kerry and he was
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: like writing down. And my friend who used to work
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: for him, she's like, girl, you and that Chinese food
• 46:10
  Speaker 2: order are now in the diary.
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: So you were just hanging out with him somewhere?
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: I hung out with all of these people for like,
• 46:16
  Speaker 2: because the thing is, the way we would do it,
• 46:18
  Speaker 2: say John Kerry, good example was Tom Vilsack. He was
• 46:22
  Speaker 2: meeting with then governor of Iowa, Tom Vilsack. So if
• 46:26
  Speaker 2: Carrie was going to meet with Vilsack, let's say 5
• 46:28
  Speaker 2: o'clock in the afternoon, I'm getting Vilsack into the hotel
• 46:32
  Speaker 2: upstairs with the full baseball hat, the whole thing, like
• 46:37
  Speaker 2: three hours earlier. So I had the loveliest conversation with
• 46:41
  Speaker 2: Tom Vilsack. He was like, tell me about yourself. Because
• 46:44
  Speaker 2: I think he actually went to school in upstate New York.
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: So all of these people, it was like Bob Graham–
• 46:51
  Speaker 2: the reporters figured out that John Kerry, they thought John
• 46:55
  Speaker 2: Kerry was meeting with someone. I physically pushed that man
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: into a car and threw his jacket over his head
• 47:00
  Speaker 2: and was like, go, go, go. It was like my
• 47:03
  Speaker 2: little Olivia Pope moment. I was like, I can't believe it.
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: You're like kidnapping him, basically.
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: Totally. And so the thing about it is, of all
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: the people John Kerry met, we met them all over
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: the country. We brought people to unexpected sort of locations
• 47:16
  Speaker 2: where no one would see them like at the airport
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: and think, oh, like, why is so-and-so here? And then like,
• 47:24
  Speaker 2: when we announced John Edwards, nobody knew, like nobody had
• 47:28
  Speaker 2: an idea that it was going to be John Edwards.
• 47:31
  Speaker 2: None of the meetings leaked in 2004.
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: That is an amazing accomplishment, truly, for people to understand.
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: I mean, like everyone is watching this process and there's
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: a lot of people read into it and keeping that
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: from leaking is amazing. How did Obama's process differ from Kerry's?
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: So it actually didn't differ much at all. He had
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: fewer meetings with people than Kerry did. Kerry, I think
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: I personally was there for like five or six meetings
• 47:55
  Speaker 2: with Kerry. And with Obama, I think he did three.
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: And the thing is, things had come a long way
• 48:01
  Speaker 2: since then, especially because Jeff Zeleny had been iterating. He's like,
• 48:04
  Speaker 2: let's look at airports. Let's see where people are flying
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: in and out of to the point that it wasn't
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden who one of the people, it might've been
• 48:14
  Speaker 2: Evan Bayh, someone that Barack Obama was meeting with, I
• 48:17
  Speaker 2: was like flying them into a different city's airport so
• 48:20
  Speaker 2: that they couldn't, I think we used like East Philadelphia airport. Oh,
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: it might've been Joe Biden. We used East Philadelphia airport
• 48:26
  Speaker 2: for Axelrod, David Axelrod and David Plouffe to go see
• 48:28
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden. Like even staff members who were going to
• 48:31
  Speaker 2: see some of these candidates, we were being super like
• 48:35
  Speaker 2: trusting nothing because everybody had sort of picked up on
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: the tricks, you know, because I was like very.
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: Were these guys tracking the tail numbers of private planes?
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: Or are you talking about like sending a staffer to
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: a public airport in the wrong city?
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: They were tracking, because at this point, no one's flying
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: commercial for this sort of stuff. They were tracking tail
• 48:56
  Speaker 2: numbers to and from, you know, if there had been
• 48:59
  Speaker 2: rumors of, you know, Tim Kaine, for example. People are
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: checking the DC airports. They're checking the Richmond airports. You know,
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: I think we actually busted– I think one of our colleagues, Ted,
• 49:12
  Speaker 2: busted Tim Kaine out of his house without his family
• 49:15
  Speaker 2: even knowing. you know, because Barack Obama, the thing that
• 49:18
  Speaker 2: then Senate, then Senator Obama felt was that what John
• 49:22
  Speaker 2: Kerry did was so honorable, right? Because you want to
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: have the freedom to have conversations with people, but then
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: not have them be humiliated for having agreed to be
• 49:32
  Speaker 2: part of the process, right? Like nobody wants to be like,
• 49:34
  Speaker 2: oh yeah, like I didn't make the cut. And so
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: I think that that was very respectful. And then if
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: you look at Donald Trump, he has done the exact
• 49:46
  Speaker 2: opposite of anyone ever. This is just a apprentice-like beauty pageant,
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: which I, even for Republicans, I just think is really,
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: that's like sad. It's like mean.
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: To your point about the kind of giving these people
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: some proper respect, I mean, you're not only... holding out
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: the hope that you might be the next vice president
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: of the United States, you are asked to turn over
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: all your financial details, these like unbelievably intrusive vetting forms.
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's like a security clearance on steroids, right?
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: I mean, like hundreds and hundreds of pages, everything you've
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: ever done that might possibly be leaked to the press
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: and be embarrassing to the campaign.
• 50:27
  Speaker 6: Totally.
• 50:27
  Speaker 2: There was one story So for the Obama search, I
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: was in the headquarters the whole time. I had people
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: who I totally trusted who were out in the field
• 50:37
  Speaker 2: sort of making these meetings happen. But the best phone
• 50:40
  Speaker 2: call I got was from one of our dear friends, Jess,
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: who was like, AM, Joe Biden. He had aviators on
• 50:49
  Speaker 2: and a baseball hat and he got off the plane
• 50:51
  Speaker 2: before I was there. And there was like a tour
• 50:54
  Speaker 2: group that had come on a chartered flight into, I
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: think we did the Biden meeting in Minneapolis. And all
• 51:01
  Speaker 2: of these like older Americans are like on a bus
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: and see Joe Biden. And she was so worried that
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: we'd been busted because him trying to look incognito was
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: actually like a beacon of Biden-ness.
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: Just looked like himself. Yeah.
• 51:14
  Speaker 2: Totally.
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: You know, you gotta give him some different glasses next time. Yeah,
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: I mean, my final memory of that whole process list
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: was just like the night before trying to go to bed.
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: I had my phone on and like reporters were just
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: like rolling calls into my cell phone. It's like, guys,
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to answer this. I'm not going to
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: tell you who it is. I don't even know myself.
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: I know there's three speeches. No, I knew there were
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: three speeches.
• 51:35
  Speaker 2: There were three speeches. I didn't even know until I
• 51:39
  Speaker 2: had to have the charter company on hold. And I
• 51:44
  Speaker 2: just got the airport. That was all I was told.
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: And it was just a couple of hours in advance.
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: So a couple hours in advance. You don't even know
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: who's getting on the plane you chartered. That's how secret
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: it was.
• 51:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Someone bring me back. I want to do it again.
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: Yeah. In hindsight, it was very fun. I mean, I
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: think the final question is, I mean, I think what
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: I'm wondering is, does Donald Trump really want to do
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: something interesting? Does he really want to shake things up?
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: Or does he just want someone who won't outshine him,
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: who won't cause problems? And he's going to be like,
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: all right, J.D.
• 52:10
  Speaker 4: Vance.
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: Probably. I mean, I think that here's the problem with
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: Trump is that because nothing he does is genuine or
• 52:17
  Speaker 2: guided by logic or reason, we have no idea why
• 52:20
  Speaker 2: he's going to end up picking someone. I mean, he
• 52:23
  Speaker 2: could be around the MyPillow guy who's going to be like,
• 52:26
  Speaker 2: pick J.D. Vance, you'll win Ohio. He's so susceptible to
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: any sort of counsel.
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: Last person you heard.
• 52:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that it'll be interesting. But for some reason, I
• 52:37
  Speaker 2: really do think he's going to pick a woman.
• 52:39
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: Well, we will, I'm sure, be talking about this again.
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: But Alyssa, thank you so much for hosting today. Thank
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: you again to Leah Littman. I had a blast. Let's
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: do it again soon.
• 52:48
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• 52:56
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• 53:00
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  Speaker 6: a review. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production.
• 53:14
  Speaker 6: Our show is produced by Olivia Martinez and David Toledo.
• 53:17
  Speaker 6: Our associate producers are Saul Rubin and Farah Safari. Kira
• 53:20
  Speaker 6: Wakim is our senior producer. Reid Cherlin is our executive producer.
• 53:24
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• 53:27
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• 53:30
  Speaker 6: Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Writing support by Hallie Kiefer. Madeline
• 53:34
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• 53:36
  Speaker 6: is our head of production. Andy Taft is our executive assistant.
• 53:40
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