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“The coronavirus debate.” · Pod Save America

• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: I'm Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Vitor.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Later on today's pod, Tommy talks to California Congresswoman, National Treasure,
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: Katie Porter.
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: Can I just pause for a second and say the
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: 30 minutes I spent talking with Congresswoman Katie Porter is
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: the best I've felt in like three days.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Now I'm really excited to listen.
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: Which is nice. Look, she's not like, she didn't invent
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: a cure. I hate to break it to everybody, but
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: she is so competent and thoughtful. And it's just nice
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: to know that people like that are in government and
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: hopefully Mnookin and others will listen to him.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: Sorry.
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: Excellent. No, that's great.
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: But first, before that, we're going to talk about the
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: debate last night between Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders, as
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: well as all the latest developments around the coronavirus crisis
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: that has now brought the entire world to a standstill.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: But first, Lovett, how was the show? Everything sounds weird,
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: doesn't it?
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: Hannah and her mother. independently texted me saying how funny
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: it was.
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: Oh, really?
• 1:10
  Speaker 4: That's so nice.
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: It's a great, great episode.
• 1:13
  Speaker 4: We did an in-studio episode with no audience. We're mixing
• 1:18
  Speaker 4: it up. We called people in their homes to ask
• 1:21
  Speaker 4: them what they were doing to prep for Corona and
• 1:22
  Speaker 4: the strangest thing they bought. We are Paul Scheer.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: What was the strangest thing that someone bought?
• 1:28
  Speaker 4: Someone bought cheese cloths so they can convert their milk
• 1:30
  Speaker 4: into soft cheese. She said ricotta, but it's probably going
• 1:34
  Speaker 4: to be cottage cheese. That was weird.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: That one didn't translate.
• 1:40
  Speaker 4: Paul Scheer came, and it was a really good sport.
• 1:42
  Speaker 4: Rachel Bonetta and Retina Fruckbaum, who have their new show,
• 1:45
  Speaker 4: Hall of Shame, were on. So anyway, we're going to
• 1:48
  Speaker 4: be adapting the format and experimenting by calling people in
• 1:52
  Speaker 4: their homes, uh, to be on the show because we
• 1:53
  Speaker 4: don't have the audience.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: I love that. Social distancing, love or leave it. Um, also,
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: if you want to know more about coronavirus from an expert, Dr.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: Abdul El-Saeed is back to give us updates on the
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: coronavirus crisis and everything you need to know in America
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: Dissected Coronavirus. It's calm, factual, and in language that you
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: can understand. There will be new episodes on Tuesdays and Fridays.
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: You can subscribe to America Dissected on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher,
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Um, Also, a
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: quick note from us on 2020. We would have already
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: passed the coronavirus economic relief bill, were it not for
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: Mitch McConnell taking the long weekend off. He was at
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: an event with his buddy Brett Kavanaugh, which is just
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: one more reason why the Democrats have to flip the
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Senate in November. You can help do that by donating
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: to our Get Mitch or Die Trying Fund, where the
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: money goes to the eventual Democratic nominee in 10 of
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: the most competitive races. Here are the 10 most competitive
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: races in our view as of now. Arizona, Colorado, Maine,
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: North Carolina, Montana, Kansas, Iowa, Georgia, Alabama, and Michigan. For example,
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: this is how this works. When North Carolina Democrat Cal
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: Cunningham won his Senate primary the other week, we sent
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: him a check for $ 66, 000. Thanks to all of you listeners,
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: all of you Crooked Media fans. So if you can,
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: please donate at votesaveamerica.com slash getmitch.
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: Fun name feels a little literal at this point, but
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: you know, I get it. I get the spirit. Get Mitch.
• 3:20
  Speaker 4: Get Mitch or.
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: Just get Mitch.
• 3:23
  Speaker 4: Just get Mitch. Okay.
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: Let's get to the news. The first and potentially last
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: one-on-one Democratic debate of 2020 between Joe Biden and Bernie
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: Sanders was like nothing we've ever seen before. The coronavirus
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: emergency forced CNN and Univision to move the debate from
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: Phoenix to a nearly empty studio in Washington where the
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: two candidates and three moderators were six feet apart at
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: all times, as the three of us are now.
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: Around our table.
• 3:48
  Speaker 5: Um.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: And except for the beginning of the debate when Biden
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: and Sanders walked out and bumped elbows.
• 3:56
  Speaker 4: The new first base.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: Well, let's start there. Before we get into all the substance,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: what did you guys think of the highly unusual setting
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: and format?
• 4:10
  Speaker 4: You know, it was a I felt for everyone involved.
• 4:14
  Speaker 4: It was a debate that they shouldn't cancel, but couldn't have.
• 4:18
  Speaker 4: It had to be about one topic, but couldn't just
• 4:20
  Speaker 4: be about one topic. They had to be serious while
• 4:23
  Speaker 4: at the same time they are competitors. And even though
• 4:26
  Speaker 4: the dynamics in this primary have shifted dramatically before coronavirus
• 4:30
  Speaker 4: took over the news, they're still looking to draw contrast
• 4:34
  Speaker 4: with each other while recognizing both the state of the
• 4:36
  Speaker 4: race and the state of the country. So it was
• 4:37
  Speaker 4: just a sort of impossible situation.
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: It was nice to see two competent, empathetic, decent human
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: beings on the stage talking about politics. That's been missing
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: from my life for about three years. My brain certainly
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: oscillated between, okay, obviously this has to happen. These guys
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: have to debate. We have to end this primary at
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: some point. Between that and, what the fuck are we doing?
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: They're 70 plus years old. Get them in a bubble.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: Don't let them leave the home. I know that's a
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: little irrational, but that's where my brain is. No, it
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: was good.
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: Look, no audience, a plus for me.
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: No audience ever.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: We've been saying this for a long time now, and
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: I would do more debates without audiences because... it reduces
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: the amount of canned applause lines you try to get
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: off as a candidate. I thought that the moderators did
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: a great job.
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: I agree.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: For exactly what Lovett was talking about, it's very hard
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: to have a debate that is, all we're talking about
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: is coronavirus, rightly so, but you can't have a debate
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: for two hours only about coronavirus and the economic fallout.
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: I mean, maybe you could. There's enough to talk about,
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: but they had to cover other things. And I thought
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: that the whole crew did a great job with that. Yeah,
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: you're right. It was sort of, at times, Bernie and
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: Biden looked like panelists in the Situation Room, just the
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: way the camera, because there was a skeleton crew there,
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: which there should have been for everyone's health and safety.
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: But yeah, there were a lot of odd, odd parts
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: of it. Yeah.
• 5:56
  Speaker 4: And also just forget even just the fact that we're
• 5:59
  Speaker 4: all focused on one issue. We're all focused on one
• 6:01
  Speaker 4: issue that is immediate. And the nature of a presidential
• 6:03
  Speaker 4: debate is in some sense hypothetical. We're talking to two
• 6:05
  Speaker 4: people who may be in charge next year. And we
• 6:10
  Speaker 4: have a crisis right now. And you know, Biden put
• 6:13
  Speaker 4: out a plan and his plan is about what he'd do,
• 6:16
  Speaker 4: not as, not just as president, but what should be
• 6:17
  Speaker 4: happening right now and good for them. But inevitably, the
• 6:20
  Speaker 4: more specific you get with these two people, uh, the
• 6:23
  Speaker 4: further away you are from the, like the real lived
• 6:26
  Speaker 4: experience of the country right now.
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: It's just one, it is so funny to think like
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: initially debates were just like candidates in a studio debating
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: issues conversational.
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: Why have we gotten to a point? Why are we
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: now at a place where it's giant auditoriums with like
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: stupid hype videos beforehand and, Like, warm-up acts, voice of God. Like,
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: we don't need that shit.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: It's made for TV.
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: It's corporate money-making in the form of a debate.
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: And it makes it seem sillier than it should be.
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: And it makes it seem like more of a show
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: than it should be. There was a gravity to last
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: night that I think, you know, you sometimes get that
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: level of gravity at the presidential debates and the general election.
• 7:00
  Speaker 4: Yes, you do.
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: Because they usually ask the audiences during those debates to
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: be quiet, and sometimes they are.
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: You're right. Sometimes.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: But the primary debates, both on the Republican and Democratic side,
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: are usually rowdy bullshit, which we've had for a while,
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: especially that South Carolina audience. It is sort of a.
• 7:15
  Speaker 4: Wake-up call about the glib way we've been doing things
• 7:19
  Speaker 4: for a long time. Yeah.
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: So the debate appropriately started with a question about what
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: each candidate would do to respond to the current public
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: health crisis. Let's take a listen to their answers.
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: There are three pieces to this.
• 7:28
  Speaker 6: First of all, I have to take care of those
• 7:30
  Speaker 6: who in fact are exposed or likely to be exposed.
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: To the virus.
• 7:35
  Speaker 6: And that means we have to do testing. We have
• 7:37
  Speaker 6: to get the testing kits up and ready. I would
• 7:39
  Speaker 6: have the World Health Organization. I take advantage of the
• 7:41
  Speaker 6: test kits they have available to us. Even though the
• 7:44
  Speaker 6: president says a million or more are coming, let's just
• 7:46
  Speaker 6: get all the tests we can done as quickly as
• 7:49
  Speaker 6: we can. Secondly, I would make sure that every state
• 7:51
  Speaker 6: in the union had at least 10 places where they
• 7:54
  Speaker 6: had drive-through testing arrangements. I would also, at this point,
• 7:58
  Speaker 6: deal with the need to begin to plan for the
• 8:01
  Speaker 6: need for additional hospital beds. We have that capacity in
• 8:04
  Speaker 6: the Department of Defense, as well as with the FEMA.
• 8:09
  Speaker 6: And they can set up 100-bed, 500-bed hospitals in tents quickly.
• 8:13
  Speaker 6: We have to lay all that out. But we have
• 8:14
  Speaker 6: to deal with the economic fallout quickly. And that means
• 8:17
  Speaker 6: making sure the people who, in fact, lose their job,
• 8:20
  Speaker 6: don't get a paycheck, can't pay their mortgage are able
• 8:23
  Speaker 6: to pay it and pay them now and do it now.
• 8:26
  Speaker 6: Small businesses be able to borrow interest-free loans.
• 8:29
  Speaker 5: What we have got to do is move aggressively to
• 8:31
  Speaker 5: make sure that every person in this country finally understands
• 8:37
  Speaker 5: that when they get sick with the coronavirus, that they will,
• 8:42
  Speaker 5: that all payments will be made, that they don't have
• 8:45
  Speaker 5: to worry about coming up with money for testing, They
• 8:49
  Speaker 5: don't have to worry about coming up with money for treatment.
• 8:52
  Speaker 5: This is an unprecedented moment in American history. Now, I
• 8:55
  Speaker 5: obviously believe in Medicare for all. I will fight for
• 8:59
  Speaker 5: that as president. But right now, in this emergency... I
• 9:02
  Speaker 5: want every person in this country to understand that when
• 9:05
  Speaker 5: you get sick, you go to the doctor. When you
• 9:08
  Speaker 5: get sick, if you have the virus, that will be
• 9:10
  Speaker 5: paid for.
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: Do not worry.
• 9:12
  Speaker 5: About the cost right now because we're in the middle
• 9:14
  Speaker 5: of a national emergency. Second of all, we have to
• 9:17
  Speaker 5: make sure that our hospitals have the ventilators that they need,
• 9:20
  Speaker 5: have the ICU units that they need. Right now, we
• 9:23
  Speaker 5: have a lack of medical personnel. And I worry very
• 9:26
  Speaker 5: much that if there is a peak, whether we have
• 9:29
  Speaker 5: the capability of dealing with with hundreds of thousands of
• 9:32
  Speaker 5: people who may be in hospitals. So we need unprecedented
• 9:36
  Speaker 5: action right now to deal with the unprecedented crisis. And
• 9:39
  Speaker 5: bottom line, from an economic point of view, what we
• 9:42
  Speaker 5: have got to say to the American people, if you
• 9:44
  Speaker 5: lose your job, you will be made whole. You're not
• 9:47
  Speaker 5: going to lose income. If Trump can put, or the
• 9:51
  Speaker 5: Fed can put a trillion and a half into the
• 9:53
  Speaker 5: banking system, we can protect the wages of every worker
• 9:56
  Speaker 5: in America.
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: What do you guys think of those answers?
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: I mean, I thought they were both good, right? I mean,
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: Biden spoke to the urgency of the moment, and he
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: wants to focus for now on the crisis at hand.
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: So we have to stop the spread. We need to
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: make sure that no one has to pay for testing,
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: that no one goes bankrupt because of the coronavirus or
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: no one gets evicted. then we can get to the
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: big structural issues. Bernie reminds me of the old Rahm
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: Emanuel line, never let a crisis go to waste. And
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: he's saying, yes, we need to deal with this urgently
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: and stop the coronavirus. But what it's showing is how
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: broken our health care system is, how broken our economy
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: is when the average family couldn't pay a $ 400 bill
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: without risking going bankrupt. And so he is making a
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: broader argument for systemic change to our economy, to our
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: health care system because of this virus. Now, I can't
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: really tell you which is more compelling to the average
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: person because my bias is bleeding into how I view things, right?
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: I mean, I have a flexible job. I have healthcare.
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: And so I don't know how this sounds to someone
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: who does not have those things. But my guess is
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: that most people are scared shitless and they just want
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: to hear someone tell them what they're going to do
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: to fix it.
• 11:05
  Speaker 4: I thought they both... I'll say this. I've been incredibly
• 11:08
  Speaker 4: critical of Joe Biden. And even when there have been
• 11:11
  Speaker 4: people saying that Joe Biden did well at a debate,
• 11:13
  Speaker 4: I have been the very first to say everyone is
• 11:15
  Speaker 4: grading Joe Biden on a curve. And I honestly don't
• 11:18
  Speaker 4: think you need to grade Joe Biden on a curve.
• 11:20
  Speaker 4: I think he was incredibly strong. That answer he gave
• 11:23
  Speaker 4: was incredibly strong. We would be fortunate if either one
• 11:27
  Speaker 4: of these two men was president right now and the
• 11:28
  Speaker 4: teams that they would assemble. And the truth is what
• 11:31
  Speaker 4: they are both describing is right. Joe Biden is right.
• 11:35
  Speaker 4: This is the emergency. This is what we have to do.
• 11:37
  Speaker 4: To Bernie's credit, he made a point in that response saying,
• 11:40
  Speaker 4: this is what I'm for a long haul, but we
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: need to basically do some of those things immediately to
• 11:45
  Speaker 4: relieve people if they're worried right now, which I really appreciated.
• 11:48
  Speaker 4: But the point that Bernie kept coming back to over
• 11:50
  Speaker 4: and over again was the way we're addressing this crisis
• 11:54
  Speaker 4: that's facing everybody is the kind of crisis that hits
• 11:57
  Speaker 4: people on an individual level all the time, all the time.
• 12:00
  Speaker 4: And I do think there are some.
• 12:03
  Speaker 4: I am very sympathetic to a lot of Bernie supporters
• 12:05
  Speaker 4: for like, this is what we're talking about now to
• 12:07
  Speaker 4: address this crisis, whether it's UBI or paid sick leave
• 12:11
  Speaker 4: or relieving people of their medical costs in the midst
• 12:13
  Speaker 4: of this emergency. That's the brokenness of our culture every
• 12:17
  Speaker 4: single day.
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting.
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: In that specific clip, I think Bernie did a great
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: job talking about the urgency of now. Throughout most of
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: the debate, you got the impression that he continued to
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: go back to Medicare for all and sort of the
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: structural weaknesses. And we'll hear him do that again on
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: the economy, which I get, you know, but like you said,
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: I mean, in a moment like this, I think people
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: are so focused on coronavirus and the urgent response. And
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: then Biden and Bernie get into a back and forth
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: a little bit after that, where Biden keeps saying everything
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: should be paid for medical wise right now, everything, all
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: the economic stuff should be taken care of right now.
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: This is an immediate crisis. And we can worry about
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: everything else later. And Bernie's you know, Bernie's argument is
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: we have to worry about it all at once. And
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: I think, I mean, look, realistically, Bernie becomes, if Bernie
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: somehow won and became president in January, like they wouldn't
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: pass Medicare for all in the midst of this crisis.
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: They wouldn't pass it not in the midst of this
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: crisis because they don't have the votes, right? But he
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: would take all the emergency steps required to get through
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: the crisis.
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think the weirdness of the debate
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: is I think that we are in a fundamentally different
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: political paradigm than we have ever been before. maybe since
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: the financial crisis or since 9-11. Yeah. And that debate
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: didn't necessarily adjust in terms of tone when we started
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: talking about votes from the 80s, votes from the 90s,
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: old positions and views. And so what I think I
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: wanted to hear as a scared human being is where
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: are the respirators, where are the ventilators, how are we
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: going to get more testing? And obviously none of these
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: individuals have any control over that, but hearing someone talk
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: about it in an urgent way made me feel a
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: little better.
• 13:52
  Speaker 4: It was interesting.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: A little bit later, Biden says, you know, Italy has
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: a single payer healthcare system and that didn't save them.
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: And I saw a lot of Bernie supporters, you know,
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: say that was a cheap shot and get upset about it.
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: And Biden wasn't saying, like Italy has a single payer
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: system and they're fucked. It was basically like, even with
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: a single payer system, even the countries that do have
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: Medicare for all or a single payer, they are still
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: being overwhelmed, not necessarily because of the makeup of their
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: healthcare system, but because a crisis like this overwhelms even
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: the best healthcare systems.
• 14:24
  Speaker 4: Part of this too is, you know, I, you know,
• 14:26
  Speaker 4: this is an, this is an emergency and Bernie is
• 14:28
  Speaker 4: talking about the larger systemic changes he thinks that are
• 14:30
  Speaker 4: important to be made. And, Maybe there's an argument that
• 14:33
  Speaker 4: that doesn't help Bernie Sanders become president in this moment.
• 14:36
  Speaker 4: But part of me thinks that's not what Bernie's worrying
• 14:37
  Speaker 4: about anymore. He is there. If there's a reason to
• 14:39
  Speaker 4: have this debate at all, if it exists, it is
• 14:42
  Speaker 4: to point out the differences that he feels with Joe Biden.
• 14:45
  Speaker 4: And the biggest difference to me is the the commitment
• 14:48
  Speaker 4: Bernie has made to systemic change as the core of
• 14:52
  Speaker 4: his argument. And the most the best thing maybe Bernie
• 14:54
  Speaker 4: Sanders can do on this platform now is agree with
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: Joe Biden on the steps we need to take right now,
• 14:59
  Speaker 4: but say, hey, everybody, when this is done, or even
• 15:01
  Speaker 4: as you're watching this unfold, remember some of the ghastly
• 15:05
  Speaker 4: ways we treat each other. And so I appreciate the
• 15:09
  Speaker 4: humanity of Bernie Sanders throughout this debate, even in the
• 15:11
  Speaker 4: moments where it got incredibly caustic. because they're human and
• 15:14
  Speaker 4: they're tired and they've been campaigning against each other for
• 15:16
  Speaker 4: a year.
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: So a little bit later, the candidates were asked about
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: the economic fallout of the pandemic. Biden once again talked
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: about the need for urgency, while Bernie talked about our
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: broader economic challenges. Here's a clip.
• 15:24
  Speaker 5: So the lesson to be learned is we have got
• 15:26
  Speaker 5: to move aggressively right now to address the economic crisis
• 15:31
  Speaker 5: as a result of Ebola. As a result, keep talking
• 15:34
  Speaker 5: about Ebola. You got Ebola in my head here right now.
• 15:36
  Speaker 5: As a result of the virus here, the coronavirus, What
• 15:40
  Speaker 5: we have got to do also is understand the fragility
• 15:44
  Speaker 5: of the economy and how unjust and unfair it is
• 15:48
  Speaker 5: that so few have so much and so many have
• 15:51
  Speaker 5: so little.
• 15:53
  Speaker 6: People are looking for results, not a revolution. They want
• 15:56
  Speaker 6: to deal with the results they need right now. And
• 15:59
  Speaker 6: we can do that by making sure that we make
• 16:02
  Speaker 6: everybody whole who has been so badly hurt in terms
• 16:06
  Speaker 6: of they lose the job, in terms of not having
• 16:09
  Speaker 6: the ability to care for their children, in terms of
• 16:11
  Speaker 6: the health care costs that they have related to this crisis,
• 16:14
  Speaker 6: we can make them whole.
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: Now.
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: Now.
• 16:18
  Speaker 6: And put in process a system whereby they all are
• 16:21
  Speaker 6: made whole. That has nothing to do with a legitimate
• 16:24
  Speaker 6: concern about income equality in America.
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: That's real. That's real.
• 16:29
  Speaker 6: But that does not affect the need for us to
• 16:31
  Speaker 6: act swiftly and very thoroughly and in concert with all
• 16:37
  Speaker 6: the forces that we need to bring to bear to
• 16:40
  Speaker 6: deal with the crisis now.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: I think that exchange probably crystallized the debate between these
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: two candidates for more than anything else, because that was
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: Biden bringing it back to the urgency and Bernie talking
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: about sort of the broader economic challenge. Now, in fairness
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: to Bernie, I'm sure he would agree with everything Biden
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: said about now. But I mean, this is almost an answer.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: that Biden could have given in other debates about other topics, right?
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: I mean, and he has, right? It's people want results,
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: not a revolution. And it's sort of, I don't know,
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: I thought it crystallized the debate pretty well.
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, look, for me, and I'm biased, again, by my
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: financial situation and everything else in life, but Biden spoke
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: more clearly to the urgency of the moment and to
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: the unprecedented nature of what we're dealing with. And I
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: agree that economic inequality is a massive issue in this country,
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: but I think maybe the way you get to address
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: it is through a really successful government intervention in the
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: near term now. And then you point to that later
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: and say, look, these programs work. We should implement them
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: more broadly. And maybe we pay for it with a
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: wealth tax, et cetera, et cetera.
• 17:44
  Speaker 4: Yeah, there was a few moments in the debate, and
• 17:47
  Speaker 4: that was one where I was surprised that Joe Biden
• 17:49
  Speaker 4: went to a line like that. There really wasn't a need.
• 17:52
  Speaker 4: There were a few moments where Joe Biden would swing
• 17:55
  Speaker 4: at every pitch. And it's part of why the debate
• 17:58
  Speaker 4: turned so caustic. in part because Bernie also threw punches too.
• 18:01
  Speaker 4: But that moment, like we need results, not a revolution.
• 18:04
  Speaker 4: It was actually a moment to me where Joe Biden
• 18:06
  Speaker 4: could have said, I agree with everything. And he does later, actually.
• 18:09
  Speaker 4: There's a moment where he does that later. But he
• 18:10
  Speaker 4: could have said, I think Bernie's critique is exactly right
• 18:13
  Speaker 4: about the larger problems in our economy. And that's something
• 18:15
  Speaker 4: we all need to work on.
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: You know what I was thinking about in these two answers, Tommy,
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: is remember Obama responding to Katrina back in 05. And
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: So Katrina happens and Bush completely bungles the response. And
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: this is sort of the moment that Barack Obama really
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: like jumps onto the national scene and starts talking about
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: it a lot. And he would talk about all the
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: immediate challenges that required a response after Bush bungled Katrina.
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: And then after talking about the urgency of the crisis
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: at hand, he would say, but let's not forget that,
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: you know, when the levees broke, not everyone in New
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: Orleans in the lower ninth ward could just jump in
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: an SUV, have a bunch of food and water and
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: take off because there was inequities before that, which I
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: thought was a really nice way to frame it because
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: he talked about the urgency. And then after getting on that,
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: he talked about sort of the broader challenges. And I
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: don't think either of them actually combined the urgency with
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: the broader challenges in the most effective way.
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: The other thing Obama said at the time was the
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: private sector doesn't pay to fix the levees. Right.
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: He made it about the role of government.
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: There are core critical government functions that protect us in
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: times like this. Yeah, no, it's a great point because
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: neither of them actually contrasted their view and the fundamental
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: democratic view of the role of government with what a
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: republican view of sort of laissez-faire capitalism has given us.
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: You know, Bernie's hard talking about it because Bernie's trying
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: to say that the democratic establishment is part of this.
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: As well, but Bernie's talking about is like larger structural issues.
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: But this is what Republican governance has given us. You
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: cut government, you cut government, you cut preparedness, you damage
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: the health care system over and over again. You cut
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: taxes for rich people, you cut regulations. And then when
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: a pandemic hits and you actually need government to be
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: ready and you need government action, where does the conservative
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: philosophy around government get you? nowhere good.
• 20:10
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I do think it's one of the opportunity costs
• 20:13
  Speaker 4: of how often these debates have landed in Medicare for all.
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: And not a contrast with Trump and the Republican healthcare view.
• 20:21
  Speaker 4: Not a contrast on healthcare, but also to policies where
• 20:26
  Speaker 4: people have been left behind in larger ways in the economy.
• 20:30
  Speaker 4: And that is actually, I think, where Bernie was stronger
• 20:32
  Speaker 4: as they got further into the debate. Family and medical
• 20:34
  Speaker 4: leave the minimum wage, people who don't have $ 400 in
• 20:38
  Speaker 4: their bank accounts in case of an emergency, the fact
• 20:41
  Speaker 4: that our economy runs on undocumented labor, many of whom
• 20:43
  Speaker 4: do not have any access to care or afraid to
• 20:45
  Speaker 4: go get care. I mean, all of these things contribute
• 20:48
  Speaker 4: to what makes us vulnerable, and all of that has
• 20:50
  Speaker 4: been made worse by a Republican in this role.
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: I mean, these moments, like, they underscore the role and
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: the need for government. Unfortunately, Republicans are willing to learn
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: that lesson after a terrorist attack like 9-11 will explode
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: the spending on military and intelligence capabilities. But, you know,
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: like I remember during Katrina thinking of Grover Norquist, who
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: used to say, I want a government so small you
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: can drown it in a bathtub. And that was a
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: pretty fucking gross quote to juxtapose with the current moment
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: at that time. Yeah.
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: And how many episodes, how many crises do we have
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: to go through that teach us this over and over again? Katrina,
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: the financial crisis, now this. I mean, it's so the
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: debate moment that generated the most headlines came during Joe
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: Biden's response to a virtual audience member question about the
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: financial and physical health of women. Here's what he said,
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: as well as Bernie's response.
• 21:37
  Speaker 6: Number one, I committed that if I'm elected president, have
• 21:39
  Speaker 6: an opportunity to appoint someone to the courts, I'll appoint
• 21:44
  Speaker 6: the first black woman.
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: To the courts.
• 21:45
  Speaker 6: It's required that they have representation now. It's long overdue. Secondly,
• 21:51
  Speaker 6: if I'm elected president, my cabinet, my administration will look
• 21:55
  Speaker 6: like the country. And I commit that I will, in fact,
• 21:58
  Speaker 6: appoint a, I'll pick a woman to be vice president.
• 22:02
  Speaker 6: There are a number of women who are qualified to
• 22:03
  Speaker 6: be president tomorrow. I would pick a woman to be
• 22:06
  Speaker 6: my vice president.
• 22:07
  Speaker 4: Senator, just to be clear, the vice president committed to
• 22:10
  Speaker 4: picking a woman as his running mate.
• 22:12
  Speaker 7: If you get the nomination, will you?
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: In all likelihood, I will.
• 22:17
  Speaker 5: For me, it's not just nominating.
• 22:22
  Speaker 7: A woman.
• 22:23
  Speaker 5: It is making sure that we have a progressive women
• 22:26
  Speaker 5: and there are progressive women out there. So my very
• 22:28
  Speaker 5: strong tendency is to move in that direction.
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: So the answer was obviously planned by the Biden people.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: You know that it was planned because it was not
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: sort of a direct response to the person's question, but
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: it was sort of a planned thing that he executed on,
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: which good for Joe Biden for executing on a debate moment.
• 22:45
  Speaker 4: Good for you, Joe Biden. You executed on a moment.
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: But what do you think the rationale was behind announcing
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: that here? And what did we think of Bernie's answer?
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: I mean, look, it's always smart to go into a
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: major event like this with news to make.
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: Right?
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: I mean, in normal context, that would be the big
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: and maybe only headline that came out of this debate. Obviously,
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: we're dealing with a post-pandemic world, so it's a million
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: different things swirled out of the debate. But Bernie's answer
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: probably showed that he hadn't fully vetted potential vice presidential nominees,
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: that they hadn't totally thought through it. And I think
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: that's understandable, but it did look lesser in terms of
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: the contrast in that moment. And I also think, look,
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: just stepping back for a minute, like, Bernie's fans on
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: the Internet and even some of his staff didn't help
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: him very much by driving down expectations for Joe Biden
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: relentlessly over the course of the last week.
• 23:33
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: I mean, the worst people online were saying that that
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: Biden had dementia, but others on his staff were saying that,
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: you know, he can only speak for seven minutes. Why
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: won't he do a debate standing up? And it made
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: Biden's performance look that much more impressive.
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: They lowered the bar for him, which usually you don't
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: lower the bar for your opponents.
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: No. Remember what the Bush people said before they debated
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: John Kerry, that he was the best debater since Cicero,
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: which is a silly, performative, dumb thing. It's so funny.
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: It's such a good line, though.
• 24:02
  Speaker 4: Since Cicero.
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: But everyone quoted it, right?
• 24:05
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: We all remember it this many years later.
• 24:07
  Speaker 4: On the nominating a woman, I thought Bernie was caught
• 24:11
  Speaker 4: off guard and gave, I think, the best answer. I'm
• 24:14
  Speaker 4: not going to make a blanket commitment. on stage in
• 24:17
  Speaker 4: response to a question, but I'm very strongly considering it
• 24:20
  Speaker 4: or leaning towards that or whatever he said.
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: I'm surprised. Bernie has been asked this before. He was
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: asked it at the New York Times editorial board meeting,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: and he said, I can guarantee you this. It won't
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: be an old white guy. That probably would have been
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: the better answer because then he didn't have to commit,
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: but he also didn't have to seem like he was,
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: you know.
• 24:34
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it all comes out in the wash.
• 24:36
  Speaker 4: I will say, what I like about the Joe Biden
• 24:40
  Speaker 4: answer is it's actually kind of runs counter to traditional
• 24:44
  Speaker 4: political advice, which is, You don't say something like that.
• 24:46
  Speaker 4: You don't run the product.
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: Well, and if there's any campaign that I would worry
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: would be traditional, it would be the Biden campaign.
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: So I'm glad.
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 24:53
  Speaker 4: I really like it. I like it, obviously, for what
• 24:56
  Speaker 4: it represents, but also because it's basically saying, I'm going
• 24:58
  Speaker 4: to pick a fucking woman, obviously. I can't possibly at
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: this stage not have a woman on the ticket. It
• 25:05
  Speaker 4: would be malpractice. And so why not just stop playing
• 25:08
  Speaker 4: games and just say that I'm going to do it? Clearly,
• 25:11
  Speaker 4: I mean, we're all, you know, there's Kamala Harris, there's
• 25:13
  Speaker 4: Stacey Abrams, there may be other people on that list,
• 25:15
  Speaker 4: but it's not a very long list and we've all
• 25:16
  Speaker 4: been talking about it for a long time. He's on
• 25:18
  Speaker 4: his way to being the nominee. I like the just
• 25:20
  Speaker 4: cutting the shit in this moment.
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the other thing they achieved by breaking this news
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: is they turned everyone's focus towards Joe Biden as the
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: nominee and his vice presidential search. So they sort of
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: started pushing everyone's minds past the primary to the general, which,
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: you know, obviously they wanted. And look, he also, you know,
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: he had said before, that his first nomination to the
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: Supreme Court would be a black woman. But reiterating that,
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: he also talked about how the cabinet would reflect the
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: face of America, would look like America. And all of
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: this sort of reminded me of what he said in
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: Detroit at that rally with Kamala Harris and Cory Booker,
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: where he talked about himself as a bridge to the
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: younger generation. And that's how he sees himself, and that's
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: how he'll see his presidency, which I think is both
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: self-aware and reassuring to people because, you know, it's been
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: hinted at before, like, does Joe Biden, if he becomes president,
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: run for two terms, right? He's going to be quite old.
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: And I think what Joe Biden is trying to make
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: clear is his theory of the case is Donald Trump
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: is an emergency. We get Donald Trump out of there.
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: And then I realized that a younger generation should step
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: up and I should have an administration that reflects the
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: diversity of America and the face of America right now
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: in 2020 and And my vice president will reflect that.
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: My Supreme Court nominee will reflect that. The cabinet will
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: reflect that. And I think that could give a lot
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: of younger progressives, at least younger Democrats, more reassurance.
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: So after all the questions about the current crisis, Bernie
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: tried to turn the debate into a discussion of the
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: former vice president's record when he was a senator, including
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: a lengthy exchange about Biden's position on Social Security.
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: Here's the clip.
• 27:00
  Speaker 5: Let me ask you a question, Joe.
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: You're right here with me.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 27:03
  Speaker 5: Have you been on the floor of the Senate? You
• 27:05
  Speaker 5: were in the Senate for a few years. Yeah. Time
• 27:08
  Speaker 5: and time again, talking about the necessity with pride about
• 27:12
  Speaker 5: cutting social security, cutting Medicare, cutting veterans programs.
• 27:16
  Speaker 7: No.
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: You never said that.
• 27:17
  Speaker 7: No.
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: All right. America, go to the website right now.
• 27:22
  Speaker 5: Go to the YouTube right now.
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: Go to the YouTube. Oh, no.
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: That's. It's so funny. Bernie sounded like Biden in past debates.
• 27:33
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I will say, you know, I think these are
• 27:36
  Speaker 4: two people that really like each other. I do think
• 27:38
  Speaker 4: Bernie was genuinely caught off guard by how emphatic Biden
• 27:43
  Speaker 4: is being given Biden's record.
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: Given the video evidence.
• 27:47
  Speaker 4: The video evidence of Biden's willingness to raise the retirement age,
• 27:52
  Speaker 4: consider cuts as part of larger budget deals. I mean,
• 27:55
  Speaker 4: that is, they're both, I get why Bernie was flustered.
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: But it is for both of them. And you know
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: how this happens on campaigns. You so deeply believe your
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: own story about your contrast with the other candidate. And
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: usually neither story is 100 percent accurate.
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: Like so Biden hears Bernie saying. you bragged on the
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: floor about cutting social security and Joe Biden thinks, I
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: never talked about cutting social security. I talked about freezing
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: all government spending for a year that included social security. Now,
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: that would mean a cut, right?
• 28:25
  Speaker 4: As Democrats say, but by the way, it's worth pointing out,
• 28:26
  Speaker 4: Democrats for a very long time have clung to this
• 28:28
  Speaker 4: idea that if you reduce growth of a social program,
• 28:32
  Speaker 4: you are cutting that social program. It's part of our fucking,
• 28:35
  Speaker 4: what do you do in church? Our liturgy.
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: And so Joe Biden, like, look, what Joe Biden should
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: have said is, yeah, There were positions that I took
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: back in the 70s and 80s and 90s. Look at
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: my record as vice president. You know, and of course,
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: Bernie said during vice president, of course, there were the
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: negotiations over the budget deal. And Biden did admit in
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: the debate everything was on the table, including Social Security. Again,
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: that was slowing the growth of a certain part of
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: Social Security, which resulted in about.
• 29:02
  Speaker 4: Which if Republicans do, we call it cuts.
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: Which we call it cuts, too.
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Look, I mean, this sort of kicked off the
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: part of the debate that you could kind of summarize
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: as old guys who have been in the Senate a
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: long time, who took a lot of votes, and now
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: we're going to go into a deep and boring history.
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: I think what you have to remember is that in
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: the early 80s, Social Security was nearly insolvent. So there
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: was an amendment that Biden co-sponsored that would have frozen
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: a year of military and domestic spending, including cost of
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: living adjustments on Social Security. Ted Kennedy supported it. But
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: more recently, Biden expressed a openness to raising the Social
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: Security eligibility age. That was back in 2007. Then Bernie
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: got asked about a comment he had made several decades ago.
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: I presume it all felt like a bit of a
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: wash to me. And yes, these are very important issues.
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: But my brain. is unable and unwilling to think about
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: things you said in 1983 when I'm wondering if.
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: I'm going to catch a fucking pandemic. Yeah, look, Biden
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: was inaccurate about his record. And all he had to
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: do there, what he should have done, is said, I have,
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: just like you, Bernie, I have changed my mind on
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: a lot of issues. This debate is about the future.
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: We have a crisis right now, and then we have
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: the future to talk about. And look at my plan
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: for Social Security right now. Not only do I protect it,
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: but I expand it. And, you know, at one point, too,
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: but then Biden... biden always takes the bait from people
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: and he hasn't ever brought up social security right yeah
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: he exactly.
• 30:28
  Speaker 4: Yeah he brought up his own because he was prepped
• 30:30
  Speaker 4: for it.
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: Oh that's right because he was prepped for it and
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: he was prepped for it in past debates right because
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: bernie didn't bring it up as much in other debates
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: and he is always you can always and they should
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: do this again for the general election you know if
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: he goes after trump though i don't doubt that trump
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: would be able to execute on this i doubt that
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: trump would be able to execute on this um Do
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: not talk about Senate votes from 30 years ago. Just
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: don't go there.
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: There was a period where Bernie was talking about Bull
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: Simpson and they were nameshaking Cola. And there was 99%
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: of the audience had no idea what they were talking about.
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: It was wild.
• 31:02
  Speaker 4: I will say Bernie did. Bernie tried to. He goes
• 31:04
  Speaker 4: to Biden. He's like, you can say, come on, Joe.
• 31:07
  Speaker 4: You can say that maybe you had some bad votes.
• 31:10
  Speaker 4: You changed your mind.
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: Well, then Biden was like, I never voted to cut
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: Social Security. And Bernie's like, okay, you didn't vote to
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: cut social security, but you said, he was.
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: Like, and then Biden, Biden's rejoinder was about bad gun
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: control votes from Bernie in the past. And it just,
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: it felt like politics as usual. And it was a
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: bit of a wash.
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: Well, that personally, I feel the same way about burning
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: the gun votes. Like Bernie had banned gun votes. I'm
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: glad he doesn't have that position anymore. Joe Biden had
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: bad social security proposals that he was willing to do.
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: I'm glad he doesn't have those anymore.
• 31:39
  Speaker 4: And it's, and it's basically, you know, it is a,
• 31:42
  Speaker 4: It is a stand-in argument for what kind of president
• 31:45
  Speaker 4: these two men would be. And the implication is Joe
• 31:48
  Speaker 4: Biden may be saying these good things, but for him,
• 31:51
  Speaker 4: Social Security is expendable in some way. He would give
• 31:54
  Speaker 4: it away in negotiation. That's the attack. And, you know,
• 31:56
  Speaker 4: now the attack against Bernie that he somehow would become
• 32:00
  Speaker 4: against gun control once he's in the White House, I think,
• 32:01
  Speaker 4: is a little less salient, a little less saleable.
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: Oh, I don't think, Joe. But I think after what
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: everyone went through in the Obama White House with the
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: debt ceiling bullshit, I don't think there's any chance that
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: a President Joe Biden would put Social Security.
• 32:14
  Speaker 4: Back on the table.
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: Oh, I don't either.
• 32:14
  Speaker 4: I don't either.
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: No, because some of Bernie supporters have been asking me that,
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: and I just know that, like, I think, I'm pretty
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: sure that everyone involved has learned their.
• 32:22
  Speaker 4: Lesson from that. Well, that's the other thing that sort of,
• 32:23
  Speaker 4: I felt, like, throughout this debate. Like, Joe Biden embraces
• 32:27
  Speaker 4: Elizabeth Warren's bankruptcy proposal. Bernie Sanders.
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we didn't even talk about that.
• 32:30
  Speaker 4: Yeah, Bernie Sanders is out here making an argument, and
• 32:32
  Speaker 4: I do think that one of the.
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: And he embraced Bernie's college proposal.
• 32:36
  Speaker 4: But the... There's a cost to us constantly treating, like,
• 32:40
  Speaker 4: Political media treats these men as protagonists, like they're protagonists
• 32:43
  Speaker 4: in the story. And so what's good for them or
• 32:45
  Speaker 4: what's bad for them is treated as what's good and
• 32:47
  Speaker 4: what's bad. And everything comes down to their decisions, who
• 32:50
  Speaker 4: they are, their ideology, their identity. And you look at
• 32:53
  Speaker 4: what's happening in our politics and like there's an incredible
• 32:55
  Speaker 4: amount of pressure that can be brought to bear on
• 32:56
  Speaker 4: Joe Biden. If you're worried that he's going to be
• 32:59
  Speaker 4: less protective of Social Security because of his past record,
• 33:02
  Speaker 4: you have a role to play in making sure that
• 33:04
  Speaker 4: isn't true.
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: So there were some flickers of unity last night. Here's
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden answering a question about how he'd go about
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: appealing to Bernie's voters if he ends up winning the
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: nomination and Bernie's response.
• 33:22
  Speaker 6: If Bernie's a nominee, I will not only support him,
• 33:25
  Speaker 6: I will campaign for him. And I believe the people
• 33:28
  Speaker 6: who support me will do the same thing because the
• 33:30
  Speaker 6: existential threat to the United States of America is Donald Trump.
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: It's critical.
• 33:36
  Speaker 6: I would hope that Bernie would do the same thing
• 33:38
  Speaker 6: if I'm the nominee and encourage all of his followers to,
• 33:41
  Speaker 6: in fact, support me as well. Because it's much bigger
• 33:45
  Speaker 6: than either of us. Character of the nation is on
• 33:49
  Speaker 6: the ballot. It goes well beyond whether or not Senator
• 33:52
  Speaker 6: Sanders and I both agree we need medical health care
• 33:55
  Speaker 6: should be a right, not a privilege. We both agree
• 33:58
  Speaker 6: we have to give deal with student debt. We both
• 34:00
  Speaker 6: agree we have to deal with education and access to education.
• 34:03
  Speaker 6: We both agree that we deal that we have a
• 34:05
  Speaker 6: new green deal to deal with the existential threat that
• 34:08
  Speaker 6: faces humanity. We disagree on the detail of how we
• 34:11
  Speaker 6: do it. But we don't disagree on the principle. We
• 34:14
  Speaker 6: fundamentally disagree with this president on everything. This is a
• 34:18
  Speaker 6: man who wants to cut Social Security, cut Medicare, not Bernie,
• 34:23
  Speaker 6: the president of the United States.
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: So this is much.
• 34:26
  Speaker 6: Bigger than whether or not I'm the nominee or Bernie's
• 34:29
  Speaker 6: the nominee.
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: If I lose this thing, Joe wins.
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: Joe, I will be there for you.
• 34:33
  Speaker 5: But I have my doubts about how you win a
• 34:36
  Speaker 5: general election against Trump will be a very, very tough opponent.
• 34:40
  Speaker 5: Unless you have energy, excitement, the largest voter turnout in history.
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: I like that a lot. Me too. I look, it
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: was really, it was very smart politically for Biden to
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: look magnanimous. And also there has been a lot of debate,
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: probably way too much debate over whether Bernie supporters would ultimately, uh,
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: support Joe Biden and vote for him or whether they're
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: going to sit that out. And what he did was
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: use that magnanimous moment to get Bernie to commit to
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: essentially the same thing. And look, I don't think Bernie
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: needed to be pulled that direction. he would have gotten
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: there anyway. Bernie Sanders damn well understands the threat from Trump,
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: but it was a nice moment.
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Bernie says right afterwards, I'll be there for you, Joe, too,
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: if I lose this thing, which is great. But that
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: answer from Biden, I think, was one of his best
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: answers of any debate so far. And that tone was perfect.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: And I started thinking to myself, if Joe Biden had
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: maintained that magnanimous tone through the entire debate, we wouldn't
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: just say that he won the debate, which I think
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: he did because he's in the lead and Bernie didn't
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: change anything. We would say that, like, that's it, home run.
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: You know, it's done. And it's just, it was a
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: great tone. I think Bernie's answer was quite good as well.
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: I mean, what do you guys think? Like, you know,
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: Bernie gave the speech after the last set of primaries
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: where he basically laid out a bunch of questions for
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: Biden in a way to sort of push him on
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: certain policies. The debate was obviously a little more heated
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: than those questions because he went after Biden's record a
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: few times and Biden certainly went after him a few
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: times too. But how do you feel about how the
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: debate ended in terms of how to bring this sort
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: of party together in this and end this primary.
• 36:10
  Speaker 4: I think the moment, the moments we just played were
• 36:13
  Speaker 4: the best moments of the debate. I, you know, I,
• 36:16
  Speaker 4: Bernie saying, I'll be there for you, Joe was the
• 36:17
  Speaker 4: way he said it. I really appreciate it.
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: I just found it.
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: It was, it was, it was heartfelt.
• 36:21
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 36:21
  Speaker 4: I mean, maybe it's because I hadn't left my home
• 36:23
  Speaker 4: for 72 hours, but I was genuinely moved by it,
• 36:25
  Speaker 4: but maybe just seeing another person to express an emotion.
• 36:29
  Speaker 4: But it was, the debate was on the whole more
• 36:30
  Speaker 4: caustic than it should have been. And I think that's
• 36:32
  Speaker 4: both of their faults, honestly. And, you know, there was
• 36:35
  Speaker 4: a moment earlier in the debate where Biden was basically
• 36:38
  Speaker 4: asked some very specific question, like, you know, will you
• 36:42
  Speaker 4: shut the port of Miami level specificity? And clearly they
• 36:45
  Speaker 4: prepped him. He said, listen, when I'm president, what I
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: would do, if I were president, what I would do
• 36:49
  Speaker 4: is I would convene the smartest people and experts and
• 36:51
  Speaker 4: we'd figure out the best plan together to be prepared.
• 36:53
  Speaker 4: And it was a It was a response to any question,
• 36:56
  Speaker 4: basically saying, I will put in place a more serious
• 36:58
  Speaker 4: process in this current president. And I wish that he
• 37:00
  Speaker 4: had a similar place to go when he's challenged on something,
• 37:04
  Speaker 4: when he's pushed on something that is more magnanimous and
• 37:06
  Speaker 4: less defensive, that he knows how to let a pitch
• 37:09
  Speaker 4: go by. But those moments were good. There's a lot
• 37:12
  Speaker 4: of advantages to being vice president. You have universal name ID.
• 37:15
  Speaker 4: You're associated with Barack Obama, who's a very popular former president.
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: In this instance... Biden could talk about his very specific
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: experience of managing the Ebola crisis, the H1N1 swine flu
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: crisis that I thought gave people confidence. My critique of
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: the debate is I wanted more forward looking future discussions.
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: I wanted more moments where they came together to talk
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: about the magnitude of the moment and of beating Trump
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: and less talk about social security votes from the 80s
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: and comments about fucking Fidel Castro. I just I have
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: no more time for any of those things and I
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: don't care. But in general, I thought it was good.
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: From the online chatter and the spin room chatter, the
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: virtual spin room chatter after the debate, my guess is
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: that both candidates are at the stage where they both
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: probably want to be more magnanimous than their staffs. And
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: this happens at the end of most primaries. Barack Obama
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: and Hillary Clinton were the first two to make peace.
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: And our staff and your staff were at each other's
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: throat for a lot longer. Not you and me, come on.
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: Not you and me. Yeah, we were the exception. But,
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: you know, after the debate, you know, Anita Dunn, who's
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: Biden's senior advisor, made a pretty graceless comment about how,
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: you know, Biden went in there and it was like
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: him dealing with a lot of the protesters who show
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: up at his rallies for two hours, which was completely unnecessary.
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: Also, hey, Credit to protesters who show up and fight
• 38:41
  Speaker 2: for things like climate change that they care about.
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: Let's not diminish any of those. No, we should never
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: diminish protesters make democracy work. And then, you know, and
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: then some of Bernie's staff went from, you know, insinuating
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: that Joe Biden may not have the capabilities to be
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: president to just saying that he's like an outright liar
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: and liar, liar, liar, you know, as opposed to, you know,
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: the the misstatements he made about his record. And then
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: they all went after each other on Twitter all night.
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: And I'm like, this is only going to end in
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: a good way if the candidates, if Biden and Bernie themselves,
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: sort of take the responsibility and tell their staffs we're
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: ending this in a friendly way to bring the party together.
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: Because staffs will go at each other forever. That's just
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: how it goes. So we have voting tomorrow, Tuesday, in Arizona. Florida, Ohio,
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: and Illinois. I mean, there's a lot of issues around that.
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: I don't know how these states can guarantee free and
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: fair elections when people who are 65 or older or
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: people with underlying physical conditions want to stay home because
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: they don't get affected and also you know other people
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: who you know maybe not might not have symptoms another
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: infected can still spread the disease to to others so
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: I don't know what happens tomorrow yeah I think it's
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: pretty simple I mean these elections may go for they
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: may not but we should just be honest about it
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: if the government is advising you to not leave your
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: house and the only way to vote is to leave
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: your house the government is advising you not to vote
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: the governor is at the government is in by advising
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: Millions of people do not vote in an election. It
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: is not a free and fair election. And that's it.
• 40:18
  Speaker 2: And it just speaks to the patchwork nature of the response, right?
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: Because Georgia and Louisiana have postponed their presidential primary elections,
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: but Arizona, Florida, Illinois, and Ohio vote on Tuesday. And look,
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: I don't know the right answer, but it just seems
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: profoundly unfair to people who care deeply about democracy and
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: want to vote, but are scared. Yeah.
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: I was asking people about this on Twitter because I
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: honestly didn't know the answer. And You know, part of
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: the issue is a lot of people have already voted
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: in those four states. I think we know that every
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: primary after those four tomorrow are all going to be postponed.
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: So that's fine. But the four tomorrow, the problem is
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: that a lot of people voted already. Now, Illinois, the
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: only one of the four states that has a Democratic governor, J.B. Pritzker,
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: who's been great during this response so far, said everyone
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: in the state can request a mail-in ballot up until Tuesday,
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: through Tuesday, on Tuesday. Arizona, Republican governor... Florida Republican governor,
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: Ohio Republican governor. Now, Ohio is doing drive up curbside voting,
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: which is good. Mike DeWine, good job. But it's it's
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: not people like, oh, why isn't Tom Perez doing this?
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: The Democratic Party. It's up to actually the Republican governors
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: in those states to run the election, which is the problem. Right.
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: But you're right.
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: You have a you have a discrepancy between the national
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: government saying no crowds over 50 and state governments who
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: run the election and telling people that the Florida.
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: Governor, Ron DeSantis, is asking Trump to restrict domestic travel.
• 41:34
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: If you're going to do that, having an election, some
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: accommodations for people voting.
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: And look, this isn't about this isn't about like an
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: advantage to one candidate or the other.
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden's coalition is quite old. And if they don't
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: show up tomorrow because they want to stay home, that
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: it's not that it doesn't help him. It doesn't help Bernie.
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: It doesn't help one of the one or the other candidates.
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: It's just it's it's really tough for the voters. Yeah.
• 41:55
  Speaker 4: I mean, look, you know, CDC is saying no gatherings
• 41:57
  Speaker 4: of more than 50 people, but they're also telling people
• 42:00
  Speaker 4: in the risk categories to remain home to self-isolate. And
• 42:03
  Speaker 4: if that's the advice, if that's the advice, it's very simple.
• 42:06
  Speaker 2: That's it.
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: We should have mail-in voting all over the country.
• 42:09
  Speaker 2: I do hope Democrats make a push to make mail-in
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: voting available to everyone in every state because it's long
• 42:16
  Speaker 2: past time.
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: And Republicans should, too, in the middle of this crisis.
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: Like I said, it's not going to necessarily advantage one
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: party or the other in the midst of a pandemic
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: when we get to November.
• 42:25
  Speaker 4: Just my usual reminder that I've seen what Trump rallies
• 42:28
  Speaker 4: look like. They are older.
• 42:29
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 42:29
  Speaker 4: And those MAGA hats offer no protection.
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: All right, let's talk about the crisis at hand. We
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: still don't know the extent of the coronavirus outbreak in
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: the U.S. because of how little testing has been done,
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: but the disease has left 50 dead and at least 3,000 infected,
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: a number that will likely skyrocket this week. As of
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: this morning, the governors of California, Ohio, Illinois, Massachusetts, Washington,
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut have ordered the closure
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: of schools, bars, dine-in restaurants, gyms, movie theaters, casinos, and
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: other public facilities. Here in California, Governor Newsom directed all
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: Americans over 65 and those with underlying physical conditions to
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: self-isolate at home. And on Sunday, the CDC recommended that
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: all events throughout the entire country, including 50 or more people,
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: be canceled for the next eight weeks. Guys, why are
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: governors taking these very drastic steps? And are they enough?
• 43:12
  Speaker 2: I mean, I thought Governor Cuomo in New York put
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: this well. This is a national pandemic, but there are
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: no national rules. And Fauci, the head of the CDC,
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: is doing his best. But I can't help but see
• 43:22
  Speaker 2: the disconnect between what he's saying on Sunday shows that
• 43:25
  Speaker 2: he would do for himself, that he wouldn't travel, that
• 43:27
  Speaker 2: he wouldn't go to public places or restaurants, and the
• 43:29
  Speaker 2: lack of a national agenda. closure of bars and restaurants.
• 43:33
  Speaker 2: And this is all being left to states and governors
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: and county level municipalities to manage it. And it's making
• 43:39
  Speaker 2: me lose my fucking mind. Because when I look at
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: Twitter or Instagram and you see Bourbon Street packed or
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: spring break still happening or St. Paddy's Day's bars with
• 43:48
  Speaker 2: lines out the door in Chicago, social distancing does not
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: work if we all aren't part of it, if we're
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: not participating. If you are at a bar with 200 people,
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: it's not that you young and you're going to be
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: fine and you won't get that sick and everything will
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: be okay. It's that you could give it to someone
• 44:04
  Speaker 2: else that is immunocompromised or old and you could kill them.
• 44:07
  Speaker 2: You could murder these people if you do not take
• 44:10
  Speaker 2: personal responsibility. And everyone who thinks this is not a
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: big deal, it's only impacting old people. Like we all
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: know somebody we used to work with who is literally
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: a specimen of a fucking human being. One of the
• 44:20
  Speaker 2: most healthy people I've known played football in college, served
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: in the military, has been battling coronavirus for five or
• 44:27
  Speaker 2: six days now. And it's just absolutely leveled on like
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: anything he's ever dealt with before. And if you think
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: that's not a big deal, you're crazy. So pardon me
• 44:36
  Speaker 2: for a browbeating listeners who are probably doing the right
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: thing since I know you people, you're pretty cool, but
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: yell at your, your kids and your cousins and your
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: friends to get your shit together. And more importantly, yell
• 44:46
  Speaker 2: at the federal government to put clear rules in place,
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: yell at state and local governments to, to put clear
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: roles in place. Like we need to shut stuff down
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: now before it's too late.
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: This is why we have a government. This is why
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: you need a president and national leadership. This is why
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: the conservative vision of government that everyone just volunteers to
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: do the right things, right? That you don't pay taxes.
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: You just, you know, you just give to charity and
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: that'll do enough. Like you can't always count on people
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: doing the right thing for the larger community. That's why
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: you have regulations and rules. And right now we don't
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: have a president. We don't have a real president who
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: is putting in place rules and regulations to protect the
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: country And that is why this response, as you said,
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: is completely patchwork and it's state dependent. But guess what?
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: Like state dependent responses don't work in a country where
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: there's 50 states and you can cross borders. Same thing globally.
• 45:39
  Speaker 4: I mean, right.
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: Like Cuomo said, this is a national pandemic, but there
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: are no national rules. There are also no global rules.
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: And it doesn't seem to be that there's a global
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: response of leaders getting together to work on this together. Yeah.
• 45:49
  Speaker 4: I mean, who knows what the situation will be right now? Forget,
• 45:54
  Speaker 4: forget national rules. Forget, forget all of that. If Trump
• 45:58
  Speaker 4: had just done the step of declaring a national emergency earlier.
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 46:01
  Speaker 4: And if Trump had just taken a better tone earlier,
• 46:04
  Speaker 4: would Post Malone have done a show in a packed arena?
• 46:07
  Speaker 4: If Donald Trump had not been saying it's going to
• 46:09
  Speaker 4: be fine and if you're young, you'll be fine. Would
• 46:12
  Speaker 4: people be packing the streets and the bars if there
• 46:14
  Speaker 4: was a coherent argument from a national leader? that everyone
• 46:19
  Speaker 4: recognized saying, this is real, this is serious.
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: Not just an international argument, though. Donald Trump picks up
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: the phone, gets all 50 governors on the phone, and says,
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: shut it fucking down by tomorrow.
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: That's all that had to happen. To Leavitt's point, I mean, NBC,
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: Wall Street Journal did a poll, and 47% of respondents
• 46:33
  Speaker 2: express less or no concern about the impact of the coronavirus.
• 46:38
  Speaker 2: That seems to track pretty consistently with political parties. And,
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: you know, when you're seeing Trish Reagan on Fox Business News, or,
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: you know, like, look, This guy, David Clark, who no
• 46:49
  Speaker 2: one should have heard of because he's an actual lunatic.
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: He's a sheriff in Milwaukee whose horrible practices led to
• 46:56
  Speaker 2: the death of people. He's one of the worst people
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: on the planet. But he speaks at CPAC every year.
• 47:00
  Speaker 2: He spoke at the Republican National Convention. Last night, he
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: was tweeting that no one has gotten to the bottom
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: of how George Soros is contributing to the coronavirus. And
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: that kind of madness and disinformation is going to lead
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: people not to take easy steps in their own lives
• 47:15
  Speaker 2: to just not put themselves or others at risk.
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: Well, there's two problems here, right? So the Republican Party
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: is a party of rural America and ex-urban America, and
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: this is a pandemic that is first striking big cities, right?
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: So if you are an average Republican voter, you are
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: sitting in some far-flung suburb or in a rural part
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: of America where you do not see the virus affecting
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: anyone yet, and what are you watching? You're watching Fox News,
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: you're watching Donald Trump, you're following all your favorite Trumpy
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: Republican politicians online, and they're all telling you, It's a hoax.
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: It doesn't matter. The governor of Oklahoma put up a
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: picture saying, eating with my kids and all my fellow
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: Oklahomans at a local restaurant. Packed tonight. Devin Nunes, as
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: one of you pointed out earlier, was saying, if you're healthy,
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: you and your family, it's a great time to just
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: go out and go to a local restaurant. This is
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: a fucking congressman.
• 48:03
  Speaker 2: Devin Nunes.
• 48:04
  Speaker 4: Devin Nunes, everybody. Look, obviously this is very serious, but
• 48:07
  Speaker 4: I don't think we need to give up the things
• 48:09
  Speaker 4: we care about most. That's why I'm once again leading
• 48:11
  Speaker 4: the annual bobbing for apples. At the Central Valley State Fair,
• 48:17
  Speaker 4: line up with your kids and elderly parents. We're bobbing
• 48:20
  Speaker 4: for apples.
• 48:21
  Speaker 2: I mean, look, Trump said at one of the press
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: conferences over the weekend when pressed on this, I don't
• 48:26
  Speaker 2: take responsibility at all. And I think that quote is
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: going to define his presidency. He does not want to
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: own this. He wants to play down the health risks
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: because he thinks that might help him with the stock
• 48:38
  Speaker 2: market in the near term. And it is so back
• 48:41
  Speaker 2: ass word in approach that it's going to make everything worse.
• 48:44
  Speaker 2: And then on top of that, I mean, Jared Kushner
• 48:48
  Speaker 2: has now been put in charge of the coronavirus response.
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: Jared and Stephen Miller wrote the Oval Office address that
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: had to be corrected three times on Twitter right after
• 48:58
  Speaker 2: the speech.
• 48:59
  Speaker 4: I mean, like.
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: And Jared also deputized Karlie Kloss's dad to crowdsource suggestions
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: on Facebook for the.
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: I wasn't in the White House still when the Ebola
• 49:09
  Speaker 2: crisis hit, but I was in a million NSC meetings
• 49:12
  Speaker 2: during my time at the White House. And like the
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: health pandemic issues tended to be managed by the same
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: people that did like counterterrorism things like that. And so
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: John Brennan, Susan Rice, Dennis McDonough, those people, Tom Donilon,
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: they would be leading those meetings as well as the
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: health related ones. And the times you saw those people
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: frightened to their core were the health related issues. It
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: was the pandemics. It was the viruses. That's why they
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: set up this NSC office. It wasn't a thing to
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: say you did. It was a critical issue. urgent need,
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: because we kind of think we know how to stop
• 49:43
  Speaker 2: an Al Qaeda fucking suicide bomber. We have no idea
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: how to stop a brand new novel coronavirus that's raging
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: across the world.
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: And again, just don't look, you know, it's some of
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: their conservatives, Trumpy people have been saying, oh, this is
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: some like, you know, liberal hoax, media hoax to take
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: down Donald Trump, of course, which means that Italy is
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: in on the hoax as well. And so it's like
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: China and South Korea and all these other places. But
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: look at the difference between what is happening in Italy
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: and what has happened in South Korea. Even if you
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: don't want to take China as an example, because people
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: don't know exactly all the information that's true out of China.
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: South Korea, they ramped up the testing. They took social
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: distancing very, very seriously. They shut things down. In South Korea,
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: the curve has been flattened. And now, you know, I
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: think yesterday the cases came down. And in Italy, in
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: northern Italy, the wealthiest part of that country, great hospitals,
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: wealthy population, they are overrun, and they have had to
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: shut down the entire country, and even still shutting down
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: the country, the deaths are spiking every single day. That
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: is where we are headed if we do not take
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: this seriously.
• 50:49
  Speaker 4: The idea that what we're seeing is a panic is
• 50:52
  Speaker 4: so dangerous and stupid, it's very frustrating. Like, where is
• 50:56
  Speaker 4: the panic? Is it Anthony Fauci? I don't think you're
• 50:58
  Speaker 4: suggesting he's panicking. Is it the airlines who are shutting
• 51:03
  Speaker 4: down service because no one's flying and they're being told
• 51:05
  Speaker 4: that it's not safe to fly internationally? I think they're panicking.
• 51:07
  Speaker 4: I think they're responding to events. Are you saying that
• 51:10
  Speaker 4: the markets are panicking? Is that what it is? The
• 51:12
  Speaker 4: markets are panicking? Okay, well, every stock sold is a
• 51:16
  Speaker 4: stock bought, right? This is what is happening. This is
• 51:18
  Speaker 4: the collective judgment of the entire financial system about what
• 51:23
  Speaker 4: we're about to go through.
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: So.
• 51:26
  Speaker 4: The only thing I can think is we are not
• 51:28
  Speaker 4: panicking enough. When I see those lines of people at
• 51:30
  Speaker 4: the fucking St. Patrick's Day bar, when I see the
• 51:32
  Speaker 4: Post Malone concert, when I see the O'Hare Airport crowds.
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: Oh, we haven't even talked about that.
• 51:37
  Speaker 4: But that the administration wasn't ready for people coming into customs,
• 51:40
  Speaker 4: making this whole crisis worse. I think we haven't panicked enough.
• 51:42
  Speaker 4: And the one thing I just want to say about that, too, is,
• 51:44
  Speaker 4: you know, I do feel like we're seeing so many
• 51:46
  Speaker 4: of our cultural problems sort of explode.
• 51:49
  Speaker 2: Because of this.
• 51:49
  Speaker 4: And obviously one of them is the virus of the
• 51:52
  Speaker 4: mind that has infected people like Devin Nunes about how
• 51:54
  Speaker 4: to talk about politics. but also the divide between news
• 51:59
  Speaker 4: users and people that don't follow the news. People say
• 52:03
  Speaker 4: all the time, Twitter's not real life, Twitter's not real life.
• 52:06
  Speaker 4: This is a situation where we might be looking at
• 52:08
  Speaker 4: a bunch of people who follow the news really closely,
• 52:10
  Speaker 4: engage in it, reacting appropriately, and a bunch of people
• 52:14
  Speaker 4: who don't, tuning it all out. And I think it's
• 52:15
  Speaker 4: incumbent upon all of us- The virus is real life.
• 52:18
  Speaker 4: The virus certainly is in real life and not on Twitter.
• 52:22
  Speaker 4: So the- The thing I would just say is if
• 52:24
  Speaker 4: you like we have to this is a situation where
• 52:26
  Speaker 4: Twitter has to become real life and take your message
• 52:29
  Speaker 4: to the people in your life that don't follow the news.
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: I want to talk about the I want to end
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: by talking about the economic fallout. But Michael just sent
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: us this breaking news. Mike DeWine of Ohio announces that
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: voting will be extended until June 2nd. that no in-person
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: voting will happen tomorrow in Ohio. He said, quote, it
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: is clear that tomorrow's in-person voting does not conform and
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: cannot conform with these CDC guidelines. We cannot conduct this
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: election tomorrow.
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: Mike DeWine, Republican governor of Ohio, is such a great
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: example of a pre-Trump Republican who is acting responsibly and
• 53:01
  Speaker 2: thoughtfully and doing the right thing. And then you have
• 53:03
  Speaker 2: these goobers like the governor of Oklahoma who's tweeting selfies
• 53:07
  Speaker 2: with his kids and Devin Nunes. I mean, Thank you
• 53:10
  Speaker 2: to all these– Tom Cotton just put up a tweet
• 53:13
  Speaker 2: storm where he recommended all kinds of good ideas, including
• 53:16
  Speaker 2: essentially universal basic income for people suffering right now.
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: Tom Cotton usually sucks.
• 53:20
  Speaker 2: He is one of the worst. He's one of the worst.
• 53:22
  Speaker 7: Well, you know why?
• 53:22
  Speaker 4: Because Tom Cotton is a raptor testing the fences. And
• 53:25
  Speaker 4: he is– we should all watch Tom Cotton. We should
• 53:27
  Speaker 4: watch Josh Hawley because these are people who are– who
• 53:30
  Speaker 4: know what Trump is doing and what's working and what won't,
• 53:32
  Speaker 4: and they are watching very, very closely.
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: Mike DeWine falls into the category of sort of the
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: old school country club Republicans, like your Mitt Romney, who
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: we'll talk about soon, and Larry Hogan in Maryland, and
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: Charlie Baker in Massachusetts, those two governors who were also
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: doing the right thing during this. And Tommy, you were
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: over the weekend talking about how annoyed you were that
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: everyone was talking about this through, it's a partisan lens,
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: but it's like, there's a bunch of Republican governors doing
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: the right thing, along with a bunch of Democratic governors.
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: It is Trump, and his fucking cult that is going
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: to get us all killed. It's not necessarily just Democrat
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: versus Republican.
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: Look, he's a fringe extreme example, but Donald Trump went
• 54:09
  Speaker 2: on Alex Jones' show on InfoWars. Right now, Alex Jones
• 54:12
  Speaker 2: is selling random weird supplements that he said will protect
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: you from the coronavirus.
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: It's going to get people killed. All right, let's talk
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: about the economic situation. Even though the Fed announced another
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: round of emergency rate cuts, the Dow is in free
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: fall again, down about 2,000 points when we started recording.
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: And most economists predict we're almost certainly headed for a
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: deep recession if we're not already in one. Though the
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: president's top economic advisor, Larry Kudlow, said this morning, this morning, that, quote,
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: this is a great opportunity to buy stocks and that, quote,
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: the fundamentals of the economy are still strong. Everyone remember
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: that one? Playing the old hits from 2008.
• 54:46
  Speaker 4: There's nothing more alarming than Larry Kudlow saying buy because
• 54:51
  Speaker 4: when Larry Kudlow says buy, a lot.
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: Of people sell.
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: The House passed a coronavirus response bill early Saturday morning
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: after final negotiations between Nancy Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnookin.
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: It includes paid sick leave, free coronavirus testing, food assistance
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: funding and strengthened unemployment benefits. However, the sick leave provisions
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: only cover about 20 percent of American workers because it
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: exempts both large and small businesses from some of the requirements. Guys,
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: does this bill go far enough and why hasn't it
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: passed yet?
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: No, it doesn't go far enough. It hasn't passed yet
• 55:23
  Speaker 2: because Mitch McConnell needed the weekend off, presumably to, I
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: don't know, sleep upside down or like, you know.
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: He was hanging with Brett Kavanaugh at some event.
• 55:32
  Speaker 4: Mitch McConnell only feeds every 28 days.
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: Right. You know, look, I want to give credit to
• 55:38
  Speaker 2: the House Democrats and to Speaker Pelosi in particular for
• 55:43
  Speaker 2: fighting with Secretary Mnuchin as hard as she possibly can
• 55:47
  Speaker 2: to get something done. Katie Porter in our interview later
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: is crystal clear that it's insufficient. I think we need
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: to do much, much, much more. I have to say,
• 55:55
  Speaker 2: over the weekend, Mnookin was the one guy at these
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: press conferences that actually seemed to get how big a
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: deal this was and want to be proactive and bipartisan
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: and work with the other side to get something done.
• 56:07
  Speaker 2: But no, this isn't enough.
• 56:09
  Speaker 4: Yeah, go ahead, Levin. No, it's striking. It does remind
• 56:13
  Speaker 4: me a bit of 2008 in that In the same way,
• 56:17
  Speaker 4: the Democratic primary in 2008 was about change. And then
• 56:21
  Speaker 4: in the final days of the election, it became about
• 56:23
  Speaker 4: who could stably take over and run the country amidst crisis.
• 56:27
  Speaker 4: And I was struck that Joe Biden in the debate
• 56:29
  Speaker 4: went back to the financial crisis, which is actually something
• 56:31
  Speaker 4: that hasn't been central to our conversation yet. And thinking
• 56:34
  Speaker 4: this through, we talk about Ebola, we talk about SARS,
• 56:36
  Speaker 4: we talk about all those other diseases. And then you realize, wait,
• 56:39
  Speaker 4: this is unprecedented. This is a financial crisis now. And
• 56:43
  Speaker 4: it was striking to see Biden go back to that
• 56:45
  Speaker 4: because it does seem as though suddenly a conversation about
• 56:47
  Speaker 4: how to get rid of Trump becomes also a conversation
• 56:50
  Speaker 4: about who's best to lead during an emergency. Yeah.
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: So much of the critique of the response to the
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: financial crisis in 2008 has to do with too many
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: bad actors were bailed out that shouldn't have been. And
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: we could debate that for a long time. But one
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: of the lessons that I have learned from it is
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: there was a fear about proposing an economic stimulus package
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: that was too big Because politically, it wouldn't get through
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: the Congress. And so you had people like Larry Summers
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: and Tim Geithner probably knowing that you needed a bigger
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: response to such an economic shock, but thinking we're not
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: going to be able to get it through because we
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: don't have the votes. And I think learning from that
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: this time around, like you're already seeing, as we just said,
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: Tom Cotton of all people talking about a cash payment.
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: of direct cash payments to Americans. You're seeing Mitt Romney
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: talk about $ 1, 000 cash payment to Americans. Ro Khanna in
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: the House, Democrat Ro Khanna and Tim Ryan co-sponsored a
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: bill last week that would be $ 1, 000 to $ 6, 000 per
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: month to Americans. And I think, you know, for all
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: the good faith negotiations between Pelosi and Mnuchin, Democrats in
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: the House and Democrats in the Senate have to think
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: pretty hard and propose the most ambitious package they can
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: think of and talk about it publicly and fight for it.
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: And if you don't get it, right, if Republicans stand
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: in the way, if Trump stands in the way, then
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: so be it. But go as big as you think
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: we need to. That is the lesson from 2008. And
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: do not be shy about this. Don't start counting the
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: votes in your head now. Propose the biggest thing you
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: can do and then work backwards from there.
• 58:26
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I also do think one of the lessons is
• 58:28
  Speaker 4: that thankfully a bunch of Republicans were pretending to believe
• 58:32
  Speaker 4: in austerity and pretending to believe that stimulus doesn't work
• 58:35
  Speaker 4: because now all of a sudden when there's a Republican president,
• 58:37
  Speaker 4: suddenly they discovered that stimulus works. The other the other
• 58:41
  Speaker 4: pieces of it, too. And I think this is why
• 58:42
  Speaker 4: it's amazing how quickly we go from universal basic income
• 58:46
  Speaker 4: as a quirky idea from a quirky candidate to an embraced,
• 58:50
  Speaker 4: widely held position during a time of crisis. But gang, gang, gang, gang. Seriously,
• 58:55
  Speaker 4: I wonder how quickly Andrew Yang absolutely softened the ground
• 58:59
  Speaker 4: for that is something people were aware of, understood. But
• 59:02
  Speaker 4: one of the lessons, too, of the financial crisis is
• 59:04
  Speaker 4: people felt as though the worst people were being helped
• 59:06
  Speaker 4: and they weren't seeing the benefit. And so I do
• 59:09
  Speaker 4: think that going to a simple, big help to everyone
• 59:13
  Speaker 4: is the right thing.
• 59:14
  Speaker 2: This is also just a cleaner example, right? I mean,
• 59:17
  Speaker 2: a bunch of bankers and people peddling mortgage-backed securities did awful,
• 59:21
  Speaker 2: horrible things that unraveled the economy and hurt all of us.
• 59:25
  Speaker 2: In this instance, no one is to blame for a pandemic.
• 59:28
  Speaker 2: And so- Other than Trump. That helps. Well, look, he's
• 59:31
  Speaker 2: to blame for exacerbating it. But like cynically, I think
• 59:34
  Speaker 2: our best hope, as you sort of said, Lovett, is
• 59:36
  Speaker 2: Republicans not wanting to own a financial disaster with Trump
• 59:40
  Speaker 2: having this much runway between the election. But like what
• 59:43
  Speaker 2: makes me apoplectic when I sit on Twitter all day
• 59:46
  Speaker 2: and read about it is knowing that like Jared has
• 59:49
  Speaker 2: his like little teenage goober Avi Berkowitz and Hope Hicks
• 59:54
  Speaker 2: working on it. It's like that's the level of brains
• 59:56
  Speaker 2: and mind share in the White House. He doesn't have
• 59:58
  Speaker 2: a chief of staff. He wakes up in the morning
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 2: and he tweets about Hillary's Benghazi emails and judicial watch.
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 2: So there is no seriousness of purpose coming out of
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 2: the White House. We really need Congress, and which is
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 2: why I'm heartened by like a Tom Cotton tweet like that,
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 2: to take this on and just push it through. Yeah.
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: And look, you're right that there's not bad actors involved.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: involved in this like last time, but, you know, they're
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: already talking about what the bailout package for the airline
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: will look like. And again, the airlines didn't cause this,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: so it's not their fault, like it was the banker's fault,
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: but a bunch of people are going to see a
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: lot of money end up going to airlines and other
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: big industries that probably has to go to them because
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: they employ a lot of people who are going to
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: be out of work, you know, and that stuff snowballs very,
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: very quickly. It's not just to help the CEOs of
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 1: these companies, it's to help the thousands and millions of
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: workers who are in the restaurant industry, the entertainment industry,
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: the hospitality industry, the airline industry, who could be out
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: of work for quite a bit.
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 4: This is why it's so dangerous to have someone so
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 4: untrustworthy as Donald Trump in this job, because we also
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 4: know that he's taken calls from shale gas billionaires and
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 4: his buddies saying, help me here, help me there. Donald
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 4: Trump owns hotels. We know he's not as rich as
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 4: he says, because we know how much he needs the
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 4: regular income to keep his whole fake operation afloat. So
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 4: You know, we're in this situation with completely unreliable, untruthworthy
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 4: human beings at the helm. And this is, you know,
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 4: three years it took to get here. But man, few
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 4: things have been as well predicted as the switch to
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 4: streaming and Donald Trump failing in a crisis. We all
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 4: knew that eventually we would switch from cable boxes to streaming.
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 4: They predicted it for years and then it happened. We
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 4: all knew that Donald Trump was a fundamental, fundamental risk
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 4: in that he was completely unable to manage a crisis
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 4: like this. And now we're in it.
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: And he's so close to the election.
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 2: So close.
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 4: And we almost made it.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And look, it's just bailing these companies out is
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: so awful in the near term. And it was so
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 2: thoroughly demagogued and it's easy to attack these people. We
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 2: all need to remember that TARP, the Troubled Asset Relief
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: Program and the auto bailout was paid back. And in fact,
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 2: it yielded like billions in profit. So these things are
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 2: so painful in the short term. The headlines are so
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 2: awful when a bunch of assholes on Wall Street paid
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 2: themselves big bonuses. And yes, I would have loved to
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 2: have seen them in jail either. But hopefully we can
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 2: just focus on the big problem and the solution.
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: And the answer is to take care of the people
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: being hurt more than we have before. And if you
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: want to beat up on some companies, which everyone wants
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: to do, you know, this paid sick leave thing, you know,
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: Pelosi tweeted, the paid sick leave is basically the government
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: funding paid sick leave. And it's not a regulation on
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: the companies to do that. But so all these very
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: big companies got off the hook here and police said, well,
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 1: we don't want to have the government, the taxpayer funding,
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: you know, what these companies should be doing on their own.
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: And I do think that there should be pressure on
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: some of the big companies that do not offer paid
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 1: sick leave right now. Not the smaller ones that are
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: struggling in this, but the very big ones. McDonald's, Walmart,
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: those are the two biggest companies in America that don't
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: offer paid sick leave. 800,000 workers combined. There's also Kroger's, Subway,
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: Pizza Hut, Burger King, Taco Bell, Target, Publix. Like these
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: are very, very large companies that do not offer a
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: good paid sick leave thing. And if you're out there,
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 1: you should go, you should pressure them to do so.
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it's also just worth noting too that the seasonal
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 4: flu kills tens of thousands of people. And every day
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 4: people have to go to work when they're sick with
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 4: the flu. And so, you know, as we put pressure
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 4: on these companies, I do think it's all of us
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 4: worth remembering what this moment feels like because a miniature
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 4: version of coronavirus happens for families every single day. Do
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 4: I go to work? Do I keep my kid home?
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 4: How do I stay home when I need the shift?
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 4: All of that happens constantly and we ignore it at
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 4: our peril.
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 2: And to your point, John, like we should be pressuring
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 2: those companies. And let me tell you, no way in
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 2: hell I am going to a business or a restaurant
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 2: that does not offer its employees paid sick leave right now.
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 2: Because that means odds are someone in there has the
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 2: coronavirus and it's just working anyway. And fuck you to
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 2: the CEOs who put them in that position. And we
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: as consumers should punish that CEO. Well said.
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: And now Tommy's going to talk about all this stuff
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: more with another consumer crusader, Representative Katie Porter. That'll be
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: up when we come back.
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 3: Hey guys, I'm Rachel Bonetta.
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 8: And I'm Rechna Frickbaum, and we're the hosts of the
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 8: new Crooked Media podcast called Hall of Shame.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 3: It's a podcast all about the craziest, messiest, most interesting
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 3: moments in sports.
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 8: Rachel here has been in the sports world for years
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 8: and co-hosts Lock It In on Fox Sports, and I'm
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 8: from Cleveland.
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 3: You're also a comedy writer.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 8: Okay.
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 2: Parks and Rec.
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 3: Fresh off the boat.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 8: Let's not do this.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 3: Do you want me to read this whole resume in
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 3: front of me?
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 7: That's it.
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 3: We're going to cover a bunch of sports scandals, from
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 3: the Boston Marathon cheater to the biggest sting operation in
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 3: sports history that you've probably never heard of. So you
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 3: can expect a lot of laughs, maybe some, I don't know,
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 3: maybe some cries.
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 8: At the very least, stories that'll make you seem super
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 8: interesting at a dinner party. New episodes drop every Monday.
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 8: Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Play, wherever you like
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 8: to listen to podcasts.
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 2: I am thrilled to be joined by Congresswoman Katie Porter
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 2: from the 45th Congressional District here in California. As I
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 2: told you the other day, you are way up on
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 2: the Crooked Media Power rankings of members of Congress based
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 2: on some of your recent questioning. So thank you so
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 2: much for joining the show.
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 7: Absolutely. Delighted to be here.
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 2: So can we just start with the basics? Like, People
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 2: are scared to death. That includes podcasters. We all assume
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 2: that you as an elected official probably know more than
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 2: us about how the government is responding or is not responding.
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 2: What's your sense Monday morning about efforts to ramp up
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 2: testing and mitigate the spread of the coronavirus?
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 7: I actually don't feel that I necessarily know that much
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 7: more than the American people, to be perfectly honest. We
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 7: are getting regular briefings. I think there's a big gulf
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 7: here between what we know about the science of this
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 7: disease and then what we know or are doing about
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 7: how to respond to it. So, you know, a shout
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 7: out to Dr. Anthony Fauci, who I think has been
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 7: relentlessly consistent in presenting the existing science. And that science
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 7: has actually been pretty consistent. What has not been consistent
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 7: is how the government's been responding. And I think that
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 7: is where the struggle continues. We have a Democratic caucus
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 7: telephone call here this morning, and so I'm sure there
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 7: will be ongoing discussions about what we need to do.
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 7: And I've gotten probably a dozen phone calls in the
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 7: last 24 hours from colleagues who are seeing things in
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 7: their district and want to be in conversation with me
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 7: about what do I think we should do about what
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 7: they're seeing. So I'm pleased that my colleagues are having
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 7: those conversations today. with their community in a safe way,
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 7: often by phone, keeping their distance, but trying to understand
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 7: what does this really mean in people's real lives.
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So let's take through the government response. I guess
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 2: I'll start with the most recent first, which is on Sunday,
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 2: the Fed announced that they're going to slash interest rates
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 2: to zero. They're going to buy hundreds of billions of
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 2: dollars in bonds. Now, obviously, that's not a health care
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 2: related response. That's a stock market response. But can you
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 2: help explain to listeners in kind of basic terms for
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 2: dumb people like me, like what does that mean? How
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 2: does slashing interest rates and buying bonds help your average
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 2: person on Main Street?
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 7: The idea behind the quantitative easing, which is what we
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 7: call some of that bond buying and slashing the interest rates,
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 7: is to try to make the cost of borrowing cheaper,
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 7: which is an issue, as we're going to be asking people.
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 7: And we're going to see businesses needing to take on
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 7: lines of credit. We're seeing retailers who are drawing downs
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 7: on their lines of credit right now to be able
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 7: to continue to pay workers even if they don't have
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 7: revenue coming in the door. So that's a monetary policy tool.
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 7: It's designed to help stabilize the markets. And even if
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 7: you don't have any investments, you're not in the stock market,
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 7: you're doing your best to just get to the grocery
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 7: store and pay the bills like most of us are,
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 7: this is still a good thing. widespread market panic doesn't
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 7: benefit anybody, even those of us who don't have a
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 7: direct connection to the market. At the same time, I
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 7: would just say, well, I'm fine with what the Fed did,
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 7: and I think it was probably appropriate. It is not
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 7: a substitute or an excuse to misunderstand that the heart
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 7: of our economic defense against a recession is American families,
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 7: it's American workers. And so we do need to be
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 7: putting cash in the pockets today of American workers who
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 7: are going to be, you know, their hours are cut.
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 7: They're being told not to come into work. They're not
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 7: being paid. Businesses are not having revenue. All of those
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 7: things are happening. And so I support immediately delivering cash
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 7: to every American worker. We can do it right now.
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 7: We can use the Treasury Department. and the IRS to
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 7: administer that. And it's incredibly important. I think we can
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 7: have a debate about how much money, whether there should
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 7: be categorical restrictions for workers that we know are still
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 7: getting paid, for instance, state workers or government workers. But
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 7: if there's one lesson from the foreclosure crisis, which I
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 7: was in the thick of, is that that if you
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 7: try to means test programs and you make the paperwork
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 7: complicated and you create 10 million eligibility requirements, you really
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 7: can kill people from paper cuts. I mean, the thousand
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 7: paper cut death economically is a real thing for American families.
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 7: And so I urge my colleagues, one, to prioritize American workers.
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 7: They are the front line in our economic stability. And two,
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 7: to understand that we are all in this economically together,
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 7: just like we're all in this together in terms of
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 7: physical health.
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 2: That's a good way to think about it. So, again,
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 2: working backwards, the House, the democratically controlled House, passed a
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 2: sick leave bill quickly. And I think that is our
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 2: credit for moving quickly. But a lot of people are
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 2: angry or confused why companies with 500 and more employees
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 2: were exempted in that bill. So, I mean, I guess
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 2: the question is, why does a small business have to
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 2: offer 10 days of paid leave, but McDonald's or Amazon
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 2: does not? And are you worried that, you know, exempting
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 2: those companies might limit the impact of social distancing efforts since,
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 2: you know, big companies employ, I think, about half of
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 2: American workers?
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 7: I'm going to do something that's probably rare, even on
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 7: the Pod Save America format, and just directly answer the question.
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 7: We we failed. The reason this happened is because of
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 7: Secretary Mnuchin and the Trump administration. So when you say,
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 7: why did this happen? Let's be clear. The House Democrats
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 7: went in. We wanted to provide 10 days minimum of
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 7: paid sick leave. We talked about 14 days of paid
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 7: sick leave for all workers. And after two or three,
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 7: four very intense days of negotiation, late nights in the Capitol,
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 7: 1 a.m., 2 a.m., hoping we were going to vote.
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 7: This is the deal we got, and it's really an
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 7: example of putting the largest corporations ahead of small and
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 7: medium-sized businesses. There's just no rational explanation for why you
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 7: give the biggest employers, those that have the most flexibility
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 7: to accommodate sick leave and the most ability to afford
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 7: to pay sick leave, to let them off the hook here.
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 7: It's simply, for me, it's another example of money in
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 7: politics It's another example of bailing out the too big
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 7: to fail, those at the top, and leaving behind those
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 7: in the middle and the bottom who get squeezed. So
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 7: I think the next bill the House passes, we need
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 7: to go back to our core principle here, which is
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 7: that paid sick leave for all workers is a necessity.
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 7: I think the sick leave portion of the Families First
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 7: Act is actually the weakest part of the bill. Some
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 7: of the other portions of the bill I actually think
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 7: were extremely well done and really some credit should be
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 7: given to House Democrats and Speaker Pelosi for achieving because
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 7: we're already seeing them make a difference right here in
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 7: our communities.
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, so I don't mean to focus on
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 2: the economic piece of this because I think that the
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 2: health piece is so much more important. But honestly, like
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 2: that's seemingly being left to governors and mayors and state
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 2: based health authorities to deal with. So I'm just not sure.
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 2: what to even ask you. So I guess sticking on
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 2: the questions about the financial impact of.
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 7: Well, Tommy, can I give you an example of where
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 7: this bill, the Families First Act, is going to make
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 7: a difference?
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 2: Yes, please.
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 7: And it's making a difference right now. So while I'm
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 7: disappointed with the sick leave provisions, I think they help,
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 7: but they don't go far enough. We also included in
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 7: the Families First Act $ 1 billion in authorized funding for
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 7: food assistance. And this is for things like senior nutrition,
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 7: Meals on Wheels. It's to expand the school lunch program.
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 7: Right here in Irvine today, we passed that bill in
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 7: the middle of the night on Saturday morning. It was
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 7: like 1 a.m., 1245 in the morning, middle of the
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 7: night between Friday and Saturday. Today, Monday, the school district
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 7: and the 45th congressional district, Irvine Unified, is open right
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 7: as we speak, distributing school lunches on a drive-out basis
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 7: to any child who needs it.
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 2: That's amazing.
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 7: Any child. And so that is possible because the school
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 7: district believes and knows that there's going to be that
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 7: additional funding for the school lunch program. So there is
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 7: real help that's being delivered here. But I think what
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 7: we've found is where the government's willing to foot the
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 7: bill and we have great partners like our local school districts,
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 7: we can make a difference in American lives. When it
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 7: came time to ask the largest corporations in the country
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 7: to step up and take care of their workers and
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 7: be part of this pandemic response, We were met with
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 7: resistance from the Trump administration, and it's incredibly disappointing and frustrating.
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 7: And I hope the American people will push back, both
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 7: on their government representatives, but also in terms of calling
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 7: on American businesses to do what's right here.
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 2: So, I mean, you are like one of the foremost
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 2: authorities on financial issues. You wrote a textbook on consumer laws.
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 2: You were tapped by Attorney General Kamala Harris at the time,
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 2: then Attorney General Kamala Harris. to be the state's independent
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 2: monitor of banks in this big mortgage settlement. What lessons
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 2: did you learn from those response efforts that you think
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 2: we should be thinking about and getting ready to apply
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 2: to the likely fallout from the coronavirus?
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 7: So I think first and foremost, there can be no
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 7: unconditional bailouts of industry here. We need to make sure
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 7: that we're getting workers and families taken care of first.
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 7: Their voices are more diffused. And let's face it, in
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 7: our current political system, at least with a lot of
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 7: my colleagues, The big corporations have more of a say
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 7: and more of a voice than everyday families. So we
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 7: need to put workers and household well-being first. If we
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 7: stabilize the economies of each of our households, then that
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 7: has the strongest possible macroeconomic effect that we could have.
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 7: The second thing is we cannot dither and waste time
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 7: with means testing. We can't be spending time worrying about
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 7: whether this person or that person deserves help Just like
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 7: everybody is at risk of getting sick from this pandemic,
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 7: everybody is going to be hurt by a major, serious,
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 7: prolonged economic downturn. So the goal here is to get
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 7: help out quickly. To go back to the foreclosure crisis
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 7: and remind people, President Obama and his team came up
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 7: with a foreclosure prevention program, making homes affordable. It had
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 7: components called HAMP and HARP. There was really, in my opinion,
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 7: nothing wrong with those programs. The problem came in that
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 7: the qualifications, the paperwork, the limitations, the who got help
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 7: and what they had to do to get help meant
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 7: that nobody, particularly the most vulnerable, didn't get help for
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 7: literally years from when that program was enacted until when
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 7: it began to really be ramped up and be operational
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 7: in an effective way.
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 5: And so there's a.
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 7: Huge lesson here for us about the need to develop
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 7: government programs that we can implement to help families just
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 7: as quickly as the Fed can implement a 0% rate
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 7: cut to help the Wall Street banks and the macroeconomic market.
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 2: That's such an important point. I mean, there are so
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 2: many moments in our history where you can point to
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 2: the cruelty of bureaucracy and how it prevented people from
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 2: literally having their lives saved. So I think that's an
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 2: incredibly important point to keep making. A lot of people
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 2: recently saw this amazing clip of you just relentlessly, doggedly
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 2: questioning the head of the CDC during a congressional hearing.
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 2: You finally got him to commit to making the coronavirus
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 2: test free of charge. First of all, thank you for
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 2: doing that. Second, have they followed up with you about
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 2: implementing that promise? And why does it take a dogged
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 2: member of Congress to get the CDC to agree to
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 2: do something that seems so obvious?
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 7: The government has quite a bit of authority here to respond.
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 7: One of the most fascinating things about that moment for me,
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 7: sort of the backstory of it, is that that statute
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 7: that we were asking him to use, that rule, it's
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 7: been on the books since early 2017. Government actually did
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 7: its job here. Previous administrations and Congress and the folks
• 1:17:28
  Speaker 7: who do this work, they propagated that rule. But then
• 1:17:31
  Speaker 7: when it comes time to respond now, Nobody wants to
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 7: use the existing authority to just get it done. And
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 7: particularly in this case, you know, my colleagues Rosa DeLora
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 7: and Lauren Underwood, we had written a letter a week
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 7: before that hearing, more than a week before that hearing,
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 7: asking the CDC director to use this authority. No response.
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 7: The hearing starts on Wednesday. They have to shut the
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 7: hearing short. I'm at the very, I'm the second to
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 7: last person to question. I'm at the bottom of the
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 7: pecking order in Congress. They cut the hearing short.
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 4: They leave.
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 7: They come back the next day. That night before they
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 7: came back, we contacted the CDC and we said, we
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 7: are going to ask Director Redfield to commit to using
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 7: this existing authority to make sure that testing is free
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 7: regardless of insurance. I have never in all my years
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 7: as a professor given a student the answer in quite
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 7: that way. And he still fumbled it. And so I
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 7: think this is where... leadership really matters, and we're reminding
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 7: government authorities, like the CDC director, the responsibility that they
• 1:18:36
  Speaker 7: have is a heavy one, and they need to be
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 7: using the tools that they have, just as Congress has
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 7: an obligation to be thinking about creating and implementing additional tools.
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 2: Congresswoman, I don't know if you watched the Bernie-Biden debate
• 1:18:51
  Speaker 2: last night. I mean, it was weird for a lot
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 2: of reasons, right? It's weird to have just the two
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 2: of them, no audience, social distancing happening in real time
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 2: on that stage. But it also just felt like we're
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 2: in a new political context, and so I'm still wrapping
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 2: my head around it. But the big divide was sort
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 2: of Biden saying, let's respond narrowly to the crisis at
• 1:19:12
  Speaker 2: hand and get through that and take care of families
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 2: that are impacted by this immediate need, uh, versus I
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 2: think Bernie's message, which is like sort of harkens back
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 2: to Rahm Emanuel saying, never let a crisis go to waste.
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 2: We need to reform the entire system. This is laying
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 2: bare how broken our healthcare system is. It's laying bare, uh,
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 2: the vast amount of economic inequality in this country. That means,
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 2: you know, the average family can't pay a $ 400 bill
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 2: or go bankrupt. Um, So it's really a philosophical change. Like,
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 2: do we need to manage the crisis or do we
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 2: need big structural change, as Elizabeth Warren might say? Do
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 2: you have a view on that debate in terms of
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 2: what we should do now or how to approach this?
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 7: Both. We need both. So there are some things that
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 7: we need to be doing right now in the immediate.
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 7: And hopefully one of the lessons of those things is
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 7: that these are just good ideas. So one of the things,
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 7: just to use a small example, it was not a
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 7: small example, but to take one issue that would actually
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 7: make a big impact and see how this plays out.
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 7: Paid sick leave is a benefit to both workers and employers.
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 7: It actually saves employers money in the long run. We
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 7: should have paid sick leave, period, regardless, going forward. But
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 7: there's an opportunity to use this moment to get people
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 7: to enact it. So one of the things I'm really
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 7: watching is, are we saying you have to give paid
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 7: sick leave for the next month? Are we saying you
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 7: have to give paid sick leave only for coronavirus? And
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 7: so I'm seeing some corporations say, well, we'll do sick
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 7: leave for those who get affected by coronavirus. And I'm thinking, well,
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 7: what if they just have cancer? They need paid sick leave.
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 7: And so I think this is not actually as big
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 7: of a contrast as it might seem. I think it's
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 7: a little bit of a difference in sort of how
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 7: to frame it. But the correct answer here, in my view,
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 7: is that most of these policies are good policies to
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 7: have in place. And paid sick leave, I think, is
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 7: really a critical example of them. But I'll offer you
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 7: another one that may seem a little more abstract, but
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 7: it's one that I'm thinking about a lot, is Congress,
• 1:21:25
  Speaker 7: which is very eager to put burdens and responsibilities on government,
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 7: local government, state government, onto businesses, onto Americans to deal
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 7: with this pandemic, to be flexible, to implement social distancing,
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 7: to plan for continuity of operations, to facilitate telework. But
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 7: Congress itself does not have continuity of operations plans. So
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 7: we don't, and I'll give you the big example here
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 7: is remote voting.
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 7: It is very possible that folks like me will not
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 7: be able to travel back to Washington to take our
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 7: next vote. Our governor here in California, Governor Newsom, just
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 7: called for everybody ages 65 and up to home quarantine
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 7: for the foreseeable future, for an unknown period. Our California
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 7: congressional delegation has 20 or more members who are over 65,
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 7: including Speaker Pelosi, including some really important figures, committee chairs,
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 7: people like that. So Congress needs to make sure that
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 7: we're not accepting ourselves from either the need to ensure
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 7: continuity of essential services, and we're not accepting ourselves from
• 1:22:42
  Speaker 7: basic public health safeguards. Most people, I think, have seen
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 7: one or more pictures of the House floor during voting.
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 7: It is 100% 435 members and 100 plus staffers running
• 1:22:57
  Speaker 7: all over, touching the same voting machines in close proximity.
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 7: We should implement a remote voting procedure. One, because it's
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 7: maybe necessary in this pandemic. But two, because we can't
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 7: foresee when else we might need it. Parallel to paid
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 7: sick leave. It's a good idea today for this. But
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 7: we also think, I think it's a good idea to
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 7: have a remote voting procedure in place. We may or
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 7: may not need to implement it, but we ought to
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 7: be prepared as we're asking businesses and families to prepare.
• 1:23:34
  Speaker 7: We should not accept ourselves from those standards. And frankly,
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 7: there's a long history of Congress accepting itself from things,
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 7: from OSHA regulations, from sexual harassment policies, from all kinds
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 7: of things. Congress members here should be asked to develop
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 7: the flexibility in how we do our work that we're
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 7: asking businesses, schools and local governments to be doing.
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I totally agree. Listen, I mean, I was sitting
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 2: there watching a debate last night and thinking to myself,
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 2: why on earth are we asking these two 70 plus
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 2: year old men, one of whom will lead the Democratic
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 2: ticket to be together, to be not in their homes?
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 2: And I'm sure all kinds of procedures were taken to
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 2: keep them safe. But the other thing I keep obsessing
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 2: about is people are going to go to the polls
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 2: on Tuesday, including lots of seniors. And I just I
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 2: obviously like, look, the darkest regions of people's brains are like,
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 2: what if Trump suspends the election? Right. And you could
• 1:24:25
  Speaker 2: very easy to get conspiratorial. But I think in the
• 1:24:27
  Speaker 2: near term, you have a lot of older voters who
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 2: want to exercise their right to vote this Tuesday, tomorrow.
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 2: And they're wondering, is this safe? And I like I
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 2: don't know what to you think we might do in
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 2: either the near or the long term to address that.
• 1:24:43
  Speaker 7: So I think our mantra here that's coming out of
• 1:24:45
  Speaker 7: this conversation for me is things that are a good
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 7: idea today because of this pandemic and because of coronavirus
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 7: were actually a lot of them were good ideas yesterday
• 1:24:55
  Speaker 7: and are going to be good ideas tomorrow. Paid sick leave,
• 1:24:59
  Speaker 7: the possibility of remote voting, voting by mail. This was
• 1:25:04
  Speaker 7: a drop off ballot boxes that you can drive through.
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 7: This was a good idea yesterday. We have it in California.
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 7: Everybody in Orange County received a vote-by-mail ballot. This is
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 7: something we should be implementing actively now, and then it's
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 7: frankly just a good idea going forward because it's going
• 1:25:22
  Speaker 7: to help people who on any given election day are
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 7: sick or on any given election day are stuck in
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 7: traffic and have trouble making it to the polls. So
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 7: the solution here, it's hard to implement it for this week.
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 7: It's hard to implement it maybe even for next week, but...
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 7: We have lots of states that already do voting by mail,
• 1:25:40
  Speaker 7: including places like Oregon that have been doing it for
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 7: 20 years. So there's a solution here. It's a mail
• 1:25:47
  Speaker 7: ballot process. It's every reason to think that it's actually
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 7: more secure than any other method. And so I think
• 1:25:55
  Speaker 7: this is another example of we have had good ideas
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 7: out there. We haven't acted on them. And now when
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 7: we really need them, we're going to have to scramble
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 7: to make them happen. But The good news is there
• 1:26:06
  Speaker 7: is a there is a solution there, just like paid
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 7: sick leave would help slow down and flatten the curve
• 1:26:11
  Speaker 7: of transmission. Vote by mail would help make sure that
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 7: everyone has the ability to participate in our democracy with
• 1:26:17
  Speaker 7: upcoming elections.
• 1:26:19
  Speaker 2: My final question for you, and those are I agree
• 1:26:22
  Speaker 2: with everything you just said, by the way, is just
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 2: how are you doing personally today? I mean, a lot
• 1:26:27
  Speaker 2: of people, I think, are pretty worried. I mean, I
• 1:26:29
  Speaker 2: had a moment over the weekend where I heard about
• 1:26:31
  Speaker 2: a friend who's younger than me, who is in better
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 2: shape than I will ever be in my life and
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 2: who is really having a hard time fighting off this virus.
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 2: And it shook me to my core and it made
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 2: me worry about my mom, who is in her 70s
• 1:26:45
  Speaker 2: and a smoker. And, you know, it's like it's easy
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 2: to spiral. And I'm wondering how you're dealing with this
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 2: anxiety and if you have advice for people listening about
• 1:26:52
  Speaker 2: how they can, too.
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 7: Yeah, I think one of the most important things, I
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 7: have to face this every day because I have three children.
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 7: I'm a single mom. I came home from D.C. I
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 7: was extremely tired. My mom kept seeing me on TV
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 7: and very helpfully she kept texting me that I looked
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 7: terrible and looked exhausted. And I was like, thanks, Mom.
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 7: It took a little bit of work to browbeat the
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 7: CDC director and stay up all night to fight past
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 7: this bill. But when I got home, I had to
• 1:27:22
  Speaker 7: talk with my children. about this virus. And I think
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 7: kind of saying to them, look, this is not normal times.
• 1:27:30
  Speaker 7: Here's what stays normal. I love you. We're going to
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 7: be together as a family. I'm going to be able
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 7: to take care of you. We have plenty of food.
• 1:27:40
  Speaker 7: Here's what you need to do to help. Here's what's
• 1:27:43
  Speaker 7: going to change. And just trying to walk through and
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 7: divide in people's mind. I mean, I think we actually
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 7: used our family whiteboard to make a list of ways
• 1:27:52
  Speaker 7: that we could change what we usually do to let
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 7: us still continue to do things, but in a slightly
• 1:27:57
  Speaker 7: different way. So one quick example is we usually go
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 7: to the library as a family and check out books
• 1:28:02
  Speaker 7: and movies. We now signed up for the ebook service.
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 7: So where my kids are getting books and downloaded books
• 1:28:08
  Speaker 7: onto their devices. Um, a quick example like that, we
• 1:28:11
  Speaker 7: now are having FaceTime play dates, um, instead of getting
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 7: together with our, with our kids' friends. So, um, I
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 7: think the more people can try to ask themselves, what
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 7: do I need and how can I get it even
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 7: while following all of the good public health guidance that
• 1:28:26
  Speaker 7: we're getting?
• 1:28:26
  Speaker 2: Congresswoman, somehow this conversation actually made me feel a little
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 2: better for the first time in a couple of days.
• 1:28:33
  Speaker 2: So thank you. I am so glad that you are
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 2: in Congress and that people, you know, the administration, if
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 2: they choose to, listen to you, have people with your
• 1:28:41
  Speaker 2: expertise around to help them make better decisions, because I
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 2: feel like we're going to be talking about this for
• 1:28:46
  Speaker 2: a while.
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 7: Absolutely. Wash your hands and stay home.
• 1:28:50
  Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you so much. Have a great day.
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 7: Thank you.
• 1:28:54
  Speaker 3: Bye.
• 1:29:00
  Speaker 1: Thanks to Katie Porter for joining us today. Look, I've
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 1: enjoyed doing this episode for a very long time because
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 1: it's just nice being around more people.
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 4: Yeah, buckle up for some long pods.
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 1: Emily and I are just sitting home and going stir crazy.
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 1: You know, it's nice to talk to some folks.
• 1:29:19
  Speaker 2: I appreciate the respectful distance we're all keeping at the moment.
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there's only six of us here, all separately, all
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 1: spaced out by six feet. How are you guys doing?
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 1: Everyone good?
• 1:29:29
  Speaker 2: I mean, look, I This sucks.
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 2: And I think it's going to get a lot worse,
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 2: not to be a total downer, but I, you know,
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 2: I think in a week we are going to look
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 2: at the steps that are being taken today and think
• 1:29:40
  Speaker 2: it was crazy that they weren't taken earlier. I think
• 1:29:42
  Speaker 2: you're going to see numbers spiking of people who have
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 2: the coronavirus or seeking treatment. I mean, I think everyone
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 2: should just mentally prepare themselves. This is going to get way, way,
• 1:29:51
  Speaker 2: way worse before it gets better.
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:29:54
  Speaker 4: I also just think people, one of the things that
• 1:29:57
  Speaker 4: I'm sort of feeling and realizing is like, oh, right.
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 4: This is unprecedented. This is deeply strange. This is scary.
• 1:30:05
  Speaker 4: No one really knows exactly how it's going to end,
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 4: how it's going to play out, because we are in
• 1:30:11
  Speaker 4: unknown territory and just giving ourselves the space to just
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 4: be okay with that and give everyone at your job,
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 4: at your school, in your life, the space to figure
• 1:30:22
  Speaker 4: it out while following the advice I just think is important.
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 1: I think being patient with people and being kind and
• 1:30:27
  Speaker 1: compassionate and empathetic at this time is important because everyone is,
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 1: everyone is freaked out. And like you said, Tommy, it's
• 1:30:34
  Speaker 1: going to, it's going to get worse before it gets better. And,
• 1:30:36
  Speaker 1: you know, we just got to be able to pull
• 1:30:38
  Speaker 1: through here. It does feel like what, I mean, it
• 1:30:40
  Speaker 1: feels like going through 9-11, it feels like what it
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 1: did in the financial crisis, you know, only this is
• 1:30:45
  Speaker 1: even more uncertain in terms of how long.
• 1:30:48
  Speaker 2: It's going to last.
• 1:30:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:30:49
  Speaker 2: I'm all for, I'm, Big into patience and empathy and
• 1:30:53
  Speaker 2: caring about people with the exception of public officials.
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 7: Oh, yeah, yeah.
• 1:30:57
  Speaker 1: I was talking about it. I was talking about each other.
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 4: Drive them like they're running your Viking ship.
• 1:31:01
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump. That goes for Mayor de Blasio who went
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 2: to the fucking gym today. It's just, you know, come on, everybody.
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 2: Tighten it up.
• 1:31:09
  Speaker 4: In a difficult moment, could Ronan and I fight over
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 4: the PlayStation 4 controller? Sure, we could. But that's not
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 4: what we're going to do right now. Not when all
• 1:31:16
  Speaker 4: this is going on. We're going to alternate an hour
• 1:31:19
  Speaker 4: plus a little buffer time to get to a safe point.
• 1:31:21
  Speaker 1: And, you know, and take care of other people, too.
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 1: If you have extra money, if you can donate, you know,
• 1:31:27
  Speaker 1: food banks need help. A lot of people have had
• 1:31:30
  Speaker 1: a great idea where, you know, if your local restaurant's
• 1:31:32
  Speaker 1: in trouble, buy a gift certificate to your local restaurant
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 1: that you can use later. You know, people who have
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 1: the means, who are able, you know, reach out to
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 1: some people who are really going to be hurting through this, too.
• 1:31:42
  Speaker 1: So that would be great.
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 1: We will continue to be doing these podcasts. as long
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 1: as we can in this thing. So we will hopefully,
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 1: Dan and I will talk to you on Thursday, and
• 1:31:53
  Speaker 1: then we'll be around later.
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 2: Bye, everyone.
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 1: Pod Save America is a product of Crooked Media. The
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 1: executive producer is Michael Martinez. Our assistant producer is Jordan Waller.
• 1:32:04
  Speaker 1: It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin is
• 1:32:07
  Speaker 1: our sound engineer. Thanks to Tanya Sominator, Katie Long, Roman Papadimitriou,
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: Caroline Reston, and Elisa Gutierrez for production support. And to
• 1:32:14
  Speaker 1: our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Nar Melkonian, Yale Freed, and
• 1:32:17
  Speaker 1: Milo Kim, who film and upload these episodes as videos
• 1:32:20
  Speaker 1: every week.